Scotland is the proud location for four World Heritage sites. On this trip I've seen three of them: prehistoric Orkney, the centre of Edinburgh, and now this, the mill town of New Lanark (the other one is a tiny island in the middle of the Atlantic). And why is this mill so important? Good question. Aside from the fact that it's quite a big mill, which doesn't earn it world heritage status in my book, the reason seems to be that it's owner, Robert Owen, was quite nice. Owen provided his workers with good homes and wages, free health care and the world's first nursery school. As he rather frighteningly put it, 'society may be formed so as to exist without crime, witiout poverty, with health greatly improved, with little, if any misery, and with intelligence and happiness increased a hundredfold.'
Ah it is so good to read of your journey and see the pics of Scotland. I lived in Ayrshire 1997-1998 - West Kilbride to be exact. We were with YWAM and the house overlooked the Isle of Arran which was always covered with snow. Will you be going there at all on your travels?
ReplyDeleteMissed it this time - but I think it's great to know there's so much more still to see some other time.
ReplyDeletevery interesting, thanks
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