1934 and inside the Independent College in Whalley Range

We are in the grounds of the Independent College in Whalley Range and the year is 1934.

Our picture is a postcard which “R” says “is a new view of the college which I thought you might like to see.  

It gives rather a good view of the grounds I think.”

He was writing to Mr and Mrs Nelson of Garston Old Road in Liverpool and he went on to say that he had “managed a good spot of work,” and was looking forward to “seeing something of a friend of mine who is preaching at Ormskirk on Sunday.”

There is nothing more to help us with the identity of “R” but given that the college had been built “educate young men of decided piety and competent talents for the Christian ministry,”* I think we can be fairly confident he was destined for a religious career.

By the time “R” was doing his spot of work the college had been open for 92 years and had continued “the preparation of young men for the ministry of the Independent church”** carrying on the work of the  Blackburn Independent Academy which had opened in 1816.

Such independent establishments had been necessary by the ban on dissenters from attending universities.  So here along with the study of theology students “will have the opportunity of gaining philosophical and scientific knowledge, in addition to the classics and mathematics.”

There were to be two resident professors and about fifty-two students the cost was to be met by public subscription and the hope was that this would in time be met by endowments.

The original design was for a gothic style building with a tall tower and a principal front 261 feet in length including two professors’ houses at either end with cloisters in between serving as an arcade in which the students can take exercise in wet weather.  There were to be three stories surmounted by battlements about 40 feet high.

“The arrangements in the interior of the College, forming a communication with different suites of rooms, are well designed and exceedingly simple consisting of corridors running the extreme length of the front and of either wing. The lower story of the building which is sufficiently high above the ground to ensure dryness is intended entirely for servants, and the corridor which connects the different offices runs along the main building.

Entering the College by the broad flight of steps in the basement of the tower we come to the entrance hall on the second or main floor which is a lofty room about 36 feet by 32 and open to the roof.”***

And I suppose this description would have been recognised by “R” as well as the countless other students who continued to study there until its closure in 1980.

Later; more stories and pictures of the college.

Pictures; of the college in 1934 from the Lloyd Collection The Assembly Hall and grounds from The Lancashire Independent College, 1843-93

* resolution of the committee held in the vestry of the Mosley Street Chapel, Manchester February 1816, and quoted by Thompson, Joseph,  in The Lancashire Independent College, 1843-93, Manchester 1893 Memorial Volume, p18
** The Manchester Guardian 1842
*** The Manchester Guardian 1842

A little bit of religious dissent in Whalley Range .... The Independent Lancashire College

I like this picture of the Independent Lancashire College in Whalley Range.

It had been here since 1843 and even before it was finished it was causing a stir amongst “the Public and more especially by strangers, respecting this beautiful specimen of gothic architecture which is seen to great advantage from the roads leading westward out of Manchester.”

It origins lay in the fact that Dissenters along with the Catholics were still barred from entering the Universities, and lay professions.  They could not marry in their own places of worship and had to rely on Anglican Churches for registering births and deaths.

This had led to the establishment of an independent academy in Blackburn was opened in 1816 to “educate young men of decided piety and competent talents for the Christian ministry.”**

By 1838 the academy was no longer adequate for this purpose and a new “collegiate building affording more extensive domiciliary accommodation,”” was agreed upon which would be sited in Manchester.

A public subscription was launched to meet the cost of what was estimated would be £10,000.  It says much for the strength of dissent in the North West that within two years the sum of £14, 736 was raised which eventually exceeded £25, 000.

And with all such subscriptions the contributions ranged from the modest to the very substantial, so while Mr Joseph Taylor of Ashton handed over £2, George Hadfield from Manchester gave £2,100, Samuel Fletcher £1,300 and our own Samuel Brooks of Whalley House £1, 550.

Brooks however also benefited from selling the seven acre site for its construction for £3,650.

The foundation stone was laid In September 1840 and the college opened in 1843.

Pictures; of the college circa 1910 from the Lloyd Collection and the Blackburn Independent Academy from The Lancashire Independent College, 1843-93

*Manchester Guardian 1842

** Resolution of the committee held in the vestry of the Mosley Street Chapel, Manchester February 1816, and quoted by Thompson, Joseph,  in The Lancashire Independent College, 1843-93, Manchester 1893 Memorial Volume, p18

The Lancashire Independent College in Whalley Range and a search for J Porter

I have fond memories of the old Lancashire Independent College in Whalley Range. 

The place has had a long history, first as a college for Dissenters, then as the GMB* National College and now as the British Muslim Heritage Centre.

The postcard image dates from the early 20th century and was sent to Miss K Phillips of Devon with the message that the new principal was “going to preach at Chorlton Road next Sunday.”

The photographer was a J.Porter, who seems to have specialized in pictures linked to religious buildings and occasions and may well have worked for M. Carr & Co who published a series of cards entitled the Moss Side Series.**

Now I suspect this is one of those tantalizing leads that will take me off in all directions.

But that is for another time.

*General, Municipal, Boilermakers and Allied Trade Union.

** A number of his images appear in a collection of 58 photographs held by the Greater Manchester County Record Office, covering the period 1907-1918 which are listed by the National Archives, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/a2a/records.aspx?cat=124-2119&cid=-1#-1

Picture; from the Lloyd collection