The history of the Co-operative Movement in Leigh, during the fifty years of its existence, is so closely connected with the history and condition of the town itself and its inhabitants, or at any rate so far as regards the condition of the working classes, that it seemed desirable, by way of introduction, to give a brief account of the same for a number of years prior to the introduction of co-operation.<br><br>Leigh is greatly in need of a historian. There is no connected record of local events prior to the publication of the local papers, the first of which was published in 1848 under the title of The Leigh Advertiser, and was continued as a four-page monthly for one year only; being edited by Mr. Thomas Halliwell. After this there is an interval of three years, when in January, 1852, the Leigh Chronicle commences, also as a monthly, and continues until July, 1855, when it commences as a weekly, and has continued as such to the present day. The Leigh Times commenced in 1871 and the Leigh Journal in 1873, the two being amalgamated as the present-day Leigh Journal and Times in 1875.