EXCITEMENT surrounded the launch of work on the World of Glass visitor centre back in 1991, but one of the biggest thrills surrounding the project was still to be discovered.

When excavations started on the Cone House in 1992, a Grade II listed building on the site, builders discovered the remains of a Siemens glass furnace buried beneath a concrete floor.

And that was just the beginning of what was an exciting find for the developers of the site. For buried under the ground were a host of regeneration tunnels used by workers to maintain the furnace and to generate the hot and cold air needed to keep the furnace working.

With the help of industrial archeaologists, a team of St Helens miners painstakingly chipped away underground for 18 months to slowly reveal the remains of the only surviving Siemens glass furnace in Europe.

Now the buiding and the furnace are to become an integral part of the hugely impressive £14 million visitor centre, which will open its doors to the public in March, 2000.

The Cone House will be linked to the modern side of the centre, which will house two exhibition halls, a restaurant, and the mighty 50ft entrance cone (an engineering feat in itself) by a superb glass bridge spanning the canal. And it is intended that the Grade II listed building will bring to life the sights and sounds experienced by workers in the glass industry in the late 1800s.

The state-of-the-art centre, which is set to be a major North West attraction pulling in an estimated 150,000 visitors a year, has come on leaps and bounds.

It has been funded by a variety of sources including Heritage Lottery Fund, Objective One, Single Regeneration Budget, RECHAR and private sponsorship. And the centre will celebrate the history of glassmaking and the town, which played a major part in the industrial revolution.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.