John Peele Clapham

Clapham founded or was connected with several notable buildings. Having arrived from Leeds,[13] he rented Burley Hall in Burley in Wharfedale from 1834,[1] until at least 1841,[8][14] and commissioned Burley Grange in 1840 in the same village, where he lived between 1841 and 1849. Between 1849 and 1859 he was living in Hanover Street, Leeds, to be nearer his place of work as county court treasurer.[1][9] In 1861 he was living in Queen Parade, Bilton, Harrogate.[10] By the end of his life he was living at Brookside, Ilkley,[3] a seven-bedroom house with a dining room, drawing room and library.[15]

• 
  Burley Hall, 2008

Clapham founded several Sunday schools for the children of mechanics in Leeds.[14]

In 1835, Clapham and the curate from St Mary's converted the upper storey of three cottages at Post Office Yard into a non-denominational Sunday School.[13] It closed in 1837 when a new curate, hired "at a liberal salary" by Mrs Anderton of Burley House,[16] started a rival ecumenical Sunday school in Back Lane. Clapham later built the schoolroom close to the Salem chapel to replace his earlier one.[14] Another version of this story says that in the early 1830s Clapham was superintendent of the Queen Street Sunday School when the vicar of St Mary's asked him to open and run a village school. However a new curate tried to make the new venture an Anglican school. The Sunday School teachers wanted a non-denominational school, and this was why he saw fit to commission the Salem Chapel and its Sunday school with support from "Leeds, Bradford and elsewhere."[1]

Burley Grange (now The Grange) replaced a previous Burley Grange which was still standing in 1837.[17] The new one was commissioned by Claphem and completed in 1840,[18] although at the beginning of 1841 he was still living at Burley Hall.[8] In 1849 Burley Grange was sold, to be later owned by Standfield, Emley and Hodson among others. Burley Urban District Council (which from 1937 was Ilkley Urban District Council) bought it in 1905. Thus it became the council office, the public library, and Grange Men's Club. It was then purchased by Bradford College for adult education,[18] and closed again in 2006.[19] Alan Hayes of Business Support and Development purchased Burley Grange in January 2009 with the intention of reopening it in the following August as a centre for business and education.[20][21]

• 
  Burley Grange, east side 1850
• 
  Burley Grange, north side, 2020
• 
  The Roundhouse in Grange Park, 2020

This Dissenter chapel, manse and schoolroom, designed for £1,500 by James Pigott Pritchett of York, was commissioned by Clapham on part of the plot on Main Street, Burley in Wharfedale, where he was building Burley Grange.[22][23] The schoolroom was a revival of his previous Sunday school which had closed in 1837.[13] He laid the foundation stone of the chapel on 14 October 1849. Mary Ann, his wife, laid the cornerstone for the schoolroom on the same day. The chapel, consecrated on 29 July 1840, was intended for “the special use of the congregation of Protestant Dissenters of the International Order.” The building, in the "Pointed style of the 12th century," originally had a balcony and a vestry inside. Between the chapel and the school was a graveyard, which was last used in 1896. In 1920, a 1911 German-made organ was installed in the chapel, replacing a harmonium. By 1987 the German organ had fallen into disrepair and was replaced in 1990 with an Wyvern organ. An accessible entrance was attached to the rear or south end of the church in 2005.[23] Between at least 1858 and 1969 it was a Congregationalist church.[24] The building is now in use as a United Reformed church.[23]

• 
  Salem Chapel, 2020
• 
  "Salem"
• 
  Family grave, where Clapham is buried

Clapham chaired the 1861–1862 building committee of West Park Congregational Church (Now West Park URC), Harrogate.[25]

This building in Ilkley, West Riding of Yorkshire, had its origins in Ilkley Bath Charity, then in 1862 became Ilkley Hospital designed by Perkin and Backhouse, as part of the Hydro movement which involved health-giving spa baths. Clapham was one of the founders of this charity and building; he was a subscriber to the charity from 1842.[26] As of 2020 the building was in use as Abbeyfield Grove House Care Home.[27]

The 4.5 acre site for Grove Road Cemetery, Harrogate, was purchased in 1862. It once had two chapels with spires, designed by Thomas Charles Sorby (1836–1924) of London,[28][29][30] at a cost of £5,000. Clapham laid the foundation stone for the non-denominational chapel on 23 May 1863. One of the ministers who spoke at the ceremony was Rev. John Henry Gavin, the first minister of West Park Congregational Church, Harrogate.[29] Gavin was to be buried there himself at age 38 in 1868.[31] Having processed from the National School to the cemetery with interested parties including eleven clergymen and various Burial Board members, the Bishop of Ripon consecrated the episcopalian half of the cemetery and the Anglican chapel on 23 April 1864.[32] Although the chapels formed an "attractive feature in the landscape,"[33] they were both demolished in 1958 to create more burial space.[34]

• 
  West Park Congregational church (now URC), built 1862
• 
  Ilkley Hospital, built 1862
• 
  Harrogate cemetery chapels, 1863