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Beatrix Potter was born 1866 into very rich family, her father was a lawyer/barrister. As a child she was very lonely as she had few friends since she did not go to school but was taught at home privately by a governess. She kept pet animals, cats, mice, and hedgehogs. She also had several rabbits; her favourite was called Benjamin H Bouncer or Bounce for short and her naughty rabbit was called Peter. Because the family was so rich they could afford to holiday for three months every summer at a castle beside the river Tay in Scotland. The summer holiday was Beatrix's favourite time of year for she hated London but loved the countryside. She would go for walks in the country and paint and sketch pictures of plants and animals. Beatrix became a very good artist. In 1892 the family decided to holiday in the Lake District ad stayed at Wray castle on the side of Windermere. In 1893 the family holidayed at Lingholm on the side of Derwentwater. Every summer for the next 20 years the family returned to Lingholm on holiday. Whilst at Lingholm Beatrix met and became friendly with Cannon Rawnsley, the vicar from Keswick, and they became good friends. In 1893 Beatrix had to write a letter to the children of her ex-governess. On this day she could not think of anything interesting to write in a letter so she wrote a short story. She linked the story together with little pictures and based it on the adventures of her pet rabbit Peter. Beatrix decided she wanted to leave London and come and live in the Lake District. Her parents disapproved of her wish to move so Beatrix had to become independent from her parents and to do this she needed some money. Her friend Cannon Rawnsley suggested to make some money she should publish some of her artwork, this she did but was very unsuccessful so Rawnsley suggested she write a children's story. In 1893 Beatrix Potter re-wrote Peter Rabbit and she tried to get the work published. No publishers were interested so with the help of Cannon Rawnsley she published the work privately, 250 copies were printed and it was a huge success. On the basis of this success they persuade a London publisher called Frederick Warne to publish Peter Rabbit. In the next two years she also wrote Tale of the Tailor of Gloucester, the Tale of Squirrel Nutkin, the Tale of Tom Kitten, the Tale of the Two Bad Mice and the Tale of Mrs Tiggywinkle. Warne was reluctant to keep on publishing this work but was encourage to do so by his son Norman. Beatrix and Norman developed a very close relationship and they got engaged to be married, unfortunately Norman died before the marriage took place. With the money from the first six books she could then buy a little farm and the farm included the farmhouse Hilltop. When Beatrix Potter died in 1943 she asked that Hilltop be kept as a museum to her. Beatrix Potter married when she was 46 years old a lawyer called William Heelis. Declaring Hilltop as too small for two people to live in she then purchased Castle Cottage. Beatrix Potter and the National Trust The National Trusted was founded on 12 January 1895. One of three founding members was Cannon Rawnsley from Keswick. Rawnsley was concerned about the large number of people who had come to live in the Lake District with the arrival of the railway in Windermere. It was possible for wealthy industrialists from the Lancashire cotton towns (eg. Manchester) to live here and commute daily by train. The rich businessmen were buying the most beautiful land and building big country houses everywhere. Rawnsley founded the NT in the Lake District with the aim of buying as much land as possible to stop people from outside the area buying it and building on it. Today the NT is the largest landowner in the Lake District owning just over a quarter of the land and including some 86 farms. Rawnsley was a friend of Beatrix Potters and had helped her publish Peter Rabbit. Since she was very grateful for his help and he was a big influence on her life, Beatrix Potter became a big supporter of the National Trust. All the money Beatrix Potter made from her childrens' stories she used to buy land and farms in the Lake District under the same philosophy as the National Trust, also she bought a lot of land she gave to the National Trust. When she died in 1943 her personal estate was left to the National Trust making her one of the biggest benefactors of the National Trust ever.
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