On this day: A property purchase to remember

TODAY, 16th September, marks the anniversary the day Shakespeare's Birthplace in Stratford-upon-Avon, the first building in Britain to be officially preserved, was bought by what is now the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

When the property was put on the market in 1846 American showman B T Barnum originally proposed buying the building and shipping it over to his homeland "brick-by-brick".

To save it for the nation the Shakespeare Birthplace Committee, supported by such luminaries as writer Charles Dickens, raised £3,000 to buy the house in Henley Street a year later.Incorporated by a private Act of Parliament, the Birthday Committee became the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.