Saving a Century |The Euston Arch, demolished in 1962, was a
powerful symbol of the railway age and a victim of the motorway
age. (Photo: Herbert Felton 1960, English Heritage, National
Monuments Record). |A silver model of the Euston Arch made by
Carrington & Co bearing the inscription: ‘to perpetuate the
memory of one of London’s finest historic monuments’ was
presented to the Victorian Society by Frank Valori, the
demolition contractor, in 1962. It was later stolen. The
Victorian Society, which celebrates its 50th birthday this year,
held its first meeting on 25 February 1958 at 18 Stafford
Terrace, Kensington, now the Linley Sambourne House museum. The
catalyst was Anne, Countess of Rosse, whose husband was chairman
of the Georgian Group, and the new society drew its strength
from the already-developing interest in Victorian architecture
in the circles of the Architectural Review, Country Life, and
the Victoria & Albert Museum. It was not, as Mark Girouard has
pointed out, a few lone voices crying in the