Preservation - Trust Annual Report 1969
Why Preserve? Sir Hugh Casson last year in his illuminating and humorous lecture at the Annual General Meeting, wondered why we stuck to the name "Preservation Trust' feeling that it smacked perhaps of embalment. There is of course some truth in this, but when we have worked under one banner for so long we do at least feel that what we stand for is known and, we hope, respected. The value which is built up round a particular name is considerable.
It is however only right that we should be continually examining ourselves and what we stand for. A watch dog without a bark is worse than useless. In a few words we want to preserve the best of Winchester, to retain the unique character of the City and keep alive the historical associations. There is much interest in the archaeology of Winchester, but what is to be seen above the ground needs to be preserved as well.
This raises the question of whether it is really true that we cannot now build anything as good as our forebears, and the answer is quite simply "Yes".
There is first of all the matter of the building materials. They are mass produced and imported from factories many miles away. There is no longer any relationship of the building to its locality. But this is of less significance than the advent of the motor car. Nobody has yet succeeded in creating a new town which suits both people and cars. Many new towns built since the war are lacking in real human qualities. At last, Cumbernauld was to solve all these problems, but alas this too has proved less than ideal, because not everyone can go about in a car, and the pedestrians are now struggling along the roads made for motorists.
A City like Winchester was created over a very long period of time and is based on the continual interaction of all human needs and opportunities, and while we see other towns steadily growing uglier we can avoid this by preserving what we have. But it has to be remembered that cities have to function socially, and changes in the use of buildings have to reflect this.
By Preservation we don't mean embalming, but the preservation of Winchester as a good place to live in, which means looking after the best of what we have.