The Wordsworth Trust
| Formation | 1890 |
|---|---|
| Purpose | heritage tourism |
| Location | |
| Website | www |
The Wordsworth Trust is an independent charity in the United Kingdom. It celebrates the life of the poet William Wordsworth, and looks after Dove Cottage in the Lake District village of Grasmere where Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy Wordsworth lived between 1799 and 1808. It also looks after the majority of the surrounding properties in the conservation area of Town End, and a collection of manuscripts, books and fine art relating to Wordsworth and other writers and artists of the Romantic period.
The Wordsworth Trust's charitable purposes comprise preserving Dove Cottage and its environs, and advancing the public knowledge and enjoyment of the works of Wordsworth and the Romantic period.
The Wordsworth Trust is a member of the Cumbria Museum Consortium, along with Lakeland Arts and the Tullie House Museum and Art Gallery Trust. In 2012–15 and 2015–18 this consortium was one of the 21 museums or consortia (16 in the earlier period) to be funded by Arts Council England as "Major Partner Museums".
The Trust's first Director was Dr Robert Woof CBE. Its current Director is Michael McGregor. Its Chairman is Chris Smith.
The Wordsworth Trust was founded (as the Dove Cottage Trust) in December 1891. Its creation followed a successful appeal for funds to purchase Dove Cottage, "for the eternal possession of those who love English poetry all over the world". Dove Cottage itself opened to visitors on 27 July 1891.
The appeal to purchase Dove Cottage was led by Stopford Brooke; the Wordsworth Trust's other founding trustees included Canon Hardwicke Rawnsley, Professor William Knight, The Rt Rev John Wordsworth and the Duke of Argyll. Their model was Shakespeare's birthplace in Stratford-upon-Avon, which had been purchased for the nation in 1847, but part of their motivation was also "the associations, personal, literary and moral, which gather around this cottage". As well as Dorothy Wordsworth, these associations included Thomas De Quincey (who himself had the tenancy of Dove Cottage between 1809 and 1835), Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Southey, Sir Walter Scott, Sir Humphry Davy and Sir George Beaumont.
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