World Connections

Sir Titus Salt was awarded the French Legion D’honour for his exemplary philanthropic approach to business in founding Saltaire, after he agreed to exhibit at the 1867 Paris Exhibition.

The major honour is referenced on the cover of the Jubilee edition of 'Saltaire, a Sketch History', produced in 1903 to commemorate the founding of Saltaire. The same book was also produced in America earlier in 1895.

The Royal Yorkshire Jubilee Exhibition was held in Saltaire in 1887 to celebrate Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee and more importantly, for Saltaire, to help meet the costs of the new School of Art and Science that had been built on Exhibition Road as a memorial to Sir Titus Salt. It was opened by Princess Beatrice and included exhibition stands, a concert hall, a bandstand, refreshment rooms and pleasure grounds and entertainments.

At the far end of the exhibition grounds there was a Japanese art and industrial exhibition in the form of a village reportedly 'peopled by Native Men, Women, and Children' and illustrating the 'industrial, social, and domestic life of Japan.' There was even a splendidly embellished Buddhist Temple.

The Shipley Times of 7 May 1887 reported:

A complete tour of the Exhibition is not made until the Japanese village at the East end of the Exhibition grounds has been visited and Mr. Tannaker Buchicrossan has provided there entertainment and instruction sufficient to satisfy the most exacting.

During building work on Exhibition Road in 1976 a sculpture was found that is believed to have been part of the village. It is now part of the Saltaire Collection.

The Victoria and Albert Museum have confirmed that the sculpture is actually Chinese.

Find more objects from the 1887 exhibition

James Roberts started work at 11 as a worsted spinner in a mill in Oxenhope, near Keighley. He rose from these humble beginnings to become a leading textiles businessman and eventually owner of Salts Mill and Saltaire, a success partly built on trading with Russia.

By the late 1880s Roberts was a successful Bradford mill owner and had spotted a business opportunity in the vast flocks of merino sheep being reared in Russia. He spent up to three months a year in Russia sourcing wool from large estates in Rostov on Don. He also started initial processing of the wool before it came to Britain so its source could be hidden from his competitors. His travels in Russia forged a strong attachment and Roberts became fluent in Russian.

In 1893 Roberts was part of a consortium of business men that purchased the failing Salt family business and Saltaire. Roberts gradually bought out the other partners to become sole owner by 1902. He revitalised the business and continued to support Saltaire and its amenities. But the First World War brought great challenges when it broke out in 1914.

At the start of the war he cancelled a trip to Russia 'to stand by' his workers. He had to deal with an immediate crisis because 90% of the exported yarn had gone to Germany and Russia and both countries cancelled their outstanding contracts. The mill was put on short time working but Roberts suspended the rents for the workers' homes in the village. Roberts reduced the cost of cloth to secure a government contract and eventually re-commenced exports to Russia, though at poor rates of exchange.

Despite his many problems, in June 1916 Sir James gave a gift of £10,000 (around £700,000 today) to Leeds University for the foundation of a professorship of Russian language and literature, believing that having Russian-speaking graduates was important for future business. Studies started in April 1917, just as the first Russian revolution was happening. When the Bolsheviks took control in October Roberts' investments in Russia were wiped out and he suffered a huge financial loss.

The loss of his Russian trade and the challenges of the war took its toll on Roberts and he sold the textiles business and the Saltaire Estate to a syndicate of Bradford 'Wool men' in 1918.

At the University of Leeds University, the chair of Russian studies thirved, interrupted only by the Second World War. It's heyday was the 1960s when there were 10 lecturers. Today Leeds has studies of the Russian Language in its School of Languages. Culture and Society and Russian History in its School of History, and the Library Special Collections holds the world-renowned Leeds Russian Archive.

Explore the Roberts Family Collection

Feliks Czenkusz was born on June 4 1920 in a village called Lakorz, in Poland, just 2 kilometres from the German Border. At the start of the Second World War Feliks embarked on a long journey that was to take him eventually to Saltaire eight years later.

He first escaped to neutral Lithuania but after a few months in a camp he was moved to Russia with other Poles. When Germany invaded Russia on in 1941 Feliks and the others were marched off again to board a ship and then a train travelling south. Arriving at a camp, Feliks found himself a member of the Free Polish Army. He recalled, 'we didn't know it but this was our first step to becoming free men'.

Feliks and his comrades travelled to Iraq and trained for a year before moving to the Allied front in the South of Italy. For two years, Feliks took part in battles across Italy, including the famed taking of the German stronghold of Monte Cassino by Polish troops.

When the war ended Feliks was not returned to, the now Russian-dominated, Poland. Instead in 1946 he boarded the 'Empire Pride' bound for Liverpool.

Settling first in Norfolk, Feliks moved to Bingley in 1947 to work in the textile industry. After 18 months, he got a job as a weaver in Salts Mill, Saltaire. He remained in work there until retiring in 1982, seeing huge changes in the textile business during this period.

Read more about Feliks

Dora, Velia and Margherita Ricciardo were born before the Second World War in Avezzano, a village near Sessa Aurunca and 40 miles from Naples. They helped in their father's agricutural business, including harvesting grasses, or stramma, some of which was pulled into twine and plaited for rope making. The skills they developed would prove to be useful in the British textile industry.

After the Second World War, Italy's economy was shattered and the family struggled until their father's business went bankrupt in 1956. Dora's brother had heard that British textile companies were seeking 'girls' to work in their mills, with travel costs paid by the recruiting firms. Dora and Velia went to Naples to be rigorously interviewed and undergo a thorough medical examination by the British recruiters and a team of seven doctors. They were successful and with short notice left Italy to arrive at a hostel in Shipley on a March evening in 1957. Their younger sister Margherita later came to join them.

The sisters started work at Henry Mason's Mill, but their experiences were simiar to the many Italian women recruited at the same time to work at nearby Salts Mill. Dora was employed as a 'gill minder', which involved looking after two large boxes of yarn to make sure that the weight was always balanced. 'When pieces of yarn were broken, I had to mend/tie these and then load them on to the bobbins. Where yarn was broken, I had to put a cross onto the bobbins'. Margherita worked in the winding process room and earned £4 a week like her sisters. They sent £10 each a month home to their parents, a welcome relief for the family in Italy.

The weather was a challenge, with the sisters, and their clothes, unused to the cold and the snow. The sisters also experienced some prejudice from - a few - of the British people they met and worked with. Some people said 'you don't belong here' or 'if you don't like it go back to your own country'.

Living in the hostel with around 40 other young Italian women was great fun except for the small, shared kitchen. The sisters attended Belle Vue Upper School on Wednesday and Thursday evenings for voluntary English lessons. At work they got by with sign language at first and did make many English friends, but the language barrier was very hard at times. 'It was always nice to get back to the hostel where we could all understand one another'.

Dora, Velia and Margherita continued to work in England, and all eventually married - St. Aidan's Church in Baildon, by Father Villani from the Italian Mission in Bradford - and had children. They are clear that they have had a happy life and would not change how life has been for them in Britain.

Read more about the sisters

As recounted above, there is a strong historical business connection between Saltaire and Dayton, Tennessee. There is also a more personal story to be told concerning a well-travelled teapot…

In the 1860s, William Hanson moved to Saltaire to work as a fitter at Salts Mill. Sir Titus Salt valued William's engineering skills highly and eventually promoted him to head of the Engineering department for the Mill.

William Hanson's youngest daughter Eva became a school teacher in Saltaire. She was engaged to Percy Johnson, a senior book-keeper at Salts Mill. Around 1884 Percy travelled to Dayton, Tennessee with Titus Salt Junior and Charles Stead to oversee the finances of the Dayton Coal and Iron company that they had founded in 1883. Eva travelled to Dayton to marry Percy Johnson in 1885 and among the wedding gifts that went with her was a teapot. Percy and Eva remained in the United States and eventually settled in Canada.

Back in Britain, Eva's grand-nephew Donald Hanson rose through the ranks of the textiles giant Illingworth, Morris that purchased the Salt business in 1958. Donald eventually became chair and joint chief executive for Illingworth, Morris in 1981. In May 2012 Saltaire Historians Dave Shaw and David King were invited to visit Dayton, and Donald requested that they enquire about his great aunt and uncle to find out more about their time in Dayton. Donald had many fond memories of Aunt Eva's visits back to Yorkshire with gifts of American toys that could not be found here.

In Dayton, Shaw and King contacted Pat Guffey, County Historian for Rhea County, and he had an immediate answer 'Percival knew my great grandparents and presented them with a teapot brought from England, when he finally left Dayton' – asking 'would you like to have it, to give to Mr. Hanson'.

The teapot was brought back to Saltaire where it was presented to Donald, who then donated it to the Saltaire Collection.

The Saltaire Collection is very grateful to Dave Shaw and David King, for this wonderful item and its story.