The college was built as an independent (i.e. congregational) college in 1840–43,the architects being Irwin and Chester.[1] The site was in the new suburb whose development had been begun about 10 years earlier by Samuel Brooks;its name later became Whalley Range. The aim of the Lancashire Independent College was a project of the Lancashire Congregational Union to provide higher education for Non-Conformists who were excluded from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge until 1871.[2] This included a new college building and moving the staff from Blackburn Academy which was then closed.[3] The three founders were George Hadfield,Thomas Raffles and William Roby (minister of the Grosvenor Street Chapel,London Road,Manchester).[4] The Blackburn Academy arose from courses of lessons given to prospective Congregational ministers by William Roby who was supported by the Manchester merchant Robert Spear. When the principal,Joseph Fletcher,left for London the academy became the Lancashire Independent College and moved to Manchester.[5] The college became known much later as the Northern Congregational College.
The similarity of design to an Oxbridge college is therefore easily understood. The marshy nature of the area,then called Jackson's Moss,meant that 4½feet (135cm) of peat had to be dug away before safe construction could begin. Nikolaus Pevsner commended the "long,very impressive,ashlar-faced,Gothic front."[1] The wings culminate in a "tall,fanciful" tower,with a "two-storey Gothicoriel (window)."[1] The entrance and assembly halls were re-ordered by Alfred Waterhouse in 1876–80 and Pevsner considered them "disappointing,but the rooms along the piano nobile are very charming,their Gothic fireplaces,ceilings and doorcases nicely varied."[1]
During World War II,it was used to house refugee academics,mainly from Czecho-Slovakia. The later name of the college was the Northern Congregational College,who used the premises until 1985 when they joined the Northern Baptist College in Luther King House,Brighton Grove.[6]
The building became the GMB National College in 1985 and trained many trade union negotiators. The GMB closed the college in 2004 as it was considered too expensive to maintain as it needed a needed a major structural overhaul costing about £5 million.[7] After a period of uncertainty,the building was purchased by the British Muslim Heritage Centre to serve as a focus for Muslim heritage and identity in Britain and to promote a balanced and moderate understanding of Islam.[8]
In January 2013 and 2014,the building was nominated for the Arts and Culture Awareness award at the British Muslim Awards.[9][10]
Nasar Mahmood currently serves as a trustee of the centre.[11] He was awarded an OBE in the Queen's New Year Honours List in 2019.[12][13]
Hartwell, Clare; Hyde, Matthew; Pevsner, Nikolaus (2004). Lancashire: Manchester and the South East. The Buildings of England. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press. ISBN978-0-300-10583-4.
Further reading
Anon. (1878) Memorial of the Opening of the New and Enlarged Buildings of Lancashire Independent College. Manchester: Tubbs and Brook
Anon. (1943) Lancashire Independent College, 1843–1943. [Manchester: the College, 1943]
Christie Hospital and Holt Radium Institute (1935) Souvenir programme of the garden party held on the occasion of the visit of Her Royal Highness The Duchess of York on Wednesday, 10 July 1935 at the Lancashire Independent College, Whalley Range, Manchester. Manchester: Service Guild
Field, Clive D. (1989) 'Sources for the Study of Protestant Nonconformity in the John Rylands University Library of Manchester', Bulletin of the John Rylands University Library of Manchester, vol. 71, no. 2 (1989), pp.108–11 (information about the college library).
Hadfield, George (1841) An Address Intended to Have Been Delivered on the Occasion of Laying the Foundation Stone of the Lancashire Independent College at Withington, near Manchester. London: Hamilton, Adams & Co.
Thompson, Joseph (1893) Lancashire Independent College, 1843–1893. Jubilee Memorial Volume. Manchester: J. E. Cornish
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