Mechanics Institutes learn new lesson in survival

They gave working-class men access to education, but as Fiona Russell reports, the fate of many Mechanics Institutes in Yorkshire hangs in the balance.

It’s almost impossible to imagine the village of Marsden, in the upper Colne Valley, without its Mechanics Institute. It is utterly distinctive, with its gaily painted clock tower and oversized portico nudging into the main street. In fact, the building is a little like the village itself – determined, impossible to ignore, a bit too big for its boots.

But things could have been so different. “It was a redundant liability,” says Tom Lonsdale, chair of the Mechanics’ Management Association, recalling the institute in the early 1970s. “In fact, at one point Kirklees Council actually applied to itself for permission to demolish it.”

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It was dirty, drab, dilapidated. The main hall upstairs was permanently closed (the ceiling had collapsed) and the only entrance was via the portico, straight onto the main street. The village couldn’t make up its mind what to do.

“Some people argued that it should be demolished and a new community centre built in its place,” says Tom. “But a good quality building of sufficient size would never have been built on that site.

“We’d have ended-up with an inferior building on a piece of land somewhere outside the village centre, and the site the Mechanics now stands on would most probably be a car park.”

A group of people – long-time residents, comers-in (like Tom), the vicar, the Marsden-based Mikron Theatre Company and a former councillor – joined forces and, with the help of an officer from Kirklees libraries, Brian Pearson, began a 12-year campaign. In the end they raised £900,000, which included the largest grant awarded to a village hall by the Rural Development Agency.

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For the last 20 years the Institute has served the village well. Owned by the council, but managed by a committee of volunteers, the Mechanics houses the village library, and the headquarters of the Mikron Theatre Company. Sure Start meets there, and Marsden’s residents can do yoga, tea dance, or attend a reading group, among many other things. The Mechanics is also popular for parties and weddings, and every year it is the centre of the Marsden Jazz Festival.

All in all, it’s been a tremendous success. But now, like all local authorities Kirklees Council needs to make savings.

“We have to find £7m savings on top of the £84m we have already identified”, says Coun Nicola Turner, who is also a member of the Mechanics’ Management Association. “Small, ageing public buildings are expensive for the council to run.” It is crisis time all over again.

Mechanics Institutes are some of the most characteristic buildings in the landscape of industrial West Yorkshire.

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They were built in the early to mid 19th- century by public subscription, and their solid dignity embodies the aspirations of often rapidly created communities

The aim was to educate working men and they were frequently supported by local mill-owners who saw them as a means of achieving a better educated work-force (and of keeping the working man out of the pub).

Larger institutes often evolved into public buildings, for example Leeds City Mechanics Institute is now the City Museum and Huddersfield’s Mechanics Institute was the origin of what is now the University of Huddersfield.

But smaller institutes have fared less well. Some, like Marsden, were taken over by councils and remain in public use, but others were sold off and have been converted into flats and business premises.

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Neighbouring Longwood Mechanics is one of the few institutes to have remained in community hands throughout. The Longwood Village Group now holds the building in trust for the benefit of Longwood residents. The institute had 
been deteriorating for half a century.

“We’d even lost our name,” Derek Fairbank, one of the four volunteer hall managers, explains. “There was a Prisoner of War Camp just up the road, at Salendine Nook, and the MoD (who had requisitioned the institute) didn’t want the prisoners to know where they were, so they removed the lettering on the front of the building.”

The building opened in 1858 and like other institutes it contained a hall dedicated to meetings and lectures (“no dancing, drinking, or gambling,” says Derek) and a reading room.

“They’d buy the paper and you could come and read it and at the end of the week, they’d auction it off,” Derek explains. “There were books you could borrow as well. It was the start of public libraries really”.

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For a while, the village school occupied the ground floor, 
before the Council School 
opened, and the institute incorporated two cottages, one for the headmaster and one for the caretaker.

Over the years the institute accumulated other functions. A penny bank opened between 5pm and 7.30pm on Saturday evenings and residents could deposit money via a square hole in the wall (it took as much as £200 a week). Later, there was a bowling green and a Darby and Joan club.

The late 19th and early 20th centuries were the heyday of the institutes. Over in Marsden, dances as well as lectures were held in the hall, and when the local district council took over its running in 1911, they furnished one of the rooms as a council chamber and used the balcony on top of the portico to announce election results.

Victor Grayson (the Colne Valley’s fiery socialist MP) gave speeches in the Mechanics. Adele Pankhurst campaigned there on behalf of Votes for Women and in times of industrial crisis the institute became a centre for the distribution of relief.

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But the Second World War marked the beginning of a long period of decline for mechanics institutes.

Derek remembers Longwood Mechanics as a boy in the mid 1970s as being “dark and dismal.” Parts of the building were falling into disuse.

Finally, when a problem developed with a gable and the roof, the council took away the entertainments license and the building closed.

It took Longwood Community Association nearly 20 years to find the money to fix the roof, but today the Mechanics is once again at the heart of the local community hosting a vibrant mix of activities – table tennis, art clubs, Zumba, ballet, martial arts and creative kids.

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Downstairs a volunteer-run café opens three mornings a week, serving three-course meals to between 15 and 20 people at a time.

The village show takes place in the Mechanics, and it is a popular party venue.

It’s an extraordinary achievement, not least because it is all the work of volunteers. But the future is filled with uncertainty. There are unused parts of the building, waiting for a project which will enable their refurbishment. And the hall is 155-years-old. What if it develops another major structural problem?

Across the valley, there are also gathering clouds. Marsden Mechanics is considering “asset transfer” where ownership of, and responsibility for an “asset” is transferred from the council to the community (“you just have to hope that it’s an asset and not a liability,” says Tom). So soon Marsden could be joining Longwood and hundreds of other small community organisations in the long queues bidding for any available pot of money.

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But Tom is convinced that mechanics institutes are worth fighting for.

“For over 150 years these buildings have been dedicated to educational and pleasurable pursuits. They’re also vital 
places of assembly, places to celebrate the bonds of community.

“After the Second World War, councils took over the responsibility for providing 
such places. But it looks as if 
they no longer can, and that 
we may have to reclaim this building once again. Marsden may have to re-enact 
the origins of the Mechanics, 
but after all, who created 
these buildings in the first 
place?”

History of the Mechanics

While the people of the West Riding embraced the idea of the Mechanics Institute, the very first one opened in Edinburgh in 1821.

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They were often funded by local industrialists with the likes of Robert Stephenson (civil engineer and son of George) and James Nasmyth (inventor of the steam hammer) opening their own institutes.

Housed in grand buildings, Leeds Mechanics Institute was designed by Cuthbert Brodrick, who was also responsible for the Town Hall.

Set up to provide low-cost education to the poor, when technical colleges began to spring up and evening classes became the preserve of the middle classes, the institutes fell out fashion.