When you can’t buy the Science Museum, aim for the Cotswolds. Ask Henry Ford...
HAD Henry Ford got what he wanted there would be a big, empty space to one side of Gloucester Street in Winchcombe. And another in Bibury.
The motor magnate toured Britain and Ireland in the 1920s retracing his family roots and those of his Warwickshire-born wife. During the trip two things in particular took his eye. One was the Science Museum in London and the other was the Cotswolds.
Despite being one of the richest men in the world and well used to having exactly what he wanted, even Henry Ford realised that London would be unlikely to let him have the Science Museum. So he set about buying the Cotswolds instead.
His intention was to establish a museum-cumtheme park near the production plant in the Dearborn area of Detroit, Michigan, USA where he’d pioneered the mass production of motor cars.
There was plenty of space and Mr Ford proposed to fill some of it with such Gloucestershire landmarks as St Peter’s, the parish church of Winchcombe, then some more with Arlington Row, the 17th-century row of former weavers’ cottages in Bibury.
Due to vigorous objections from St Peter’s congregation and the National Trust, which by swift action gained ownership of Bibury’s main attraction, Ford’s advances were thwarted and the buildings stayed put.
A blow to Mr Ford though this was, his museum in Dearborn had managed to acquire some notable exhibits from this side of the Atlantic, such as a Newcomen atmospheric steam engine, along with other more immediate curiosities, including the chair in which Abraham Lincoln was sitting when he was shot and George Washington’s bed.
However, we must assume that despite the allure of these items, Ford knew that something with a tad more pizzazz was needed if his museum was going to pull in the punters and his thoughts returned to the Cotswolds.
The manager of the Ford car-making factory in Manchester was charged with the task of finding a picture book Cotswold dwelling for the museum, which he did in Chedworth. Rose Cottage, dating from the 17th century, was lived in at the time by a Mr Smith, who had to find himself somewhere else when his home was sold for £500.
Local workers were engaged to restore the property to its original condition. Then the cottage was dismantled stone by stone, each one numbered and packed into gravel sacks along with the surrounding drystone wall.
On March 28, 1930, the 475 tons of cottage were taken to Foss Cross railway station, about a mile from Chedworth and loaded onto 67 wagons of a specially commissioned train for transportation to Brentford Docks, thence by ship to America.
The builders who’d dismantled Rose Cottage went too and re-erected the building at the Henry Ford Museum’s Greenfield Village. So pleased was Henry with their workmanship that he paid for them all to have a holiday at Niagara Falls before catching the ship back to Blighty.
If you visit Greenfield Village in Detroit and are not worn out with the excitement of seeing Rose Cottage and George Washington’s bed for yourself, you might like to seek out another piece of Gloucestershire Mr Ford shipped Stateside.
On another trip to li’l old England, Henry stayed in Burford at the Lygon Arms, which was then owned by Sydney Russell, father of the furniture designer Gordon Russell. We must guess that in conversation, Henry Ford asked Sydney if he had any old picturesque Cotswold stone buildings he wanted to sell and was answered in the affirmative.
Sydney Russell owned a disused forge in Snowshill and before long that was taken down, numbered stone-by-stone, put on a train, then a ship and rebuilt in Michigan.
By the way, the brochure for the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation is a lively read, urging visitors to “explore the place where America’s can-do spirit inspires you to go out and get it done”. So there.
It also reveals that the Cotswolds, from where Rose Cottage and the Snowshill forge originated, “is a range of mountains in the south-east of England”.
You learn something every day.