The origins of one the country’s major textile firms in Stroud will be traced at an exhibition in the town.
The Victorian beginnings of Strachan and Co will be explained at the Stroudwater Textile Trust show at the Museum in the Park.
In the 1800s Strachan’s Lodgemore and Fromehall Mills were built up into the second largest woollen cloth business in Gloucestershire.
By the 1860s and 70s they were one of the most important in the country.
Textile trust spokesman Ian Mackintosh said: “Victorians considered local cloth to be almost perfect.
“It won numerous accolades so that an eminent London journalist Henry Mayhew visited to write a detailed account of the processes involved.
“Famous for his study of the street people of London he brought his powers of close observation to bear on the mill’s workers.”
So now, 150 years after Mayhew’s visit drew attention nationally to Strachan’s importance, the exhibition was highlighting it again from June 4 to 16, opening from 10am to 5pm daily except on June 10 when the museum is closed.
Lodgemore Mill is now the home of WSP Textiles Ltd, which produces the cloth used on the tennis balls at Wimbledon and the cloth for the tables at the World Snooker Championship.
