A CENTURY-old beer bottle found on wasteland in Keighley has been reunited with legendary brewery Timothy Taylor.

Metal detectorist Paul Reynard found the empty bottle near an old Victorian building and saw it bore the name T Taylor & Co.

The Keighley man’s research showed that the bottle must date from the period between 1860 and 1920.

He bumped into Tim Dewey, current chief executive of the company, when they were both at C&L Herd butchers in Queens Road near the brewery.

Mr Reynard said: “I showed Tim a picture of the bottle that I had found. Tim asked me to email him the pictures and not long after we met down at the brewery at Knowle Spring.

“Tim kindly gave my dad a Timothy Taylor’s jacket in exchange for the bottle and I was happy knowing that the company now have a piece of history to show to their visitors and clients.”

Mr Reynard said the history of T Taylor & Co before the company changed its name to Timothy Taylor & Co Ltd in 1929 was limited, but the records did show the original name.

He added: “T Taylor & Co was the original name of the brewery founded by Timothy Taylor in 1858, based initially in Cooke Lane, Keighley.

“At that point Timothy had two business partners, James Shackleton and John Naylor. This partnership was dissolved in 1863 and, at about the same time, a parcel of land from the Knowle Spring Estate came up for sale.

“Timothy moved to what would become known as the Knowle Spring Brewery in 1863 where the company remains to this day. It is still 100% family owned.”

Paul was last year involved in the finding of £100,000 of gold coins dating back to the 1500s in a field in Northern Ireland.

He and fellow metal detectorist Michael Gwynne had been asked by a farmer to look for the wedding ring he had lost working.