Abstract
William Kershaw Slater was born on 19 October 1893, the only child of James Slater (1859-1922) and Mary Ann Kershaw (1861-1924). His father belonged to the older generation of Lancashire cotton manufacturers who knew the industry from A to Z—a highly skilled technologist with great business ability who retired as managing director of a large company with directorships in several others. His mother, who came of a Yorkshire farming family, never lost her interest in, and love of, the land. His grandfather on his mother’s side was a man of many interests; he was a keen amateur botanist and a founder member of the second Cooperative Society to be formed in England, remaining a member of its Board for many years. As a child, Slater suffered rather severely from asthma and was at first unable to attend school. Eventually, at his doctor’s recommendation, he was sent to Bournemouth to live in the house of the proprietor of a small private school. The curriculum of this school was limited but unusual and included, along with English and arithmetic, astronomy, natural history and book-keeping. In the evening the schoolmaster’s family and resident pupils read for two or three hours; for the young Slater the reading began with boys’ stories and graduated to Dickens, Scott and the Victorian essayists. About the age of 14 his health improved quite markedly and he returned to live at his home in the small Lancashire town of Shaw. The boy was now sufficiently recovered to be able to attend Hulme Grammar School (Oldham). His uncle William Kershaw, Director of Education for Oldham, was one of the main influences in Slater’s early reading. He helped him to build up a small library of his own, mainly of the English classics in the Everyman’s edition.