Iron mining was another occupation, and for poor children, a weaving house was founded at Dalton. William Close started a small music school for Dalton’s urchins while in the same town, classics and mathematics were taught by one master while his assistant looked after the rest; this school was situated close to Goose Green at the foot of the cliff behind the vicarage. The school, according to one source, had 80 pupils. Initially there were 20 pupils when it was founded by Thomas Boulton in the 17th century. According to Dr. David Borwick, writing in 1994 about education, “Furness seemed to have conformed to the high standards of Cumberland and Westmorland rather than the lower ones of Lancashire”.
(p. 377 An English Provincial Society).
People walked or rode in horse drawn carts to the hiring fairs of Dalton or Ulverston to be hired for work on farms or to be employed as servants in the houses of the wealthy such as Conishead Priory, the home of the Bradyll family or Holker Hall where the Cavendish family lived.
Sports considered cruel by today’s standards were cock fighting and badger baiting (on Sundays); enjoyed by both rich and poor.
William Close was a prolific letter writer. He wrote numerous letters to Nicholson’s Journal on various subjects of Natural Philosophy making observations on blasting rocks eg an account of an improvement whereby the danger of accidental explosion would be greatly lessened. In one of these letters he noted the practice of blasting sand in Furness; there is also the reference to some explosions at a quarry in Kirkby.
(p. 377 An English Provincial Society).
People walked or rode in horse drawn carts to the hiring fairs of Dalton or Ulverston to be hired for work on farms or to be employed as servants in the houses of the wealthy such as Conishead Priory, the home of the Bradyll family or Holker Hall where the Cavendish family lived.
Sports considered cruel by today’s standards were cock fighting and badger baiting (on Sundays); enjoyed by both rich and poor.
William Close was a prolific letter writer. He wrote numerous letters to Nicholson’s Journal on various subjects of Natural Philosophy making observations on blasting rocks eg an account of an improvement whereby the danger of accidental explosion would be greatly lessened. In one of these letters he noted the practice of blasting sand in Furness; there is also the reference to some explosions at a quarry in Kirkby.
“Although he was a busy and highly respected doctor he still found time to work on many new ideas and inventions. These included new types of explosives, printing inks, siphons and pumps of various kinds, including one for raising water by the lateral motion of a stream of water through a conical tube.” (Jim Walton)
Another letter was written by Close to Mr. Percival in 1812 in which he states: “I shall send one of your circular letters to Mr.Scruton of Ulverston tomorrow.* He has asked the prices of your instruments and thinks that some of the pupils at Dr. Everard’s academy may have a wish to learn to play the trumpet”. The academy was a boarding school founded by Dr. Everard, a ** Catholic priest, who came to England during the French Revolution to establish a Catholic Mission in Ulverston. The school was situated in Fountain Street. The pupils were chosen from the aristocratic families of south Lancashire. Fees were between £200 and £400 a year, according to the social standing of the parents and their sons’ requirements. The young gentlemen kept their own horses and dogs, followed the hounds, dined, danced and played cards at the country houses of the gentry. All this was happening while there were paupers living a short distance away in Ulverston’s Poor House, formerly Neville Hall, now Ulverston Police Station. At the same time, Dalton’s Workhouse was home to 20 paupers, while beggars roamed the Furness Peninsula.
Other correspondence related to the improvements he had made in musical instruments especially the trumpet, the French horn and the bugle of which he secured a patent for the introduction of three pistons of the cornet and all other piston instruments. He wrote about his invention of tubular appendages or polyphonian trumpets.
Jim Walton also writes about the doctor’s musical expertise in his article “The Man who made trumpets from Soap’’ Dr. Close “had a passion for developing a new type of trumpet or horn which was capable of producing a musical scale by means of finger holes in its body; he felt that he could create an improved version of the horns and trumpets that existed at that time – but he had a problem.
Another letter was written by Close to Mr. Percival in 1812 in which he states: “I shall send one of your circular letters to Mr.Scruton of Ulverston tomorrow.* He has asked the prices of your instruments and thinks that some of the pupils at Dr. Everard’s academy may have a wish to learn to play the trumpet”. The academy was a boarding school founded by Dr. Everard, a ** Catholic priest, who came to England during the French Revolution to establish a Catholic Mission in Ulverston. The school was situated in Fountain Street. The pupils were chosen from the aristocratic families of south Lancashire. Fees were between £200 and £400 a year, according to the social standing of the parents and their sons’ requirements. The young gentlemen kept their own horses and dogs, followed the hounds, dined, danced and played cards at the country houses of the gentry. All this was happening while there were paupers living a short distance away in Ulverston’s Poor House, formerly Neville Hall, now Ulverston Police Station. At the same time, Dalton’s Workhouse was home to 20 paupers, while beggars roamed the Furness Peninsula.
Other correspondence related to the improvements he had made in musical instruments especially the trumpet, the French horn and the bugle of which he secured a patent for the introduction of three pistons of the cornet and all other piston instruments. He wrote about his invention of tubular appendages or polyphonian trumpets.
Jim Walton also writes about the doctor’s musical expertise in his article “The Man who made trumpets from Soap’’ Dr. Close “had a passion for developing a new type of trumpet or horn which was capable of producing a musical scale by means of finger holes in its body; he felt that he could create an improved version of the horns and trumpets that existed at that time – but he had a problem.
