1880 - Bradford Technical College - Bradford, UK
Posted by: 
dtrebilc
N 53° 47.483 W 001° 45.689
30U E 581587 N 5961022
This date stone is on the right hand side of the wall of the college built to support Bradford's textile industry.
Waymark Code: WMJYXH
Location: Yorkshire, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 01/19/2014
Views: 1
This extract from the college's webpage gives us the history of the building.
Prehistory: the Mechanics' Institute
The story of the University of Bradford began in 1832 with the founding of the Bradford Mechanics' Institute. Bradford's wool industry was growing quickly. Leading nonconformists felt morally obliged to improve the education of the people streaming into the city to work in the mills. The Institute's lectures and classes originally emphasised general education, but the dominance of wool meant scientific and technical topics were most popular.
The mill owners often did not encourage efforts to educate workers, valuing instinct and common sense rather than theory, and unwilling to share their secrets with competitors. The Institute founded a School of Industrial Design and Art in 1848 which was not well supported. Attitudes changed as European wool industry competitors began to overtake Bradford in the 1860s, and the 1870s depression harmed trade. In 1863, the Institute was able to establish professionally run classes including textile topics. The shock of the poor response to Bradford textiles at the 1878 Paris Exhibition meant further action was possible. A small Weaving School was opened in 1878 in the Institute, which was soon enlarged to form the Bradford Technincal School.
Technical School and Technical College
The first building for the new Bradford Technical School was opened in 1882, by the Prince of Wales. The purpose of the School was clearly to support local industries, "technical, scientific, artistic and general instruction in the various processes involved in the production of Worsted, Woollen, Silk and Cotton fabrics ..." Four departments were created: Textiles, Art and Design, Engineering, and Chemistry and Dyeing. Soon after, the School was re-named Bradford Technical College, possibly in response to the Yorkshire College of Science at Leeds."
link
The Worshipful Company Of Clothworkers is one of the 'Great Twelve Livery Companies', based in London set up in 1528 to look after the interests of cloth workers. It was therefore appropriate for the Master of the Livery Company to lay the foundation stone of a building that would benefit and improve the lot of cloth workers in a modern industrial city. Their
web page gives more details of their history.
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