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University of Plymouth PEARL https://pearl.plymouth.ac.uk 04 University of Plymouth Research Theses 01 Research Theses Main Collection 2018 'The Road to Learning': Re-evaluating the Mechanics' Institute Movement Watson, Douglas Robert http://hdl.handle.net/10026.1/11817 University of Plymouth All content in PEARL is protected by copyright law. Author manuscripts are made available in accordance with publisher policies. Please cite only the published version using the details provided on the item record or document. In the absence of an open licence (e.g. Creative Commons), permissions for further reuse of content should be sought from the publisher or author. Copyright This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with its author and that no quotation from the thesis and no information derived from it may be published without the author’s prior consent. ‘The Road to Learning’: Re-evaluating the Mechanics’ Institute Movement by Douglas Robert Watson A thesis submitted to University of Plymouth in partial fulfilment for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY School of Humanities and Performing Arts Doctoral Training Centre 7 April 2018 Acknowledgements ‘“The Road to Learning”: Re-evaluating the Mechanics’ Institutes Movement’ followed on from my MRes thesis ‘The Battle of Plymouth Hoe’ (2012) and grew out of a chance encounter with a Mechanics’ Institute, which arose from that project; reading about its members and their sense of public-spirited engagement with science and progress left its mark on me and I wanted to find out more about these Institutions. I would like to thank those mechanics from long ago first and foremost. This research project was made possible by the University of Plymouth, and I would like to thank the University Doctoral Training Centre in the Humanities for the award of a scholarship, 2012 – 2015. I would like to thank my supervisors, Dr James Gregory, Dr Daniel Grey and Professor James Daybell. Their support through what has been an at times difficult process has gone beyond what could have reasonably been expected of them as individuals and as a team. Thank you. I would also like to thank Dr Lee Miller, Professor Liz Tingle, Professor Roberta Mock, Professor Kevin Jefferys and Karen Sedgman for their support, insight, and encouragement. I would like to thank the students I had the pleasure of teaching at Plymouth between 2012 – 2013. I would like to thank the Members of Plymouth University Nineteenth Century Society (PUNCS), for allowing me to present at their inaugural conference in March 2015. I would also like to thank the Society for the History of Education for allowing me to present a paper to their Postgraduate Panel at the annual History of Education Society Conference in Exeter in 22–23 November 2013. I would especially like to thank my examiners, Dr Helen Rogers and Dr Claire Fitzpatrick, for their valuable insights and recommendations. For their help, insight and encouragement, I would like to thank Dr Jana Sims, Dr Helen Flexner, and Lucy Huggins. I would also like to thank Taryn Edwards at the San Francisco Mechanics Institute. Lastly, I would like to thank my family for putting up with me all this time. AUTHOR’S DECLARATION At no time during the registration for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy has the author been registered for any other University award. Work submitted for this research degree at the Plymouth University has not formed part of any other degree either at Plymouth University or at another establishment. This study was financed with the aid of a three-year studentship from the School of Humanities and Performing Arts, 2012 – 2015. A programme of advanced study was undertaken, which included taught modules and attendance at training and study workshops. These were as follows: Research Skills in the Arts and Humanities (Plymouth University module code MARE 525); Plymouth University Graduate Teaching Associate training programme; Faculty Doctoral Training session in workshops in Endnote; Presenting to Conferences; Sessions on Writing Spaces; Referencing; Discursive Strategies and Framings; Overcoming Panic and Anxiety; Stop Procrastinating; Research Owning and Using; Critical and Strategic Reading Word count of main body of thesis: 79, 079 Signed: …………………………. Date: 7 April 2018 ‘The Road to Learning’. Re-evaluating the Mechanics’ Institute Movement Abstract Douglas Robert Watson This thesis is a re-evaluation of a movement founded to provide what Samuel Smiles called “the road to learning” for workers in the nineteenth century. Mechanics’ institutes emerged during the 1820s to both criticism and acclaim, becoming part of the physical and intellectual fabric of the age and inspiring a nationwide building programme funded entirely by public subscription. Beginning with a handful of examples in major British cities, they eventually spread across the Anglophone world. They were at the forefront of public engagement with arts, science and technology. This thesis is a history of the mechanics’ institute movement in the British Isles from the 1820s through to the late 1860s, when State involvement in areas previously dominated by private enterprises such as mechanics’ institutes, for example library provision and elementary schooling, became more pronounced. The existing historiography on mechanics’ institutes is primarily regional in scope and this thesis breaks new ground by synthesising a national perspective on their wider social, political and cultural histories. It contributes to these broader themes, as well as areas as diverse as educational history, the history of public exhibition and public spaces, visual culture, print culture, popular literacy and literature (including literature generated by the Institutes themselves, such as poetry and prose composed by members), financial services, education in cultural and aesthetic judgement, Institutes as sources of protest by means of Parliamentary petitions, economic history, and the nature, theory and practice of the popular dissemination of ideas. These advances free the thesis from ongoing debate around the success or failure of mechanics’ institutes, allowing the emphasis to be on the experiential history of the “living” Institute. The diverse source base for the thesis includes art, sculpture, poetry and memoir alongside such things as economic data, library loan statistics, membership numbers and profit / loss accounts from institute reports. The methodology therefore incorporates qualitative (for example, tracing the evolution of attitudes towards Institutes in contemporary culture by analysing the language used to describe them over time) and quantitative (for example, exploring Institutes as providers of financial services to working people) techniques. For the first time, mechanics’ institutes are studied in relation to political corruption, debates concerning the morality of literature and literacy during the nineteenth century, and the legislative processes of the period. LIST of CONTENTS List of Illustrations and Tables Introduction 1 Introduction: A Meeting of Worlds 1 The Structure of the Thesis 2 The Historiography of the Mechanics’ Institute Movement 5 Contemporary Commentaries 7 Later Diversification 12 The Historians of Education 13 Socialists and Sociologists 15 Regional Studies 21 Thematic Studies 27 Questions to Examine 28 Methodology and Sources 31 The Scope of the Thesis 38 Chapter 1. The Politics of the Mechanics’ Institutes, 1823 – 1860 40 Introduction: Down among the “Liberty Boys” 40 Mechanics’ Institutes in a Political Context I: “The Uncongenial Hole” as Political Space 43 Mechanics’ Institutes in a Political Context II: From Radical Space to Party Political Shorthand 45 Mechanics’ Institutes in Public Political Life I: Robert Peel, the Tamworth Reading Room and “The Best Manure of the Mind” 48 Mechanics’ Institutes in Public Political Life II: The Evolution of the “Public Conversation” 50 Mechanics’ Institutes and the Mechanics of Democracy I: Parliamentary Debates 52 Mechanics’ Institutes and the Mechanics of Democracy II: Parliamentary Petitions 56 Mechanics’ Institutes and the Politics of the Tory-Anglican Establishment 60 Mechanics’ Institutes and the Politicisation of Education I: Political Economy 63 Mechanics’ Institutes and the Politicisation of Education II: History and the Celebration of Political Personality 66 Mechanics’ Institutes in Civic Society: Power, Politics and Patronage 70 Mechanics’ Institutes and Radical Politics: Chartism and “Wholesome Agitation” 77 Mechanics Institutes: Case studies of Leaders and Members 83 Conclusion 98 Chapter 2. Social and Economic Aspects of the Mechanics’ Institutes Movement (1820–1869) 101 Introduction 101 Women as Visitors and Performers 105 Women as Members and Learners 109 Women as Lecturers 113 Social Attitudes Towards the Female Reader 117 Bookishness and Unmanliness 118 Redefining the Bookish and Unmanly Reader 122 Youth and Young Manhood 124 The Social Function of Mechanics’ Institutes Soirées 126 Manufactured Men in Man-Made Places 129 Social Economy I: Banking and Savings 131 Social Economy II: Affordable Home Ownership for the Working Classes 137 The Economics of Failure 141 Social Engineering and the Campaign to Expand the Parliamentary Franchise 145 Popular Social Commentary 146 Social Enterprises in Context 149 Conclusion 152 Chapter 3. Mechanics’ Institutes and Culture (1820–1869) 155 Introduction 155 Contemporary Manifestations of Self Culture