Salt’s Mill in Saltaire, Yorkshire, England. Photo by Jill Browne.
Saltaire is a UNESCO World Heritage Site near Leeds in Yorkshire, England. I spent a weekend there. What’s remarkable about it is that this was a model town built around a woolen mill, all owned and run by a Victorian era philanthropist. Almost all the original buildings are intact and in use. The houses are still being lived in, and the mill has shops and art, including a gallery of David Hockney’s work.
If you have English roots, especially in the north, chances are you have mill workers in your family tree.
This is an article originally published on Buckettripper.com.
Whenever I discover something about one of my English ancestors, I wonder, “What was it like for them?” and begin to imagine the streets and houses of their time and place. To find out more about life as a Victorian-era worker in a woolen mill, my family and I came to Saltaire, near Bradford in Yorkshire.
By the mid-1800s, the Industrial Revolution had done its worst to England’s north. The “dark Satanic mills” polluted the air and water, making the intensely overcrowded towns even more deadly for the people there.
In 1840s Bradford, the air was toxic thanks to so many mills spewing smoke into such a small area. Cholera was no stranger. The life expectancy was barely over 20. It was an intolerable situation for the workers, but they had nowhere else to go.
Enter the Victorian paternal philanthropists: a few wealthy industrialists who spent their own money to improve their workers’ lot. One was Titus Salt, former mayor of Bradford, who built a whole new mill and a town to go with it. Although he ruled it strictly, life in Saltaire (Salt’s village on the River Aire) was a life and not a life sentence.
Salt’s Mill is magnificent: a massive buff-coloured four-storey building with neat rows of large windows on each level and Italian-style campaniles for chimneys. Once the largest factory in Europe, perhaps the world, the mill opened in 1853. The town of Saltaire followed over the next decade.
Tours of Saltaire with Salt’s Walks
It’s been 50 years or more since the mill stopped making woolen fabrics. The old jobs like “loom operator,” “carder,” and “overseer in Salt’s Mill” have disappeared.
We’re staying in one of the original workers’ houses for the weekend. Now we tourists can make that daily walk from home to mill.
The head of security could watch all of Saltaire from the watchtower on his house. Photo by Jill Browne.
Saltaire is a World Heritage Site now because it’s an intact, original village, a perfect example of its type. People continue to live and work here today, doing modern jobs in the old buildings. It’s not a museum or a site constructed to demonstrate history.
By luck, we get to tag along on a “Salt’s Walk” group tour. Three costumed Saltairians of the past share their views of life in town. With a lot of good humour and a solid grasp of Saltaire’s history, the actor-guides leave no doubt about how things were. Follow the rules or pack your things, because “the Master” is firmly in charge of this town, and what he says goes. He does own it, after all.
Saltaire was built to fill the workers’ every need
The history gallery inside Salt’s Mill documents the change from booming production to eventual decline and shutdown over about 100 years. By the 1980s, Salt’s Mill was another decaying industrial property on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal.
Fortunately, the late entrepreneur Jonathan Silver, with the support of his friend, artist David Hockney, rescued Salt’s Mill. It now houses specialty shops, galleries and cafes. Passionately dedicated community members have kept up the momentum of heritage preservation and development in the village.
We spend a few hours browsing the books, art, and antiques before heading upstairs to see Hockney’s bright paintings and new electronic creations.
There are tributes to the alpaca all over Saltaire because Titus Salt made a fortune from their wool. Photo by Jill Browne
I’m standing on the top floor of the mill looking out the gallery window. The view hasn’t changed.
I imagine a girl sweating away at some finger-crushing machine in the deafening factory, secretly lifting her eyes to the hills for a moment of peaceful salvation.
Religion was as much a part of Titus Salt’s vision as industry. Coming out the mill gate, the workers would see the elegant Italianate-style church. Designed by Lockwood & Mawson, the architects of Saltaire’s grid of terraced houses and Roman roads, it features a part circle of graceful columns supporting the portico, circular bell tower and dome above.
The dome of Saltaire’s church and the green Yorkshire hills across the River Aire. Photo by Jill Browne.
Over the course of the weekend, we explore the church inside and out. We cross the river to Roberts Park and have coffee and goodies at the friendly Half Moon Cafe. We peek into the elegant Victoria Hall, originally the Saltaire Institute, where famous people like Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli and explorer David Livingstone gave public lectures.
Rank and hierarchy mattered
Although the residential streets look identical at first, we start to notice different sizes of houses. The higher your job, the bigger your house.
The head of security lived on the hill above most of the others. The house still has a tower with windows on all sides, the better to watch for rule-breakers.
It’s a bit too much like the panopticon of Pentonville model prison for my liking. Woe betide the woman who hangs her laundry out to dry, or the man who dares drink the demon alcohol. If you’re late for work, you lose the day’s pay. Take a bath once a week at the public bath house. Individually the rules seem harmless enough, but in our tour, Mrs. Ellin Dooley (played by local historian Maria Glot) confessed to the occasional longing to kick over the traces.
Paternalism had a purpose
Although paternalism has gone out of style, in its day it was the salvation of hundreds of Saltaire families. On Titus Salt’s funeral day in January 1877, it’s estimated that 100,000 people lined the route out of respect and affection.
Today we can look at the town, with its straight lines, its opportunities for education, work, and self-improvement, and its adherence to all of Titus Salt’s rules, and think upon what Winston Churchill said: “We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us.”
Practicalities
- Easily reached by train from Leeds. Leeds is well connected to London by rail.
- Salt’s Mill is built on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, accessible to canal boats.
- Saltaire is a living, working town, not a museum. Walking is the best way to see it.
- Ask at Visitor Information for the details of Salt’s Tours. If you get the chance to take one with costumed guides, don’t miss it.
Disclosure
This is my standard form of disclosure that I am retroactively adding to all blog posts done before April 1, 2018, and will add to all new posts.
1. Is this experience open to the public?
Yes.
2. Who paid the cost of me doing this?
I did.
3. Did I get any compensation or special consideration for writing this blog post?
No.
4. Would I be as positive about this place if I had gone as a regular visitor?
Yes. I did go as a regular visitor.
No Comments