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Research dossier · Places & Architecture

Cowden Park House

listed historic building in Alloa, Clackmannanshire, Scotland, UK

Architectural plans, a scale model, maps and brass measuring instruments
Places and architectureInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 4, 2024
Entity authorityQ5179630 ↗
Source-derived summary

Cowden Park House is a house in Alloa, Clackmannanshire, Scotland. On 17 June 1977 it was listed as a Category C(s) historic building.

It was built in the 1850s for Alexander Forrester-Paton, a member of the family that owned the Patons and Baldwins wool company and large areas of land in Clackmannanshire.

The architect was John Melvin Sr. (1805 – 7 March 1884).

Editorial summary

“Cowden Park House” enters the record as listed historic building in Alloa, Clackmannanshire, Scotland, UK. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Cowden, Park and House can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA strong orientation record where physical form, institutional use and historical geography need to be read together. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1977, 1805, 1884—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Cowden, Park and House.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Cowden Park House” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Cowden, Park and House provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 4, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q5179630. Authority coordinates are 56.119, -3.806. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1977, 1805 and 1884.

Critical limits

Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.

Best used for
  • Historic place names
  • Jurisdictional context
  • Routes into maps and plans
Verify next

Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Cowden Park House”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Cowden Park House primary sources, Cowden Park House archive and Cowden research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Cowden Park House”?
  2. What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
  3. Which earlier names or jurisdictions may reveal additional records?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Cowden Park House” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.