page_title: George Stephenson
section_title: Life at Alton Grange
hierarchical_section_title: George Stephenson / Life at Alton Grange
caption_attribution_description: English: Stephenson's House at Alton Grange, (Alton Hill, Ravenstone) remains largely unchanged today.
context_page_description: George Stephenson was a British civil engineer and mechanical engineer. Renowned as the "Father of Railways", Stephenson was considered by the Victorians a great example of diligent application and thirst for improvement. Self-help advocate Samuel Smiles particularly praised his achievements. His chosen rail gauge, sometimes called 'Stephenson gauge', was the basis for the 4 feet 8 ¹⁄₂ inches standard gauge used by most of the world's railways.
  Pioneered by Stephenson, rail transport was one of the most important technological inventions of the 19th century and a key component of the Industrial Revolution. Built by George and his son Robert's company Robert Stephenson and Company, the Locomotion No. 1 is the first steam locomotive to carry passengers on a public rail line, the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825. George also built the first public inter-city railway line in the world to use locomotives, the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, which opened in 1830.
context_section_description: George Stephenson moved to the parish of Alton Grange (now part of Ravenstone) in Leicestershire in 1830, originally to consult on the Leicester and Swannington Railway, a line primarily proposed to take coal from the western coal fields of the county to Leicester. The promoters of the line Mr William Stenson and Mr John Ellis, had difficulties in raising the necessary capital as the majority of local wealth had been invested in canals. Realising the potential and need for the rail link Stephenson himself invested £2,500 and raised the remaining capital through his network of connections in Liverpool. His son Robert was made chief engineer with the first part of the line opening in 1832.
  During this same period the Snibston estate in Leicestershire came up for auction, it lay adjoining the proposed Swannington to Leicester route and was believed to contain valuable coal reserves. Stephenson realising the financial potential of the site, given its proximity to the proposed rail link and the fact that the manufacturing town of Leicester was then being supplied coal by canal from Derbyshire, bought the estate.
  Employing a previously used method of mining in the midlands called tubbing to access the deep coal seams, his success could not have been greater. Stephenson’s coal mine delivered the first rail cars of coal into Leicester dramatically reducing the price of coal and saving the city some £40,000 per annum.
  Stephenson remained at Alton Grange until 1838 before moving to Tapton House in Derbyshire.
caption: Stephenson's House at Alton Grange
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