DOES anyone remember The Charles Baxter Singers and The Dalians hitting the high notes in Rossendale back in the 50s and 60s?

They were formed and headed by Charles Baxter, whose singing won him many leading roles with Bacup Amateur Operatic Society.

And they were often heard by a larger audience than Lancashire as the singers made regular radio broadcasts.

The Charles Baxter Singers, in particular, won fame in the BBC series 'What Makes a Star?'

The Dalians were a quartet comprising Charles and three Rossendale colleagues, Harold Roper, Ronnie Spencer, and Derek Seal, who were accompanied by Harry Hollowood.

When Charles moved away from the area the singers disbanded, but in the mid sixties he returned to his roots in the Valley and announced he was back in business, to the delight of music circles.

One of his first moves back in Rawtenstall was to get in touch with his fellow Dalians and reform the group, as well as search for a dozen vocalists to recreate the Charles Baxter Singers.

Rehearsals were soon in full swing as our photograph from 1964 shows and the only change was that instead of being a commercial proposition, they operated as a charitable organisation.

COLNE Piece Hall – it later came to be known as the Cloth Hall – was built in 1775 and was the centre for the sale of worsted and woollen materials in the town.

As the woollen trade declined, to be replaced by the cotton industry, and damaged by competition from nearby Halifax, the Cloth Hall, in Walton Street, became redundant as a textile centre.

It survived, however, as a civic building, occupied by the Congregational Church between 1807 and 1811, used as a barracks in the 1840s, and the place where the Colne Building Society was founded in 1866.

Balls, circuses, concerts, theatre productions and bazaars were also held there — sometimes it is also referred to as the assembly hall.

More significantly, parts of the hall were leased out to businesses, including that of Caleb Duckworth, a fruit preserver who was apprenticed to William Pickles Hartley, who also had offices there, until he left for Aintree.

Duckworth went into partnership with a Mr Tempest and established his own fruit preserving and wholesale business Caleb Duckworth Ltd.

Caleb Duckworth's offices in the Cloth Hall were used as the venue for the AGMs of the Colne Piece Hall Proprietors' Directors and Shareholders.

The Colne Piece Hall Proprietors sold shares in the Cloth Hall which took the form of stands within the building.

The Cloth Hall was demolished in 1952.