A Hundred Years Ago.

Those two thriving north-country cities—Manchester and Leeds—famed respectively for cottons and woollens, are celebrating this year the one hundredth anniversary of the passing through Parliament of the Bill authorising the construction of that historic transportation link, the Manchester and Leeds Railway. The movement for the building of the Manchester and Leeds line began in 1825, but it was not until some five years later that a working company was formed, and George Stephenson and James Walker employed to conduct a survey. Short-sightedly, it would seem, the proposals of the promoters were thrown out by Parliament. In 1836, better luck attended the promoters, for all objections were then swept aside, and the Parliamentary Bill received Royal Assent on July 4 of that year.

Building of the Manchester and Leeds Railway commenced in 1837, with Stephenson in charge of the engineering works. The section of track between St. George's Fields, Manchester, and Littleborough was the first to be opened out—on July 4, 1839. The section between Hebden Bridge and Normanton followed, connection being given at the latter point with the old North Midland Railway. Through working between Manchester and Leeds began on December 31, 1840, the entire cost of the programme having run to something like #250,000. In 1847, the Manchester and Leeds Railway was swallowed up by the Lancashire and Yorkshire system, the latter railway itself disappearing as a separate concern in 1923 on the formation of the London, Midland and Scottish group.