A larger than life-size bronze statue of Dobson, who is dressed in his mayoral robes and chain. In his raised right hand is a monocle, in his left hand are papers. The statue stands on a grey granite pedestal. Sir Benjamin Alfred Dobson was a textile machinery manufacturer, born at Douglas on the Isle of Man, the son of a Belfast engineer. He then joined the Belfast and Northern Counties Railway as an engineer before moving in 1871 to Bolton, where he joined the family firm, Dobson and Barlow. He and T. H. Rushton were responsible for considerably expanding the firm, which by 1898 employed a workforce of over 5,000. In 1874 he was returned as a Conservative councillor. He took an active part in municipal affairs and was soon regarded as the leader of Bolton’s Conservatives.