Model Villages

Prior to the Industrial Revolution, Great Britain had not changed significantly for hundreds of years.  The vast majority of people lived and worked as they had done since the 1300s, in small farming communities consisting of tiny villages and hamlets.  Scattered market towns would, largely, have been the only examples of an ‘urban environment’.  Life in these communities was labour intensive; work was done by hand and aided only by horse-power and the basic tools of the time.  Many essential products, such as textiles and pottery, took time and man-power to produce.  Cottage industries and the ‘putting out’ system were the way these products were made, produced at home and then sold at market.

 

 

Then, in the early 1700s everything changes.

 

A spurt of scientific and industrial innovation takes place. Thomas Newcomen invents the first steam engine, later replaced by the far more efficient and therefore useful Boulton and Watt Steam Engine in the late 1700s. Major advances take place in the world of automated textile manufacture, firstly with John Kay's fly-shuttle, then, in the latter half of the 1700s, James Hargreaves' Spinning Jenny. In addition, farming is increasingly industrialised with the invention of the mechanical seed sower and later the threshing machine.

 

The fundamental reason for Great Britain’s unparalleled success in scientific and industrial innovation is the attitude of the government of the day.  Advancement in science and related fields is encouraged, any individual, from any walk of life, can research and experiment in order to improve technology which can then be used for all manner of practical applications.  This is not the case in many other countries.  In France, for example; only members of the Academy of Sciences are permitted to be involved in such work.  The reason for Britain’s unique stance is based in economics.  Economists across Europe believe that the wealth of a given country is finite and the only way to increase that country’s fortune is to invade another land.  Britain alone has a different stance; British economists are of the opinion that through innovation, i.e. using its attributes to greater effect, a country can increase its fiscal worth.  As a result, industry flourishes and a new world emerges.

 

The technological innovations of the mid 1700s are spurred on by the need to process a material which Britain has access to in abundance, cotton.  The sprawling British Empire encompasses cotton-rich India and from 1757, the majority of trade with India is controlled by the East India Company which is, essentially, a branch of British Government.  Furthermore, the British navy and shipping industry is superior to that of any other nation, giving Britain the exclusive means to transport cotton from India.  The three pronged method of Britain’s development of the cotton industry, ownership of the source, the means to transport and the technology to process the raw material, ensure that a prosperous and highly profitable industry is created.

 

The combination of a reduced need for farming labour and a huge requirement for workers in the new textile and pottery industries, creates a social shift.  For the first time in British history the population is consolidated on a huge scale.  People flock to the burgeoning industrial towns and cities where work in a palace of industry is guaranteed.

 

Overnight, factories are thrown up and alongside them workers move in to existing houses or cheap ‘jerry built’ back to back terraces.  The population of these new British industrial cities live in slums, filled to breaking point with overcrowded and poorly built homes.  Streets and rivers become filthy and putrid, awash with waste and human excrement resulting from the absence of a sewerage system or refuse collection.  Long hours in the factories and poor living conditions drive the population to public houses where excessive drinking and prostitution are rife.  In addition to the squalor, the population must endure constant smog produced by the factories which belch out thick smoke and steam 24 hours a day.

 

According to Richard B. Schwartz's Daily Life in Johnson's London: "The city had become honeycombed with what were intended to be temporary dwellings but which grew to be permanent ones. The scarce available land was continually subdivided. Courts were built upon. Business establishments were cut up into tenements. Hovels and shacks were commonplace. Many of the poor crowded into deserted houses. A sizeable number of the city's inhabitants both lived and worked below ground level."

 

The conduct of industrialists is generally irresponsible and the success of the mills they run is at the expense of the workforce.  A change is needed.  Change comes in the form of Richard Arkwright who is, today, considered to be the father of the modern industrial factory system and whose inventions become a catalyst for progress during the Industrial Revolution.  He is born in Preston in 1732, the son of a tailor.  Arkwright’s family do not have the means to send him to school, instead his cousin Ellen teaches him to read and write.  He begins working as an apprentice barber and it is only after the death of his first wife that he pursues a career as an entrepreneur. His second marriage to the wealthy Margaret Biggins in 1761 enables him to expand his barber's business. He acquires and develops an innovative method for dyeing hair and travels the country purchasing human hair for use in the manufacture of wigs which brings him in to contact with weavers and spinners.  Inspired by the mechanical inventions in the field of textiles, Arkwright decides to concentrate on this emerging industry to make his fortune.

 

Although he creates nothing new, Arkwright’s improvements to existing technologies are revolutionary, he develops innovative modifications to the carding engine which turns raw cotton buds in to workable cotton.  Arkwright, with the help of a clockmaker John Kay, also makes improvements to the spinning jenny which had been invented by James Hargreaves in 1764.  Arkwright creates a device that produces a stronger yarn and requires less physical labour, he names his machine the water frame.

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Arkwright is a key contributor to the development of mills in both England and Scotland, after which he establishes a mill of his own in Nottingham.  The venture is short-lived as Arkwright moves his attention to a new venture, a water powered mill at Cromford in Derbyshire.

 

Cromford is opened in 1772, and it is this building that can claim to be the first modern factory in the world.  Arkwright pioneers two processes which are key to the present factory system, primarily, his use of the ‘flow’ system of production which is a faster and cheaper process than the slower ‘batch’ production, which is reliant on skilled workers.  The flow system depends upon the ‘division of labour’, this is the separation of a process into a number of tasks, with each task performed by a separate unskilled worker. Breaking down work into simple repetitive tasks eliminates time wasting and unnecessary work.  These reforms in the production process are revolutionary and totally reliant on Arkwright’s innovation of a mill in which the whole process of yarn manufacture is carried out using his water frame.  These radical changes have the effect of greatly improving efficiency and increasing profits.  Arkwright is also the first to use the Boulton and Watt steam engine to power textile machinery, though he only uses it to pump water to the millrace of a waterwheel. From the combined use of the steam engine and the machinery, the power loom is eventually developed.

 

The 200 workers required to run the mill cannot be sourced locally, Arkwright must, therefore, obtain workers from further afield.  As a result, North Street is built in 1771 to house his mill workers; it is one of the earliest examples of planned industrial housing in the world.  Arkwright specifically advertises for large families and the thirty houses on North Street accommodate much of his initial workforce.  As well as being the first notable instance of town planning, North Street represents one of the earliest examples of the terraced housing that becomes characteristic of industrial towns. Unlike later versions, North Street is built to a high standard, with attention to details such as sash windows and classical door frames which sets it well above the poorer quality housing of the day. The upper floors have long windows to allow more light in, a sign that the occupants would supplement their income by spinning or knitting.  At No 10 North Street, filled-in blocks in the floor of the attic room suggest that frame knitting would be carried out here, since the vigour of the operation requires such a machine to be stabilised by fixing it to the floor.

 

Labourers are worked just as hard as their city dwelling counterparts but enjoy housing fit for habitation, clean air and a vastly improved way of life.  The mill is a huge success, eventually employing over 1000 people and expanding dramatically.

 

From 1775, a series of court cases challenges Arkwright's patents as copies of others work.  His patents are revoked in 1785.  Despite his controversial business practices, Arkwright is knighted in 1786, furthermore, Arkwright’s mill design, alongside his revolutionary worker housing, is replicated under license across Britain and worldwide, examples still exist in Germany and the USA.  By the time of his death on 3 August 1792, he is one of the wealthiest men in Britain.

 

The growing demand for coal, to power the emerging industries of the mid 1700s, reveals serious problems with Britain’s transport system. Many mine owners and industrial speculators begin financing new networks of canals in order to link their mines and factories more effectively with the growing centres of population and industry.  Josiah Wedgewood is an early backer of the canal system and provides funding for James Brindley's Trent and Mersey Canal.

 

In 1761 the Duke of Bridgewater opens a canal between his colliery at Worsley and the rapidly growing town of Manchester, this proves to be a highly beneficial transport link. Other canal building schemes are quickly authorised by Acts of Parliament, in order to link up an expanding network of rivers and waterways. By 1815, over 2,000 miles of canals are in use in Britain.

 

Roads are also widely used to transport materials and goods, however, the poor state of the roads makes their use a difficult prospect. This leads to 'Turnpike Acts’ that allow for new roads to be constructed, paid for out of tolls placed on passing traffic. In addition, new techniques in road construction are developed by pioneering engineers such as John McAdam and Thomas Telford. By the 1830s a stagecoach journey from London to Edinburgh takes just two days, compared to nearly two weeks only half a century before.

 

As the infrastructure and transport links of the country improve, opportunities for prospective industrialists increase.  Great Britain is a land of possibility with every corner of the nation accessible as never before.  Not only are new trade routes created but locally sourced materials and expertise can be exploited.

 

Inspired by Arkwrights achievements at Cromford and the larger Masson Mill which he later builds nearby, David Dale establishes a Mill at New Lanark in Scotland.  The mill is established in  partnership with Arkwright, however, the union is short lived and the two men go their separate ways.  New Lanark is; however, predominantly associated with another individual, the social reformer, Robert Owen.

 

Robert Owen, the son of a saddler and ironmonger from Newtown in Wales, is born on 14th May, 1771.  At the age of ten his father sends him to work in a large drapers in Stamford,Lincolnshire.

 

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After spending three years in Stamford, Robert moves to a drapers in London until 1787, now aged sixteen Robert finds work at a large wholesale and retail drapery business in Manchester.

 

While working in Manchester Owen hears about the success Richard Arkwright is having with his textile factory in Cromford. Owen, quick to see the potential of this way of manufacturing cloth and although only nineteen years old, borrows £100 and sets up a business as a manufacturer of spinning mules.

 

In 1792 Owen becomes a manager at Peter Drinkwater's large spinning factory in Manchester, it is during this period that Owen meets David Dale, the owner of Chorton Twist Company in New Lanark, Scotland, now the largest cotton-spinning business in Britain.  Dale and Owen become close friends and in 1799 Owen marries Dale's daughter, Caroline.

 

Owen purchases New Lanark for £60,000 and under Owen's control; the Chorton Twist Company expands rapidly.  Owen is not only concerned with making money; he is also interested in creating a new type of community at New Lanark. Owen argues that people are naturally good but they are corrupted by harsh treatment.  When Owen arrives at New Lanark theft, alcoholism, and other vices are common, education and sanitation are neglected, most families live in one room and children as young as five work thirteen hours a day in the textile mills. He ceases to employ children under ten and, for the remaining minors, labour is reduced to ten hours a day. Owen introduces nursery and infant schools, which young children are required to attend, this example of infant schooling is considered to be the first in the world.  Older children work but also attend his secondary school for part of the day.

 

It is common for many workers at New Lanark to live in one room know as a ‘single end’  Two separate families would live in two single ends within the same modest building. This could mean that as many as 20 people lived in a relatively small space.  Under Owen’s stewardship, however, the humble homes are well-kept, clean and affordable.

 

Many industrialists of the time employ the truck system; this involves workers being paid in tokens which can only be redeemed at a shop run by the company.  The prices of goods in the truck shop are often highly inflated and the produce is of poor quality.  In 1813, Robert Owen establishes a village shop in New Lanark to provide groceries and household goods at fair prices. Profits from the shop are used to help fund the education system.  The village shop is considered to be the origin of the Co-Operative movement, a business from which members receive a dividend.  Inspired by Owen, others begin their own co-operatives throughout the 1800s.

Robert Owen tours the country making speeches about his experiments at New Lanark. Disappointed with the response he receives in Britain, Owen decides, in 1825, to establish a new community in America based on his socialist ideas, he names the town New Harmony.

 

By 1827 Owen loses interest in his New Lanark textile mills and decides to sell the business.  He continues to work for his "new moral order" until his death on 17th November, 1858.

 

The rudimentary education system established by Owen, at a time when schooling is not considered important, is revolutionary.  In time more industrialists follow Owens example setting up schools of their own.

 

As a result of Owens campaign for better working conditions for children, the 1833 Factory Act is passed.  The act sets the minimum working age at 9 years old and reduces working hours for children.  In addition, for the very first time, education provision is made a legal requirement for all employers.

 

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The American War of Independence (1775-1783) creates a demand on the textile industry to provide uniforms for the thousands of troops engaged in hostilities.  However, the most profound effect on British industry, resulting from the conflict, is a surge of investment.  Investors who had, prior to the British defeat by the newly formed United States, sought to back business interests in the Americas, redirect funds to British based industry.

 

In light of refined production techniques and an influx of capital investment, cities continue to grow, factories multiply and density increases.

 

In addition, a far faster and more efficient method of transport has emerged, connecting the country like never before, the railway.

 

Many attempts are made in the early 1800s to create an efficient steam locomotive, most notably is Mathew Murray's Salamanca and Christopher Blackett's Puffing Billy. However it is George and Robert Stephenson's Locomotion and later Rocket which influence the uptake of the railway. George Stephenson not only invents the vehicle but also the infrastructure, i.e. the railway itself. During the 1820s Stephenson works on 3 pioneering lines: The Stockton and Darlington Railway, The Bolton and Leigh Railway and The Liverpool and Manchester Railway.

 

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Between 1830 and 1860 over 10,000 miles of railways are built.  Materials, goods and people can be transported nationwide at lightning speed.

 

However, improved transport links resulting in increased trade and productivity, also have a negative effect.  The already overpopulated cites, crammed with factories working 24 hours a day are under even more pressure to meet the demands of the newly connected nation.

 

One of the most highly populated and polluted industrial cities is Bradford in Yorkshire.  Upon visiting the city in 1844 Frederick Engles writes:

 

The manner in which the great multitude of the poor is treated by society to-day is revolting.  They are drawn into the large cities where they breathe a poorer atmosphere than in the country; they are relegated to districts which, by reason of the method of construction, are worse ventilated than any others; they are deprived of all means of cleanliness, of water itself, since pipes are laid only when paid for, and the rivers so polluted that they are useless for such purposes; they are obliged to throw all offal and garbage, all dirty water, often all disgusting drainage and excrement into the streets, being without other means of disposing of them; they are thus compelled to infect the region of their own dwellings.

 

Indeed, it is reported that the rivers in and around Bradford are polluted to such a degree that a lit match could ignite the noxious gasses rising from them.

 

By the 1800s the factory system pioneered by Richard Arkwright is firmly established in Bradford.  One man benefitting greatly from the system is Titus Salt.

 

Titus Salt is born in 1803 near Leeds in Yorkshire.  As a young man Titus serves an apprenticeship in the wool mills of Bradford, he then joins his father in the family business,

Daniel Salt & Son, as a wool stapler.

 

In 1830 Titus Salt Marries Caroline Whitlam, he is 26 and she is 18.  They eventually have 11 children during their 46 year marriage.

 

Titus is not afraid to innovate and experiment, introducing new wools to the burgeoning worsted trade.  In 1834 Titus notices bales of “unworkable” alpaca wool at a Liverpool warehouse. He spends over a year experimenting with it, and finds he can weave it into beautiful lustrous cloth – perfect for making garments for the wealthy elite.

 

Specialising in worsted cloth manufactured from, the now, fashionable alpaca wool, Titus Salt becomes a highly successful industrialist.  He is so highly regarded in his field that Queen Victoria sends wool from her heard of alpaca to Salt’s mill to be spun.

 

Despite Salt’s drive and determination in his business pursuits, he is all too aware of the detrimental effect the industry, which has allowed him to become a very rich man, has had on the surrounding city and its inhabitants.  Salt has a genuine concern for the wellbeing of the residents of Bradford, his paternalistic nature leads to his appointment as Mayor of Bradford in 1848.  His main concerns are the pollution in the city and the living standards of the workers. 

 

Salt decides to start afresh, a new mill and a new town, a town he will build from the ground up where those who work for him will benefit from all the amenities which are conducive to a healthy and happy life.

 

The idea of the industrial Model Village is not a new one, Titus Salt’s project is the latest in a long succession of villages created to serve industry dating from North Street at Arkwright’s Cromford mill.

 

The popularity Model Villages really begins to flourish in the early 1800s.  Many are built, from small scale endeavours such as Barrow Bridge in Bolton to the larger New Lanark.  In addition, the penchant of wealthy land owners for 'follies' results in Model Villages built to adorn and beautify their estates.  Old Warden, Bedfordshire and Blaise Hamlet, Bristol are notable examples of the acutely idealised and idyllic rural heritage style favoured by the landed gentry.

 

Titus Salt’s venture is on a massive scale and includes amenities such as schools, churches, social clubs and a train station.  The town is named Saltaire, a combination of Titus ‘Salt’ and the River ‘Aire’ adjacent to which the new mill is built.  Saltaire is built five miles from Bradford near the village of Shipley between 1853 and 1872.

 

Salt's paternalistic intentions are only part of his impetus to build Saltaire, his company has been operating from a number of mills in Bradford and it makes financial sense to combine the fragmented business under one roof.

 

Salt endeavours to establish a community:  “that would enjoy the beauties of the neighbourhood, and who would be a well fed, contented, and happy body of operatives…..nothing should be spared to render the dwellings of the operatives a pattern to the country”.

 

The layout that architects Lockwood and Mawson settle on for Saltaire is a rigid grid-work of streets and housing, aligned with the pre-existing lane leading to the mill. By 1871, when the housing development is completed, the census records a housing stock of 824, occupied by 4,300 people being served by 40 shops.

 

As with all the buildings in Saltaire, the houses are constructed of local stone, the majority being two-storeys. The houses of many of the streets are similar in character – workman cottages consisting of living room, scullery, two bedrooms and a half cellar. Other streets have slightly bigger houses, intended for overlookers and their families. Each of these larger houses has a parlour-kitchen, a third bedroom and a garden to the front of the houses. The later part of the development, south of Titus Street, consists of “improved workman” cottages having three bedrooms. The grandest properties are the 42 “executive/ improved overlooker” houses on the western side of the development. Forty-five almshouses are also built for the sick and aged poor.  Gas is supplied directly from the mill (as is water in the early years, before being switched to the public supply). Each house has its own lavatory in the yard at the back of the house, with each pair of houses sharing an ash pit for the disposal of coal ashes. All the properties are “through” houses – houses were not built “back to back,” which is an unpleasant feature of much 19th Century Bradford housing.

 

Salt insists on strict temperance rules, there are no pubs in Saltaire.  This is not because Salt is opposed to the consumption of alcohol, he himself is not tea total, but because he believes that public houses are prime locations for strike plotting.  In addition, meetings of large groups of workers outside of working hours are forbidden in an attempt to impede the organisation of strikes.

 

Saltaire may not be the first of its kind but it is the first model village which bears a striking resemblance to modern communities.  It sets a precedent in town planning, combining good housing, local amenities, transport, public parks and recreation spaces, as well as an abundance of job opportunities.  A testament to Saltaire’s success as an attractive and pleasant place to live is that even today people flock to live there and house prices are far higher than in nearby towns.

 

 

Titus Salt passes away at his home, Crow Nest, Lightcliffe, near Halifax in 1876 and is buried at Saltaire Congregational Church.  The degree to which Titus Salt is regarded is demonstrated by the estimated 100,000 people lining the route of his funeral procession.

The scale and infrastructure of Saltaire inspires other industrialists to build similar communities.  Bournville by Cadbury, Port Sunlight by Lever Brothers and New Earswick by Rowntree, although architecturally very different from Saltaire, draw upon the model popularised by Titus Salt.

This new generation of Industrial Model villages in turn influences others, notably an unknown court reporter named Ebenezer Howard.  Howard will take inspiration from the industrial past to write the next chapter of British society’s history, as he sets about implementing his vision, the Garden City Movement.

 

 

The Next Chapter...

 

As cities grow, due to industrialisation, an increasing sense of disconnect from a rural way of life becomes apparent. At the end of the 1800s a group of radical thinkers led by Ebenezer Howard seek an alternative way of life. In 1895 Ebenezer Howard’s ‘Garden Cities of To-morrow’ is published, it sets out his plan to create a community consisting of the most desirable elements of town and country life. Howard’s dream becomes a reality with the creation of Letchworth Garden City. The ideas pioneered by Ebenezer Howard have revolutionary implications on town and country planning.

 

Go to GARDEN CITIES...