Nelson, United Kingdom

A small mill had been established by the Ecroyd family at Edge End as early as 1740, and they started Lomeshaye Mill as a water-powered spinning mill in 1780. The coming of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal in 1796, followed by the East Lancashire Railway Line in 1849, spurred its development as an industrial town, with an economy based mainly upon cotton weaving. The first Ordnance Survey map of the area, published in 1848, shows three small villages: Marsden (around St Paul's), and Hebson and Bradley, both on Walverden Water in the modern-day centre of town. Also apparent are the estates of Marsden Hall to the east and Carr Hall across Pendle Water to the north-west, as well as the turnpike roads of the Marsden, Gisburn and Long Preston trust (Scotland Road) heading north, and the Blackburn, Addingham and Cocking End trust (Manchester Road) heading east.

Brierfield railway station was originally called Marsden, and Nelson railway station was known as the Nelson Inn station, Great Marsden, after the adjacent public house, the Lord Nelson Inn (named after Admiral Lord Nelson). As the villages developed into a town, the name Nelson was chosen to differentiate it from Marsden across the Pennines in the neighbouring West Riding of Yorkshire.

There was a worsted mill at Lomeshaye close to a "cotton factory" and another cotton mill along the canal at Reedyford by 1848. Walverden Mill in Leeds Road was built in 1850, and it was soon followed by others. From 1862, Phoenix Foundry, the steam engine factory of William Roberts, stood at the site of the shopping centre's car park, and has been called "Nelson's most significant engineering site". By 1891, there were 57 cotton spinners and manufacturers listed in Nelson. The largest had 1,950 looms and the smallest only 8.

The cotton industry was the most important in the town, and by 1910, more than 12,000 local workers were members of the Nelson and District Power-Loom Weavers' Association.

Nelson is considered part of the Burnley Coalfield. There is evidence of old bell pits and surface mining at Swinden Clough and Castercliff, and as early as 1465 there was a complaint of people unlawfully digging coal in the area. Clough Head Colliery, also known as Town House Pit, was on Clough Head Beck on the eastern edge of the town and it had a troubled history. While under construction in 1845, an accident during assembly of the steam pumping engine resulted in the death of one worker. On 12 April 1850, six men were working in the pit when one man went to check for gas with a safety lamp, but before he had signalled it was safe, another man opened his lamp causing an explosion that killed them all. Another explosion in November 1856 resulted in two fatalities. A surface tramroad connected it to railway sidings at Bradley Lane Head. It is uncertain when the colliery closed, but it was possibly in the late 1880s.

The town became associated in the 20th century with the production of confectionery, including Jelly Babies and Victory V, and it was where the package holiday company Airtours (formerly Pendle Travel and now part of Thomas Cook) began life as an independent travel agent. The textile industry, in particular, has now sharply declined, leaving the town with low property prices and higher than average unemployment.