Even more on the Brontë Birthplace auction

Earlier today we post more on the so-called Lot No 053. Now several newspapers and news agencies echo this news.

From Reuters:

Webber added: "When you consider that this family gave the world the likes of Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre it's hard to believe that the home in which they were conceived and born is still available for private sale -- especially when the appeal of the Brontes is global."
The current owner, detective-story writer Barbara Whitehead, has restored many of the house's original features and opened its doors to visitors.
Writing on a Web site about the house, she said: "It was a busy home and a happy, youthful one."
She added: "People sometimes wonder why the birthplaces of famous people are so important. But the first years are very formative."
Her son, Roger Howson, told Reuters: "My mother got a real thrill showing people around. The fact it was the birthplace of the Bronte sisters was a real attraction for her moving here."
Part of the building was later used as a butcher's and a restaurant, and an extra bedroom was added.

From The Telegraph (this article includes a few pictures):

The Lottery Fund had refused to support plans by the Brontë Birthplace Trust for a £500,000 tourist and study centre and its owners were planning to sell it as an anonymous private house. The Trust disbanded soon after and ill-health forced Mayston to pull out, leaving Ms Whitehead with the role as sole conservator and curator.
Now, at 76, she feels it is time to pass the responsibility on.
“She has regrets that that she has not been able to do all she would have wanted,” says her son, Roger Howson, 57, a retired civil servant.
“But she is pleased that she achieved what she set out to do, which was to save it. She has completed a significant part of restoring it to its original state.
“It led to a much closer association with the Brontës, whose books she obviously already knew. She researched the family’s early life, joined the Brontë Society and served on its council.”
She also wrote a novel, Charlotte Brontë and her ‘Dearest Nell’, about Charlotte’s friendship with Ellen Nussey. Barbara found that the house, which was built in 1802, had gone through a series of alterations since the Brontës left. It had been split into two homes, had a single-storey butcher’s shop built in the front garden in the 19th century and had a brief incarnation in the 1990s as a restaurant.
Yet its literary legacy earned it a Grade II* listing, even though its link with history is fleeting. The children were barely out of nappies when their father, the Rev Patrick Brontë, moved his family to their better-known address eight miles over the moors at the Parsonage in Haworth.
But while the stone terrace cottage is as unassuming as its address, it played a part in nurturing the collective Brontë genius. Patrick wrote and published two books there and his wife Maria wrote with the intention of being published.
“It was a busy home and a happy, youthful one,” Barbara writes on the Brontë Birthplace website, “with fresh furnishings of the light and graceful Regency period.
“There would be constant comings and goings of churchwardens and parishioners, as well as friends and family from Bradford.”
Mayston once described the house as “the Bethlehem of the Brontës”. He and Whitehead set about restoring the house to the way it was in 1820 when the Brontës left. They spent £20,000 on repairs, restoration, period furniture and antiques – even buying the original title deeds from a collector.
“It was a labour of love,” says Howson. Barbara restored the original kitchen, opened up a staircase which had been enclosed, reflagged the hall floor and had a new stair carpet woven in an authentic Georgian pattern.
“Everything she has done fits in with the Brontës’ time,” says her son, “although she has obviously had to accept things which make it a 21st-century home, such as central heating.”
The house has two sitting rooms and a dining room, and three staircases leading to four bedrooms. There are also three front doors. A sign over the dining room fireplace reads: “Tradition has it that all the famous Brontë children were born in this room. These infants of genius were nurtured each day in a loving home, unaware of the disaster and glory that lay ahead. Where in the world of literature is there a room more deserving of our love?”
The fame of the house is international and Barbara has shown round up to 100 visitors a week. Tony Webber, of the auctioneers Eddisons, has tried to whip up enthusiasm among Brontë aficionados.
“We have emailed Brontë societies across the world,” he says. “If they aren’t interested in bidding, then it will make a lovely home for someone, but I think Barbara Whitehead would be most upset if somebody came in and ripped it all apart ignoring the Brontë connection.
“It certainly has an atmosphere, even with all mod cons. You can actually imagine the Brontës living here. There is a bit of a feel about the place – a sense of the history.” (Paul Wilkinson)

From The Scotsman:

"It would be nice to see the home purchased and used to further build the Bronte brand in Yorkshire," said Tony Webber, auctioneer for Eddisons who are handling the sale.
"But then again, how romantic would it be if a family bought it and their children went on to make an impact in the literary world?" (Avril Ormsby)

We will see what happens next Monday. We are still hoping that some rich person will step in, buy it and then give it to some institution/council à la James Roberts, who bought the Haworth parsonage and gave it to the Brontë Society in the 1920s.

Categories: Brontëana, In the News