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The Garden City Utopia: A Critical Biography of Ebenezer Howard PDF

214 Pages·1988·21.142 MB·English
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THE GARDEN CITY UTOPIA Ebenezer Howard at the age of sixteen (from a contemporary photograph) The Garden City Utopia A Critical Biography of Ebenezer Howard Robert Beevers M MACMILLAN PRESS ©Robert Beevers 1988 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1988 978-0-333-42375-2 AII rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended). Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be Iiable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. First published 1988 Published by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LT D Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world Typeset by Wessex Typesetters (Division of The Eastem Press Ltd) Frome, Somerset British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Beevers, Robert The garden city utopia: a critica! biography of Ebenezer Howard. 1. Howard, Sir Ebenezer 2. City planners -Great Britain-Biography 3. Garden cities--Great Britain 1. Title 711' .4'0924 HT16l.H7 ISBN 978-1-349-19035-5 ISBN 978-1-349-19033-1 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-19033-1 To A.M.B. Contents List of Illustrations ix Acknowledgements xi 1 The Young Ebenezer 1 2 The Dissenter 9 3 Commonsense Socialism 25 4 From Unionville to Garden City 40 5 A Unique Combination of Proposals 55 6 The Evangelist and the Sceptic 68 7 Managing Director 79 8 The Ideal City Made Practicable 92 9 Housing a Co-operative Community 108 10 The Spirit of the Place 118 11 The Path Followed Up 133 12 A Hundred New Towns 145 13 Second Garden City 158 14 A Heroic Simpleton? 168 Notes and References 185 Index 201 vii List of Illustrations Frontispiece Ebenezer Howard at the age of sixteen (from a ii contemporary photograph, reproduced by permission of the British Library) 1 Ebenezer Howard in his mid thirties 15 (from a contemporary photograph, reproduced by permission of the British Library) 2 The Vanishing Point of Landlord's Rent 33 (from To-morrow) 3 The Master Key 41 (from a diagram by Ebenezer Howard, reproduced by courtesy of the Hertfordshire County Archive) 4 Garden City, Ward and Centre 51 (from To-morrow) 5 Ebenezer Howard in his late forties 56 (from a contemporary photograph, reproduced by permission of the British Library) 6 The Three Magnets 60 (from To-morrow) 7 Diagram of Administration 65 (from To-morrow) 8 Walter Crane's design for the cover of 81 Garden Cities of To-morrow 9 Elizabeth Howard about a year before her death 105 (from a contemporary photograph) 10 Group of Smokeless Slumless Cities 138 (from To-morrow) ix Acknowledgements I cannot now remember precisely how long ago it was that I first became interested in the ideas of Ebenezer Howard nor the names of the many persons who, over the years, provided what to them may have seemed insignificant pieces of information, but which together helped to build in my mind the first tentative outlines of a book. Latterly I have profited in more ways than I can possibly express in a short note from the professional advice, knowledge of the garden city movement, and personal concern of Mr Michael Hughes, senior assistant librarian at the Central Library, Welwyn Garden City, and archivist of the papers of the late Sir Frederic Osborn. I am indebted, too, to friends and former colleagues in the Open University. To Dr David Sewart, who read my typescript in an early draft, and who, by an unlikely analogy with Greek tragedy, reminded me that my subject was a man of flesh and blood no less than a theorist. To Miss Olive Lewis, whose assistance with the initial research charted the evidence and assembled it into manageable form. To Mrs Patricia Proctor, who tracked down many obscure references. And lastly to Miss Gillian Brown, whose skill at a word-processor made frequent revision of the text easy for the author, though no less tedious for herself. Permission to quote from published and unpublished letters of Shaw was granted by the Society of Authors, on behalf of the Bernard Shaw Estate © 1987 The Trustees of the British Museum, the Governors and Guardians of the National Gallery of Ireland and Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. The Leverhulme Trust, by the generous award of a research grant, gave me not only material help but a welcome incentive to bring the work to completion. R.B. Windsor, 1986 xi 1 The Young Ebenezer Upon the publication in October 1898 of To-morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform by Ebenezer Howard, The Times accorded it the modest tribute of a short notice on its book review page. The reviewer was clearly interested, even entertained, as he put it; but equally clearly he placed the garden city in the category of visionary schemes which, however attractive, are impossible of realisation. 'Mr. Howard', he wrote, 'is not content with half measures; like Sir Thomas More, he builds a Utopia - a charming "Garden City" of 32,000 people in the midst of a little territory, all owned, planned, built and generally directed by the community itself. The details of administration, taxation, etc., work out to perfection, and it is quite evident that if Mr. Howard could be made town clerk of such a city he would carry it on to everybody's satisfaction. The only difficulty is to create it; but that is a small matter to Utopians.'1 'If that be so', responded Howard, 'then, by "The Times" own showing, I am no Utopian for to me the building of a city is what I have long set my mind upon, and it is with me no "small matter".'2 Howard had indeed thought long and deeply about the subject and about the social problems which his garden cities were intended to solve. At the time of publication of To-morrow he was nearly 50, but the first stirrings of interest in his mind regarding the 'social question' seem to have begun some 25 years earlier during an abortive attempt to make a new start in life in America. Even so, he was a late starter partly no doubt because his formal education finished at the age of fifteen. Looking back on his early life from the vantage point of the fame and honour his garden city idea was to bring him, Howard confessed that he had made little progress at school and that for some years afterwards he had drifted from one job to another as clerk in the interstices of commerce in the City of London where he was born. The London of Ebenezer Howard's childhood was that of Charles Dickens, imbued with the same sense of optimistic vitality 1

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