Queen Street Mill facts for kids

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Queen Street Mill
Cotton
Queen Street Mill
Location in the Borough of Burnley
Weaving mill
Current status	Closed 12 Mar 1982
Architectural style	Single storey
Location	Harle Syke, Burnley, Lancashire, England
Owner	Queen Street Manufacturing Company
Further ownership	Burnley Borough Council (1982)
Current owners	Lancashire Museums
Coordinates	53°49′N 2°12′W / 53.81°N 2.20°W / 53.81; -2.20
Construction
Built	1894
Completed	1895 (1895)
Floor count	1
Design team
Awards and prizes and listings	A Grade I listed building.No. 1416482(2013-12-25)
Power
Date	1894
Engine maker	William Roberts of Nelson
Engine type	Tandem compound
Valve Gear	Corliss valves operated by Dobson trip gear
rpm	68
Installed horse power (ihp)	500
Transmission type	Direct drive to line shafts
Boiler configuration
Boilers	Twin Lancashire boilers, coal fired
Pressure	140
Equipment
Date	1894
Manufacturer	Pemberton Harling & Todd
No. of looms	990 (now 308)

Queen Street Mill is a historic former weaving mill located in Harle Syke, a suburb near Burnley, Lancashire, England. It is a very important building, recognized as a Grade I listed building. Today, it works as a museum and a cafe. You can visit it for public tours from April to November. The cafe also opens on Wednesdays during winter. You can also arrange private visits.

The mill was built in 1894 for the Queen Street Manufacturing Company. It stopped operating on March 12, 1982. After closing, it was kept in good condition and later taken over by Burnley Borough Council to become a museum. In the 1990s, Lancashire Museums took ownership. It is special because it is the only surviving steam-powered weaving shed in the world that still works! In November 2010, it won an Engineering Heritage Award.

The museum used to offer weaving demonstrations. It closed in September 2016, except for school groups. In April 2018, Lancashire County Council announced that the museum would reopen three days a week. This included Helmshore Mills Textile Museum and the Judges Lodgings in Lancaster.

Where is Queen Street Mill?
The Mill's Story
Featured in Movies and TV
See also

Where is Queen Street Mill?

Queen Street Mill is located in Harle Syke, a suburb of Burnley. Burnley is an industrial town in the North West of the United Kingdom. Harle Syke is about 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) from Burnley town center. It is part of the area called Briercliffe with Extwistle.

The mill is about 35 kilometers (22 miles) north of Manchester and 42 kilometers (26 miles) east of Preston. These cities were also very important during the Industrial Revolution. Harle Syke is on high ground near the River Calder and the M65. This area was built with a grid layout and once had seven cotton mills, or weaving sheds.

The Mill's Story

The Queen Street Mill Manufacturing Company started in 1894. It raised £20,000 by selling £5 shares. The first group of directors included weavers, a builder, a glazer, a foreman, and a headteacher. They built Queen Street Mill between 1894 and 1895. Because money was tight, they only installed one Lancashire boiler at first. The second boiler was bought six years later.

The weaving shed was a single-story building. The front part of the mill had three stories. All the weaving machines, called looms, were bought from Burnley companies: Pemberton & Co. and Harling & Todd Ltd.. These original looms are still there today. The mill first had 900 single-shuttle Lancashire looms. These machines made plain, unfinished cloth. When more looms were needed, the company added 366 more at Primrose Mill, Harle Syke. This mill was right next door and was known as the "bottom shed" by workers.

Finished cloth was taken by horse and cart, and then by train, to other places for bleaching and dyeing. Around 1910, former mill workers who became hauliers bought two steam-powered trucks. These trucks were taken for war work in 1915, so horses were used again for a short time. In April 1913, the mill decided to upgrade its engine. They asked William Roberts & Co of Nelson to make it more efficient. This work was done during the summer holiday, known as Wakes Week.

The company's financial setup made it hard to make changes. The original equipment was not improved or replaced again. However, the mill kept weaving even when many other companies closed. Mains electricity was only added in 1947.

In November 2015, Lancashire County Council announced plans to stop funding the museum. This meant it would close to the public from April 1, 2016. In March 2016, the museum got a six-month delay and stayed open until September 30, 2016. In April 2018, it was announced that the museum would reopen on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from July 7 to October 28, 2018. It also reopened between Easter and the end of October in 2019.

Worker Strikes and Challenges

Weavers were paid based on how much cloth they produced. A good weaver using four looms earned about 24 shillings a week. This was only a little less than a "tackler," who fixed the looms. Workers in Harle Syke were often paid slightly less than the standard rate. The management said this was because of the cost of transporting goods to Burnley.

In August 1915, a strike happened that lasted several weeks because of this unfair pay. Many workers were also shareholders in the mill, meaning they earned a share of the profits. Because of this, they refused to join the strike. The Weavers' Union printed leaflets calling them "Knobsticks" and accusing them of working during the strike. The problem was solved in December 1915. A "War Bonus" was introduced, and weavers were convinced to see this as the pay raise they wanted. In 1918, "Cotton Control" was introduced, which meant workers only worked four days a week.

Fire at the Mill

A serious fire broke out in October 1918. Luckily, the fire did not damage the boilers or the engine. The mill was back to full operation just 10 days later. However, the front of the mill was damaged and had to be rebuilt. It was rebuilt as a single-story building. During the rebuilding, the looms were moved to the "bottom shed." The engine, named Prudence, was not damaged in the fire. It was later renamed Peace to honor the soldiers who died in the First World War.

Queen Street Mill as a Museum

By early 1982, the mill was only using 440 looms and was no longer making enough money. It finally closed on March 12, 1982. The mill was then carefully preserved. In 1983, Burnley Borough Council saved the mill. It reopened in April 1986 as a working textile museum.

Ownership then moved to Lancashire County Council's Museums Service. They did major renovations with help from English Heritage, the National Heritage Memorial Fund, and the European Regional Development Fund. The museum reopened again in 1997. The mill still produces cloth during demonstrations, and its machinery is considered very important to the nation's history.

What You Can See at the Museum

Besides the original machines, Lancashire Museums also show other textile machines they own or are fixing. They even weave special orders.

One order is a blue and white fabric for shirts. This is sold only to a company called 'Old Town' in Holt, Norfolk, which makes old-fashioned work clothes.
Another special order is weaving woollen Jewish prayer shawls.
You can see a large Hattersley Standard Loom and a smaller, foot-pedal operated Hattersley Domestic Loom.
There is also a Sulzer loom and a Saurer telescopic rapier loom. These modern looms work very fast, making 180 picks (rows of thread) per minute.
The museum has a collection of shuttles and machines used to make and fix them.
You can also see machines for making "reeds" and "healds," which are parts of the loom.

Museum Closures and Reopenings

In November 2015, the Labour-controlled Lancashire County Council announced it would stop funding five of its museums. These included Fleetwood Museum, Helmshore Mills Textile Museum, Judges' Lodgings, Museum of Lancashire, and Queen Street Mill. The council leader said this was due to "relentless cuts to central government funding" and increasing demand for services. They were supposed to close at the end of March 2016, but they got a six-month delay until September 2016.

The museum closed on September 30, 2016, along with the other four museums. Only pre-booked school groups could visit. In October 2016, the council's website said that a "potential new operator" was interested. By June 2017, it stated that "Negotiations are underway." In April 2018, it was announced that the museum would reopen on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from July 7 to October 28, 2018, and again between Easter and the end of October in 2019.

Mill Design and Structure

Originally, the mill had a four-story main building and a large single-story weaving shed. After the fire in 1918, it was changed into a single-story building. Some space from the weaving sheds was used for a new preparation area. When it closed in 1982, Burnley Council reorganized it. The weaving shed was divided, with about one-third used for industrial units to rent and another third for visitor facilities.

The 37-meter (121-foot) tall chimney and the 60-meter (197-foot) by 25-meter (82-foot) water lodge were located to the south. The boiler house, engine house, and chimney were already protected as historic sites. In 2013, the entire mill site was given Grade I listed status. This means the whole building is protected.

The weaving shed was originally about 170 meters (558 feet) by 160 meters (525 feet). It had special north-facing roof windows that let in natural light. This shed held 990 looms. On the Queen Street side were the boiler room, engine house, and a four-story warehouse.

The ground floor was for the "weft" department (crosswise threads).
The first floor had offices, the cloth warehouse, and temporary storage.
The second floor was for winding and beaming (preparing threads for weaving).
The third floor was for the "preparation department," where threads were sized.

After the fire, the ground floor of the front building was rebuilt and used for winding and preparation. 100 looms were removed, and part of the shed became the new warehouse. However, a worker named Rowland Kippax later said there were 1040 looms, with nine "tacklers" (loom fixers) looking after 130 looms each.

The weaving shed at Queen Street Mill

How the Mill Was Powered

Steam for the mill is made by two Lancashire boilers built by Tinker, Shenton & Co in Hyde. The first boiler was installed in 1895, and the second in 1901. A device called a Greens Economiser was added then to make it more efficient. Water for the boilers is now supplied by a pump installed in 1956.

Both boilers were originally fed coal by hand. Later, in 1962, secondhand Proctor automatic stokers were added. Boiler No.1 got a "Shovel type" stoker, and Boiler No.2 got a "coking type." Today, only the 1901 boiler, which is still stoked by hand, is used. Coal used to come from a local mine called Bank Hall Pit. Now, because of stricter pollution rules, coal has to be imported. At its busiest, the mill burned 6 tonnes of coal a day. Now, it uses only 10 tonnes a month.

The steam, heated to 100 pounds per square inch (psi), powers the original large steam engine. This engine is a "tandem compound horizontal stationary steam engine." It has two cylinders: a high-pressure (HP) cylinder that is 16 inches (41 cm) wide, and a low-pressure (LP) cylinder that is 32 inches (81 cm) wide. It uses special "Corliss valves." The engine turns a 14-foot (4.3-meter) flywheel at 68 rotations per minute. This 500-horsepower (373 kW) engine was built and installed by William Roberts of Nelson in 1895. It has never been moved and still works perfectly. Power from the engine's crankshaft is sent to the looms through a series of directly driven "line shafts." Currently, the mill uses coal bought from the United States and Russia.

Lancashire Boiler
Lancashire Boiler with feeders
Peace, a tandem compound engine
Looking towards the flywheel.

Weaving Equipment and Process

The mill is famous for how complete it is. When yarn (thread) arrives at a weaving mill, it comes on different sized "cops" and "cheeses." These threads had to be wound onto smaller bobbins called "pirns" to fit into the shuttles used by the looms. All this equipment is still at the mill and is used. For the "weft" (the crosswise threads), there are two sets of "pirn winders" operated by one person.

The "warp" (the lengthwise threads) needs to be prepared. Threads from 300 bobbins are wound onto a large roller called a "beam." Four or five of these beams are then combined to make a final "beam" with 2000 threads. This final beam is placed in the Cylinder Tape Sizing Machine (made in 1919 by Howard & Bullough Ltd. of Accrington). The threads pass through a special liquid called "size" to make them stiffer and reduce friction. The "size" at this mill is a unique mix of flour, soft soap, and tallow. The threads are then dried over steam-heated cylinders and wound onto the final "weavers beam."

The "weavers beam" is then placed on the "Drawing-in frame." Here, each thread is carefully passed through "healds" (frames that lift threads) and then through a "reed" (a comb-like part). This job was done by a "reacher-in" (usually a young boy) and a "loomer." The reacher-in would pass each thread in order to the loomer. The mill still has two Drawing-in frames.

Another way to prepare the loom was to use a Barber-Colman knotter. If the loom had already woven that type of cloth, a short length of warp thread could be left on the healds and reed. The knotter could then tie the new warp threads to the old ones. This process took only 20 minutes, much faster than starting from scratch. Spare healds and reeds are stored high up for this purpose.

Once prepared, the "weavers beam" is taken to the weaving shed. One weaver would operate 6 or 8 Lancashire Looms. A "tackler" would keep these looms working. Today, there are 308 looms from 1894, built by Pemberton or Harling & Todd of Burnley. These looms would have needed 65–80 weavers and 3 tacklers. At its busiest, the mill had 990 looms, all powered by overhead line shafts.

Pirning machine
Bobbins for the Beaming frame
Cylinder Sizer machine
Drawing-in frame

Featured in Movies and TV

The weaving shed at Queen Street Mill has been used as a filming location for several movies and TV shows:

It appeared in a scene in the 2010 film The King's Speech.
The museum was used to represent the Milton steam mill in the BBC series North & South.
It was also featured in Life on Mars.
Most recently, it appeared in the 2015 BBC adaptation of An Inspector Calls.

Queen Street Mill has also been shown in various documentaries, including Channel 4's 2014 series Hidden Villages, presented by Penelope Keith.