The Emperors - Unit 4

Robert Owen has bought New Lanark Mills

The 27-year-old young bussinessman, Robert Owen, has converted New Lanark Mills in a "Working Paradise" and has provided opportunities for children.

In 1799 Robert Owen, at the age of twenty-seven, ended the purchase of the Dale factory holdings in New Lanark, Scotland, and married Anne Caroline Dale soon there after.

As the manager of the New Lanark Mills, which employed more two thousand people, (including around five hundred children whose working life had begun at the age of five or six when they had left Edinburgh or Glasgow workhouses), Robert Owen introduced a yet more human and progressive employment regime than the one that had been in place under David Dale. No child younger than ten years old was employed and these were allowed relatively decent breaks for meals and some modestly worth while educational opportunities. As far as adult employees went he sought to introduce some new machinery, to improve the flow of work through the factory, and to quietly discourage pilfering and drunkenness.

New Lanark gained international fame when Owen's experiments in enhancing his workers' environment resulted in increased productivity and profit. Robert Owen spent considerable amounts of money on improving housing conditions in New Lanark, arranging the public refuse system, and for the paving of its streets. He also arranged for a company store that sold goods of higher quality and at lower prices than the stores that had previously been available in the area. This store managed to make a profit that Owen diverted towards funding a school for the worker's children leading to the establishment of the first infant school in Great Britain through Owen's support for the educational efforts of James Buchanan.