The cash registers are ringing for Lady Diana’s wedding

Press, 1 May 1981, Page 13

The cash registers are ringing for Lady Diana’s wedding

By

GRAHAM LEES,

“Observer,” London

The impending marriage of Lady Diana Spencer to Britain’s future king has turned her home into a kind of Mecca for the royal faithful — and produced a sharp rise in her family’s income. Thousands of loyal subjects, plus a growing number of inquisitive foreign tourists, are flocking to the sixteenthcentury Althorp Hall to gaze at the lawns where Diana played as a child and file through history-laden rooms, including the one where Prince Charles slept when he first came courting her. There is no prospect of the visitors catching even a glimpse of the happy couple, but they will see plenty of the eighth Earl and the Countess Spencer, who are taking a very personal interest in the serious business of catering for all their extra visitors.

Like many of Britain's historic homes, Althorp Hall has been open to the fee-paying public for several years to help towards its costly upkeep. But Lady Diana’s home, set amid rolling green countryside near industrial Northampton in the English Midlands, was never on the popular tourist route — until the royal engagement. . Now visitors are arriving by the coachload. One American businessman is offering a trip to the hall and lunch with Lady Diana's father and step-mother as the highlight of a “Romantic Tours” holiday package. The-

tours, starting later this month, were organised with the help of the English romantic novelist Barbara Cartland, who is the countess’s mother.

It is not the style which some royal circles would find palatable, and Lady Diana’s mother, the earl’s first wife, Mrs Frances Shand-Kydd, is reported to be angry at the commercialisation of Althorp Hall in the wake of her daughter’s betrothal.

The Spencers are not poor but the upkeep of their enormous mansion, the family seat since 1508, is reported to cost more than $lOO,OOO a year. Evidently every little bit helps. Admission to the gardens at Althorp is free but guided tours of the hall cost just over $2 a head. Few visitors fail to find their way to the converted stables where the earl and his wife are on hand to encourage sales of tea, cakes, and souvenirs. On one particular busy recent Sunday afternoon, the Countess Spencer could be seen rolling her sleeves up to help her hard-pressed assistants. Her presence provoked a sudden surge of interest in a table full of necklaces and bracelets beside which was a discreet notice: "Please make cheques payable to the Earl Spencer’s house opening account.” The countess has also shown some of her mother's literary talent by research-

ing and writing a short history of Althorp Hall and its inhabitants through the ages, a must for a tour of the house. Quite apart from its romantic links with the British Throne, the hall is home for one of Europe's richest private art collections. Its large picture gallery contains paintings by Rubens, Van Dyck, Reynolds, and Gainsborough, although most eyes in recent weeks have been settling on an 1858 family portrait of Lady Diana’s ‘great-great-grand-

mother, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Britain’s future Queen. Since Prince Charles announced his engagement to Lady Diana, the former trickle of visitors to Althorp has grown to more than 500 a week, and as summer and the July 29 wedding draw nearer that figure could double. Judging from their enthusiasm so far, the earl and countess will have a welcoming smile for them all.— Copyright, London Observer Service.