History
The hall dates back to around 1420, when it was recorded as being inhabited by one William Otes. Prior to 1619, it was owned by the Savile and Waterhouse families. The three families' armorial symbols are recorded in a stone-mullioned 20-light window. For three hundred years, it was in the hands of the Lister family (c. 1615-1926). Its most famous resident was Anne Lister (1791–1840) who became sole owner of the hall after the death of her aunt. It is currently open to the public, the 'West Yorkshire Folk Museum' being housed in an adjoining barn and farm buildings.
The hall has been extensively modified from its original design by generations of residents, although its Tudor half-timbered frontage remains its most recognisable feature. The hall has a variety of restored workshops, including a brewery, a basket-weaving shop, a tannery, a stable and an extensive collection of horse-drawn carriages.
The park and gardens were restored, between 2007 and 2008, with almost £3.9 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund and £1.2 million from Calderdale Council. The major features of the park, including terraced gardens, rock gardens, cascades, and the boating lake, were commissioned by Anne Lister in the 1830s and a "Paisley Shawl" garden designed for the terrace, by Joshua Major, was added in 1850s. The park also contains a dry stone walling exhibition, children's play area and miniature steam railway.
Read more about this topic: Shibden Hall
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“What would we not give for some great poem to read now, which would be in harmony with the scenery,—for if men read aright, methinks they would never read anything but poems. No history nor philosophy can supply their place.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Literary works cannot be taken over like factories, or literary forms of expression like industrial methods. Realist writing, of which history offers many widely varying examples, is likewise conditioned by the question of how, when and for what class it is made use of.”
—Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956)
“If man is reduced to being nothing but a character in history, he has no other choice but to subside into the sound and fury of a completely irrational history or to endow history with the form of human reason.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)