The Social and Educational Reformation in New Lanark.
New Lanark, the former cotton spinning village in the valley of the River Clyde near the old town of Lanark, is famous internationally because of its pioneering management, and social and educational experiments led by the publicist, Robert Owen. New Lanark is also an important industrial monument, because of its role as an early center of mass production using state-of-the-art technology at the time in 1785. It was built by David Dale, Owen's father-in-law, a resourceful textile entrepreneur and banker. One reason for the success of New Lanark in the early stages of Industrial Revolution was its geographic location. With the natural, cheap power of the Falls of Clyde to drive its spinning machinery, and a close connection with Glasgow, the industrial center of Scotland, New Lanark was established quickly by David Dale. Although much of the recorded history of New Lanark is about the era when the factory was under Robert Owen's management, from about 1800 to 1825, New Lanark existed and performed well as an extremely efficient textile mill for about 200 years since Dale's era! Therefore, it is interesting to examine its rather long history for a Scottish textile factory and how it became a suitable laboratory for Owen's social reformation. .
New Lanark was under several major ownerships from 1785 to 1968: David Dale, from 1785 to 1800; Robert Owen, from 1800 to 1825; John Walker and sons, from 1825 to 1881; Birkmyres and 'the Gourock', from 1881 to 1968. Since then much effort had been put in both from public and private forces to make it possible to be one of the England's best tourist attractions. This document, it will mainly focus on humanitarianism and social and educational reforms in Dale's to Owen's era and what impacts these activities had on its architecture, rather than on the industrial revolution and the successes of the entrepreneurs.