3-070-975 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Townhall of Rochdale, Lancashire, 1881. 'The recent celebration of Mr. Bright's seventieth birthday at Rochdale, the town where he was born, has given some additional interest to our Illustration of the Townhall, in which the right hon. gentleman received an address of congratulation from his fellow-townsmen. This building, indeed, which is a handsome Gothic edifice, having a front 220 ft. in length, with a tower 150 ft. high, was opened ten years ago by the Mayor of that year, 1871, the late Mr. G. Leach Ashworth. The architect of the Townhall was Mr. W. H. Crossland, of Leeds. Rochdale, not only by its manufacturing industry, and by its historical association with the political and free-trade movements of the past forty years, and with that of the co-operative associations for the benefit of the working-classes, is a place of considerable interest'. From "Illustrated London News", 1881.