General view from WNW of Rosedale Street, with Long Row (left) and Double Row (right)

Description General view from WNW of Rosedale Street, with Long Row (left) and Double Row (right)

Date 12/6/2002

Collection Records of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS), Edinbu

Catalogue Number E 32559 CN

Category Photographs and Off-line Digital Images

Copies SC 755015

Scope and Content Nos 1-26 Long Row, New Lanark, South Lanarkshire, from west-north-west This shows the gable end (left) of Nos 1-26 Long Row which was built in the late 18th century and split into 14 tenements. These tenements are two-storeyed on the north (just out of sight on the left), but, because the building is built on a slope, the south front, seen here, is three-storeyed. Equally, the north front of Nos 9-24 Double Row (right) is three-storeyed but the south front is between four-and five-storeyed. Mill workers and their families mainly lived in single-roomed flats in these tenements although larger families may have been allowed more space. Living conditions were good for the time but poor by modern day standards. The only source of water was from public wells or the River Clyde and sewage was stored in public dung heaps. Since 1977 each of the tenements in Long Row have been restored into single houses and ten of them are privately owned with four let by the New Lanark Association. Nos 9-24 Double Row were unrestored at the end of the 20th century. New Lanark was founded c.1785 by David Dale (1739-1806), a Glasgow merchant, and Richard Arkwright (1732-92), inventor of a water-frame for cotton spinning. Powered by water flowing from the Falls of Clyde the first cotton mill opened in 1786 and by 1799 the complex was the largest of its kind in Scotland. Robert Owen (1771-1858), who was married to David Dale's daughter, was one of a group who bought the mills in 1800. He transformed them into a model industrial community with good working conditions, houses, a non-profit store, a school and an institute for workers. Owen's partners bought the mills in 1828 and operated them until 1881 when another partnership took over. The Gourock Ropework Company ran the site until 1968 which is now mainly under the care of the New Lanark Conservation Trust (founded 1974-5). New Lanark was designated a World Heritage Site in 2001. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

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