420 History of Inland Transport 



Clubs formed in connection with the Institution include an 

 athletic club, a rifle club, a quoit club, a cricket club and a 

 football club. Concerts, illustrated lectures and various 

 entertainments are given in the Institution during the course 

 of each session. 



The Midland Railway Institute at Derby, also going back 

 to 1851, had a membership in 1910 of 2621. Classes in French 

 and shorthand are held, but technical subjects are not taught, 

 special facilities in this respect for the company's staff being 

 provided by a large municipal technical college in the town. 

 The Institute has a library of over 17,000 volumes, a well- 

 stocked reading-room, a dining hall, a restaurant (for the 

 salaried staff), a cafe (for the wages staff), committee rooms 

 and a billiard-room ; while the various associations include 

 an engineering club (which holds fortnightly meetings 

 during the winter months for the reading and the discussion 

 of papers, and, also, pays visits to engineering works), a 

 natural history society (which holds indoor meetings and 

 organises Saturday rambles), a dramatic society, a fishing 

 club, a photographic society and a whist and billiard club. 



A Mechanics' Institute and Technical School opened at 

 Horwich in 1888 was mainly due to a grant of ^5000 by the 

 directors of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company 

 and to the gift of the " Samuel Fielden " wing by the widow of 

 that gentleman, for many years a director of the company. 

 In October, 1910, there were 2224 members, of whom all but 

 53 were in the employ of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway 

 Company. The leading features of the Institute include a 

 dining hall, reading, magazine and smoke-rooms, a library of 

 about 13,000 volumes, a lecture hall with seating accommoda- 

 tion for 900 persons, the Fielden gymnasium, a miniature 

 rifle - range, class - rooms, and chemical and mechanical 

 laboratories. 



Science, art, technical, commercial and preparatory classes 

 are conducted at the Institute in connection with the Board 

 of Education, London, and the instruction given includes a 

 continuous course of study designed to enable engineering 

 students to make the best use of classes of direct service to 

 them. The special arrangements thus made comprise a 

 preliminary technical course (extended over two years), 

 a mechanical engineering course (five years) and an electrical 



