Wedgwood Memorial College was a small residential college in Barlaston, near Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. The college was owned and operated by Stoke-on-Trent City Council until it was closed down by the council in March 2012. [1] It still[ when? ] houses the centre of Esperanto education at Estoril House.[ citation needed ]
There is also a similarly named building in Burslem, the Wedgwood Institute, which is sometimes called the "Wedgwood Memorial Institute". This is a completely separate institution.
The college, a member of the Adult Residential Colleges Association, offered short courses in literature and languages (French, German and Esperanto); political science and history; and art, art history and architectural history. [2] Wedgwood Memorial College had a non-circulating library with 15,000 volumes available for research and private study. [3]
The buildings were also rented out for weddings, parties and small conferences, with eight rooms available that accommodated from ten to 40 people per room. [4] One of these rooms is the Montagu C. Butler Library, located in Esperanto House on the grounds of the college.
The Barlaston estate was acquired by Wedgwood in the 1930s, and the college opened in February 1945 in Barlaston Hall, a country house. The building was endangered by coal mining operations and a geological fault, which caused major diagonal cracks in the walls. The college moved from Barlaston Hall to Victorian and Edwardian buildings in Barlaston village.
Esperanto House, the headquarters of the Esperanto Association of Britain has its main office on the Estoril site of Wedgwood Memorial College.
Between 1960 and 2011, the last opportunity prior to its 2012 closure, Wedgwood Memorial College offered a week-long Esperanto summer school every August. This came about partly through the influence of Horace Barks, the Lord Mayor of Stoke-on-Trent, who was an advocate of Esperanto.
The college offered a weekend course in Esperanto theatre every January and a weekend residential course in Esperanto language every October. The Esperanto Association of Britain offers a partial subsidy to Esperanto learners attending the Wedgwood Memorial College programme and who have first completed such an introductory course. [5]
Stoke-on-Trent is a city and unitary authority area in Staffordshire, England, with an area of 36 square miles (93 km2). In 2021, the city had an estimated population of 258,400. It is the largest settlement in Staffordshire and is surrounded by the towns of Newcastle-under-Lyme, Alsager, Kidsgrove and Biddulph, which form a conurbation around the city.
The Montagu Butler Library is one of the world’s major collections in and about Esperanto, having 4433 items in its detailed catalogue.
The Esperanto Association of Britain (EAB) is a registered educational charity whose objective is to advance education in and about the international language Esperanto and to preserve and promote the culture and heritage of Esperanto for the educational benefit of the general public. The organisation was established in 1904.
The Etruria Works was a ceramics factory opened by Josiah Wedgwood in 1769 in a district of Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England, which he named Etruria. The factory ran for 180 years, as part of the wider Wedgwood business.
Sennacieca Asocio Tutmonda is an independent worldwide cultural Esperanto association of a general left-wing orientation. Its headquarters are in Paris. According to Jacques Schram, chairman of the Executive Committee, the membership totalled 881 in 2003. In 2006 SAT had 724 members. In 2015-2016 there were 525.
Staffordshire University is a public research university in Staffordshire, England. It has one main campus based in the city of Stoke-on-Trent and four other campuses; in Stafford, Lichfield, Shrewsbury and London.
Colonel Josiah Clement Wedgwood, 1st Baron Wedgwood,, sometimes referred to as Josiah Wedgwood IV, was a British Liberal and Labour politician who served in government under Ramsay MacDonald. He was a prominent single-tax activist following the political-economic reformer Henry George. He was the great-great-grandson of potter Josiah Wedgwood.
Burslem is one of the six towns that along with Hanley, Tunstall, Fenton, Longton and Stoke-upon-Trent form part of the city of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. It is often referred to as the "mother town" of Stoke on Trent. The population of the town was included under the Burslem Central ward and had a population of 6,490 in the 2021 Census.
Etruria is a suburb of Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England.
Stoke-on-Trent railway station is a mainline railway station serving the city of Stoke-on-Trent, on the Stafford to Manchester branch of the West Coast Main Line. It also provides an interchange between local services running through Cheshire, Staffordshire and Derbyshire.
Barlaston is a village and civil parish in the borough of Stafford in the county of Staffordshire, England. It is roughly halfway between the city of Stoke-on-Trent and the small town of Stone. According to the 2001 census the population of the parish was 2,659, rising at the 2011 Census to 2,858.
Etruria Hall in Etruria, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England is a Grade II listed house and former home of the potter Josiah Wedgwood. It was built between 1768–1771 by Joseph Pickford. The hall was sold by the Wedgwoods in the 19th century and is now part of a hotel.
Smallthorne is an area in the city of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. It is in the north-east of the city, near Burslem. Smallthorne borders Bradeley and Chell in the north, Norton-in-the-Moors in the east, Sneyd Green in the south, and Burslem in the west.
Barlaston railway station served the village of Barlaston in Staffordshire, England. This station was opened on 17 April 1848 and is on the first line opened by the North Staffordshire Railway on that date. At some times it was called Barlaston and Tittensor after the slightly more distant village of Tittensor.
Barlaston Hall is an English Palladian country house in the village of Barlaston in Staffordshire, on a ridge overlooking the valley of the River Trent to the west, about 5 miles (8.0 km) south of Stoke-on-Trent, with the towns of Stone about 4 miles (6.4 km) to the south, and Stafford about 11 miles (18 km) south.
The Wedgwood Institute is a large red-brick building that stands in Queen Street, in the town of Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England. It is sometimes called the Wedgwood Memorial Institute, but it is not to be confused with the former Wedgwood Memorial College in Barlaston. It achieved listed building status in 1972.
The Adult Residential Colleges Association (ARCA) was a group of 27 residential colleges in the United Kingdom. The association was based in Felixstowe, Suffolk, England.
Montagu Christie Butler was a British academic, librarian, lexicographer, musician, and Esperantist. A winner of several prizes at the Royal Academy of Music in London, he was a harpist and a versatile music teacher skilled in playing various musical instruments, as well as a teacher of voice and of musical composition.
Horace Barks, OBE (1895-1983) was a British Labour politician. He was Lord Mayor of Stoke-on-Trent in 1951–2.
Montagu Butler may refer to:
