Outing to John
Rylands Library and People’s History Museum
On Friday, January 27th
40 members of Marple U3A
travelled by train to Manchester to visit two more of the gems of our
great
city. Dividing into
two groups we in
turn had tours of the library andthe museum meeting to have lunch
together
in
the café at the library.
The museum has recently been
refurbished with a grant from
the Heritage Lottery of seven and a half million pounds!
We learned a lot about the rise of Manchester
during the Industrial Revolution including how conditionsfor the
working
classes were improved by the introduction of Trades Unions. Different exhibits depict
how the people of Manchester
lived both at work and in their leisure time.
Built
in the 1890s, the John
Rylands Library is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful
libraries in
the world;
both the building and its collections are of outstanding
international significance. Our
guide
was extremely knowledgeable
as she proudly showed us the beauty of the building
as well as the priceless books and manuscripts housed by the library
We finished the tour by being shown documents
of particular significance to Marple;
a
book of Samuel Oldknow’s
accounts, rescued from the fire which destroyed his
mill, is housed here.
We returned home
full of knowledge and gratitude that so much of our heritage remains to
be
enjoyed and appreciated.
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ENLARGE
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