Chetham's School of Music and Library  Manchester Cathedral began life
as a church on a sandstone bluff at the confluence of the rivers Irk
and Irwell. In 1421 it was transformed into a collegiate
foundation. A series of buildings were constructed on the site of
the manor house of the de la Warre family. The college was
dissolved in 1547 and in the years that followed the buildings were put
to a variety of uses. In 1653 the executors of the will of a
wealthy merchant Humphry Chetham purchased them and founded a library
and a bluecoat school. Here is a view of the college in the mid
1700s from a map by Casson. There have been a number of additions
to the complex of buildings but the ones shown above are still there.
 The view below was taken in 2009 and the core of the complex of buildings is still made up of those of the medieval college and library.    The school describes itself as
follows: "With 290 or so students, aged 8 - 18, Chetham's is the
largest specialist Music School in the UK and the only Music School
based in the North of England."
  Above: The Millgate Building with the following plaque.    Below the Vallins Arts Centre  Below: College House and the Gatehouse  The photograph below, taken in the 1980s shows the site prior to the construction of New College House.  Below is the New College House in October of 2009  Below is the Palatine Building
(the white building on the right) which is the former Palatine Hotel
built in 1842 - 3 by J. P. & I. Holden. It was acquired by
the school in 1969.
 In October of 2009 excavation
began for the new extension to Chetham's School on Hunt's Bank.
   ****** The photographs below were taken in January 2010    On the far side of the building
site you can see the entrances to the Victoria Tunnels that have been
"Bricked-in". These tunnels were used as air-raid shelters during
WWII.
   Above you can again see the closed entrances to the tunnel system. ************ By March of 2010 the site preparation is complete.  Note that you can see the remnants of the brick walls from the former railway office building.  ******************* Update - June 6, 2010    ******************************* The site was once the location
of a set of buildings housing the offices of the Lancashire and
Yorkshire Railway.
 After the building was
demolished a parking lot was created as you can see in this photograph
by Peter Whatley in 1979.
 ![Creative Commons Licence [Some Rights Reserved]](http://creativecommons.org/images/public/somerights20.gif)
©
Copyright
Peter Whatley and licensed for reuse under
this Creative
Commons Licence.*************** Chetham's Library  Founded in 1653 by a bequest from Humphrey
Chetham (seen below in the monument dedicated to him in the adjacent
Cathedral), Chetham's Library is the oldest public library in the
English-speaking world. It operates as an independent charity and
remains open to readers and visitors free of charge.
The Humphrey Chetham monument in the Cathedral *************************** The library sits across the courtyard.
The entrance to the library is through the doorway below.  ********************
The Reading Room
     In this alcove. below, by the
window, - it is said - that Karl Marx,
who had travelled up from London, met with his friend Friedrich Engels
who was living in Manchester.
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