Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Todmorden

TODMORDEN, a market-town of England, partly in Lancashire but chiefly in the West Riding of Yorkshire, stands on the Calder, on the Rochdale Canal, and on the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway, 13 miles west of Halifax, 9 north of Rochdale, and 2071/4 north-north-west of London. It lies in three valleys amidst scenery originally romantic, and still in part retaining that characteristic. The townhall (1875) bridges the counties boundary, the Calder, enabling the magistrates to exercise jurisdiction in both counties. Of the other buildings, the Unitarian church, the market-hall, the free endowed school, and the Unitarian free school may be mentioned. A bronze statue has been erected to John Fielden, to whose energy in developing the cotton manufacture the town owes much of its prosperity. The staple industry is the spinning and weaving of cotton, and there are also foundries and machine-works. The population of the township of Todmorden and Walsden (area 7007 acres) in 1871 was 9333, and in 1881 it was 9237. In addition to this (situated wholly in Yorkshire), the urban sanitary district includes parts of Langfield and Stansfield in Yorkshire, and of Cliviger in Lancashire, the total area being 15,690 acres, with a population in 1871 of 21,764, and in 1881 of 23,862.

As early as the reign of Edward III. Todmorden was in the possession of the Radcliffes, a branch of the Radcliffes of Radcliffe Tower, but it was sold by them about the close of the 17th century. Todmorden Hall is an interesting old building of various dates.