Brontë Parsonage Museum facts for kids
The Brontë Parsonage Museum is a special house museum that celebrates the famous Brontë sisters: Charlotte, Emily, and Anne. This museum is in their old family home, a parsonage in Haworth, West Yorkshire, England. The sisters lived here for most of their lives and wrote their amazing novels in this very house.
The Brontë Society helps run the museum. It is one of the oldest groups dedicated to writers in the English-speaking world. Its members help keep the museum and its valuable collections safe for everyone to enjoy. The parsonage building itself is a very important historical site in England.
Contents
Discovering the Brontë Family Home
The Brontë Parsonage was built a long time ago, between 1778 and 1779. In 1820, Patrick Brontë, the sisters' father, became the new minister at St Michael and All Angels' Church, Haworth. He moved into the parsonage with his wife, Maria, and their six children. This house became their family home for the rest of their lives.
The wild, open moorland around the house greatly influenced Charlotte, Emily, and Anne's writing. Their father, Patrick, was also a writer, so the children grew up seeing books with their family name on the shelves.
In 1821, Maria Brontë, the mother, passed away. Her unmarried sister, Elizabeth Branwell, came to live with the family and help raise the children. In 1824, the four oldest sisters went to a school called the Clergy Daughters' School. Sadly, the eldest daughter, Maria, became ill and died at the parsonage in May 1825, when she was eleven. Ten-year-old Elizabeth also became ill and passed away shortly after.
The Sisters Become Writers
Years later, in 1846, Charlotte, Emily, and Anne used some money from their Aunt Branwell to publish their poems. They used secret names to hide their true identities: Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. Their book of Poems was published, but only two copies were sold!
Charlotte then tried to publish her first novel, The Professor. Several publishers said no. However, one publisher, Smith, Elder & Co., encouraged her to send them her next book. This next book was Jane Eyre, which was accepted and published in October 1847.
Around the same time, Emily's novel Wuthering Heights and Anne's novel Agnes Grey were also published. Later, after Anne's second novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Charlotte and Anne had to reveal their real names.
Sad Times for the Family
The Brontë family faced many sad times. Their brother, Branwell, became ill and passed away suddenly in September 1848, at age 31. Emily also became ill and passed away in December 1848, at age 30. Anne too became ill and went to Scarborough to try a sea cure, but she passed away there in May 1849, at age 29.
Charlotte continued to write. She finished her novel Shirley, which was published in 1849. Her last novel, Villette, came out in 1853. In 1854, Charlotte married her father's assistant, Arthur Bell Nicholls. She passed away in March 1855, at age 38. Patrick Brontë, the father, lived at the parsonage for six more years, cared for by his son-in-law. He passed away in 1861, at age 84.
The Brontë Society and Museum
After Patrick Brontë passed away in 1861, the items from the parsonage were sold off. Friends and servants also sold letters and keepsakes. In 1893, the head librarian of Bradford Library suggested that all the important items, letters, and documents related to the Brontës should be collected and saved.
This led to the founding of the Brontë Society. They started collecting "Brontëana" – items connected to the family. By 1895, the collection was big enough to be shown in a museum above a bank in Haworth. The society quickly gained many members, and about 10,000 people visited the museum in its first year!
A Permanent Home for the Collection
In 1928, a man named Sir James Roberts bought Haworth Parsonage for £3,000. He then set it up as a museum and gave it to the Brontë Society. This meant the Brontë family's actual home became the museum.
A collector named Henry Bonnell from Philadelphia also left his large collection to the society in 1926. This collection was moved to the parsonage when it opened, making it available for scholars to study. The museum's collection has continued to grow over the years, with new items being donated or loaned. Today, the Brontë Society has about 2,000 members.
One special item is the mahogany desk where Charlotte Brontë wrote her famous novels. After being in private collections for over a century, it was donated to the museum in 2011 by a kind person who bought it for £20,000 in 2009.
See also
- Grade I listed buildings in City of Bradford
- Listed buildings in Haworth, Cross Roads and Stanbury
