Today is the bicentennial of the birth of John Passmore Edwards who was born near Redruth in Blackwater, in 1823, He was a chartist and philanthropist, and a life-long champion of the working classes and is remembered as a generous benefactor.
Over the relatively short space of 14 years, 70 major buildings were established in Cornwall, London and other places in the UK, for the benefit of local communities. One of these is the old Redruth Library building on Clinton Road – now re-opened as The Ladder and today we joined a wonderful celebration, the Human Book Chain!
The library is now nearer to the town and about 100 people including children from two local schools formed a chain between the two buildings and passed books along. Everyone looked at the titles as the books were passed from hand to hand.
Part of the human chain passing books along, photo taken by Ladder photographer
Puppet Passmore Edwards on his way back to The LadderThe following poem and film were shown at The Ladder and are a wonderful tribute to a remarkable man. Your Space and Mine – A Passmore Edwards Poem by Ben Rowswell.
