The National Trust has launched a fundraising appeal-the first major one under the new director-general, Dame Helen Ghosh-to restore an entire industrial community. From the 1780s to the 1920s, Quarry Bank Mill in Cheshire, built by the Greg family, was at the heart of cotton production and illustrates perfectly the growing prosperity, yet also the grinding poverty, of the era.
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The Trust hopes to raise £1.4 million to help create a time capsule of life at that time by restoring a worker’s cottage and shop, the glasshouses beloved of the Victorians in which exotic fruit was produced, the Pleasure Grounds and the Gregs’ house with all its archive material.
‘It captures a precious time in this country’s history-it’s no wonder the industrial era featured so heavily in the Opening Ceremony at the Olympics,’ comments Quarry Bank Mill general manager Eleanor Underhill.
The entire project will cost £6 million and take five years. To donate, telephone 01625 527468 or visit www.nationaltrust.org.uk/quarrybankappeal
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