Panmure House Campaign receives $1 million donation from The Global Philanthropic Trust

The campaign to conserve and adapt Panmure House, the final home of renowned economist, Adam Smith, is receiving a major, $1 million gift from the Global Philanthropic Trust. This generous donation will help ensure that works on the conservation of the House can start in early 2014, and that on its opening in the Autumn of 2015, it will provide world-class educational programmes.

Panmure House, situated in Edinburgh’s medieval Old Town and within the Edinburgh World Heritage site, is the last extant home of the great moral philosopher and economist, Adam Smith (1723-1790). It is also the last significant remaining home of any member of the Scottish Enlightenment. Panmure House was purchased in 2008 by Edinburgh Business School, the Graduate School of Business of Heriot-Watt University, in order to conserve and adapt the house for future generations, to honour Adam Smith’s legacy and to create a centre for economic excellence that will welcome curious minds from around the world to learn about Smith’s life and works.  

The project is led by Professor Keith Lumsden, Director and Founder of Edinburgh Business School, who also chairs the fundraising committee of the Panmure House Campaign.

Professor Lumsden said, “On behalf of the whole campaign team, I am pleased to announce the generous donation the campaign has received from the Global Philanthropic Trust to support our efforts to restore Adam Smith’s final home, Panmure House. Adam Smith is often said to be the world’s first economist, he is a vital part of Scotland’s heritage and a beacon of intellectual endeavour. Revitalising his last home as an educational centre will help ensure his pioneering thinking lives on in the minds of future generations.”

Terry Kibbe, Advisor to the Global Philanthropic Trust, said, “It has been 237 years since the publication of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, and his understanding of the mutual benefits of trade and voluntary cooperation are more relevant and more urgently needed than ever before.  As the world struggles to lift ever more people out of poverty, Smith's ideas provide a modern roadmap to renewed prosperity.  On this basis, the Global Philanthropic Trust is delighted to support the effort to conserve and adapt Smith’s final home, to honour his great legacy and to endow the programme, ‘The Life and Works of Adam Smith’ which will educate people from around the world about his ground-breaking ideas.”

The Duke of Buccleuch, Co-Patron of the Panmure House campaign, said, “I am honoured to serve as Co-Patron of the Panmure House campaign. My family has a historic link with Adam Smith dating back over two hundred years and it has been inspiring and moving to see the depth of support shown for our efforts to restore his last home, not just within the United Kingdom, but from around the world. This very generous grant from The Global Philanthropic Trust will greatly contribute to our ongoing efforts to develop Smith’s Edinburgh home into a unique focal point for fans of his life and works.”

Ends

For more information, further interviews and photographs please contact:

Chris Watkins, Development Director (Panmure House Project), Edinburgh Business School,
+44 (0)131 451 3090 / +44 (0)7760 665597 or email cw2@ebs.hw.ac.uk

Or:

Caroline Dempster, Press Officer, Heriot-Watt University, +44 (0)131 451 3443 or email c.m.l.dempster@hw.ac.uk

Notes to editors:

About Heriot-Watt University

Heriot-Watt University specialises in science, technology, engineering, modern languages, business and design, with a particular focus on developing solutions to critical global issues, such as climate change and energy.

In The Sunday Times 2013 University Guide

·         Scottish University of the Year 2012/13 (for the second year running)

·         UK University of the Year 2012/13 for student experience

·         Number 9 in the UK overall

In the National Student Survey 2012

·         No 1 in Scotland and No 4 in UK (based on responses to all questions from FT degree students)

·         In the Top 10 for graduate employment in the UK (over 94% of graduates are in employment or further study within six months of graduation)

Established in 1821, the university has campuses in Edinburgh, the Scottish Borders, Orkney and Dubai, and is investing £35 million in a new campus in Malaysia.
 

About Edinburgh Business School

Edinburgh Business School is the Graduate School of Business of Heriot-Watt University. As one of the world's leading business and management schools, Edinburgh Business School offers students a rigorous and rewarding programme of study.

Whether MBA, MSc or DBA, our courses are among the most sought after in the business world. Our qualifications are among the most highly regarded. We have more than 11,000 active students, more than 16,000 alumni, and partners across six continents.

About Global Philanthropic Trust (“GPT”)

The Global Philanthropic Trust (GPT) was founded in 2006 with the aim to empower individuals to take more control over their lives by furnishing them with the maximum opportunity to realize their full potential. 

Adhering to the libertarian philosophy, the GPT supports educational institutions in promoting libertarian causes and funds social activities that are focused upon the understanding and expansion of human liberty.  As a firm believer that individual liberty is the organizing principle of society, the GPT further endorses and funds classical liberal or libertarian programs, organizations, think-tanks and public policy groups undertaking action-driven initiatives with measurable results.  

Comment

This is great news!

I know how hard colleagues have worked on this project, first to get planning permission for restoring Panmure House as it is situated in the designated World Heritage site in the Old Town in Edinburgh, where Adam Smith lived and worked from 1778 to his death in 1790 (he is buried in the nearby Canongate Kirk).

Securing that necessary permission has taken a long time since Edinburgh Business School bought the run down building from years of neglect, that was Panmure House, the last home of Adam Smith.

I recently visited the site again, with a small party of retired Scottish Geologists who wanted to see Panmure House, where James Hutton, the founder of scientific geology was a regular guest at Adam Smith's Sunday dinners, along with many other luminaries of the Scottish Enlightenment. 

As a retired Professor Emeritus of Heriot-Watt University I am very proud to have been associated with the Panmure House project from the beginning and I look forward to attending the opening of the Adam Smith educational project in (early) due course and participating in its work.