Jubilee Stone

Packmen, pedlars, farmers and labourers used tracks and moorland paths to go about their business, but in the 19th century landowners began blocking ancient rights of way. In the 1870s the Lord of the manor of Over Darwen – and absentee landlord – the Reverend William Arthur Duckworth blocked paths so as to prevent public access to the moor. Game-shooting rights were lucrative and Duckworth did not wish to have his land devalued by its use by the public exercising its rights of way. William Thomas Ashton, manager of Eccles Shorrock's mines at Dogshaw Clough and Entwistle Moss, used the moorland footpaths to deliver coal to farmers and other customers. Whenever Duckworth's gamekeepers…

The council insisted that the main contractors should all be local to Darwen. The subsequent competition for the design of the tower was won by David Ellison, an employee in the borough surveyor's office. His design was later modified by his senior, the borough surveyor, Robert William Smith-Saville. The builder was R. J. Whalley of Darwen. The eastern and western pediments of the tower carry commemorative plaques. The eastern one reads: The western plaque records the names of the mayor and local dignitaries involved in the building of the tower. It names Smith-Saville as architect, and omits mention of Ellison, the original designer. and by another author as "a phallic object … for all the…