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Photo Rob |
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1007 - First mention of the River Mersey, in a deed from the reign of
Ethelread II, the name is old English from Maere, meaning boundary 1166 - First mention of Liverpool, in a deed of the Earl of Mortain,
later King John. 1207 - King John signed a Royal Charter, creating the borough of
Liverpool, on Tuesday 28th August 1207. 1235 - Liverpool Castle built (near the modern Derby Square,
demolished 1721). 1272 - First census, population 840. 1282 - First Mersey ferry, established by monks at Birkenhead Priory. 1351 - First recorded mayor, William, son of Adam. 1515 - Liverpool’s first Town Hall built. 1522 - First grammar school (founded by John Crosse of Crosse-Hall). 1580 - Liverpool’s first Town Council. 1647 - Liverpool was made a free and independent port, no longer
subject to Chester. 1648 - First recorded cargo from America landed at Liverpool. 1650 - The council passed an order creating Liverpool’s fire brigade:
“That the bailiffs cause leather buckets and four or six hooks to be made for
pulling down any house being on fire – which God defend”. 1676 - Liverpool’s second Town Hall built. 1679 - Liverpool’s Mayor founded the world’s first charity for
sailors. 1700 - Liverpool’s population 5,714. The first recorded Liverpool
slave ship, the Liverpool Merchant, sold a cargo of 220 slaves in Barbados. 1708 - The first reference to scouse (by Ned Ward in The Wooden World
Dissected). 1709 - First cargo of cotton traded in Liverpool. 1715 - World’s first wet dock controlled by floodgates (Steer’s Old
Dock, Canning Place). 1754 - Liverpool’s third Town Hall built, designed by John Wood the
Elder of Bath. 1758 - First circulating library (Lyceum). 1763 - Liverpool’s Dock master built the first lighthouses to use
parabolic mirrors (at Hoylake and Bidston). 1774 - Matthew Dobson, a Liverpool physician, discovered the link
between sugar and diabetes. 1776 - First public use of Ether as an anaesthetic. Liverpool’s first
newspaper published (Liverpool Advertiser). 1786 - Europe’s first purpose built prison (Great Howard Street). 1790 - World’s first American Consul (James Maury). 1791 - First school for blind people (Commutation Row, and later
London Road in 1800) 1793 - The only municipality with the right to issue its own money
(300.00 pounds). 1795 - Liverpool Town Hall severely damaged by fire, reconstructed by
James Wyatt. 1797 - The Liverpool Athenaeum founded. 1800 - Liverpool’s population 77,708. 1803 - First underwriters association (Liverpool underwriters
Association). 1812 - The only assassination of a British Prime Minister. Spencer
Percival was shot by bankrupt Liverpool merchant John Bellingham. Britain’s
first balloon ascent by J Sadler of Liverpool. In 1824, he was ‘thrown out of
his balloon near Blackburn, which caused his death’. 1813 - Liverpool’s first outdoor public sculpture (Nelson Monument in
Exchange Flags), first paid for by public subscription. 1814 - World’s first cast iron church (St Georges, Everton). 1823 - First mechanics lending library. 1825 - World’s first school for deaf people. 1830 - World’s first train shed and first large wooden railway station
roof at Crown Street Station). First railway passenger fatality (William
Huskisson). 1835 - World’s first railway timetable published (Lacy’s). 1838 - First travelling Post Office (a horse box fitted out as a
sorting office) ran between Liverpool and Birmingham on 6th January. 1840 - World’s first scheduled transatlantic passenger service (the
wooden paddle-streamer Britannia owned by Samuel Cunard). Britain’s first
Borough Engineer appointed. Welsh national Eisteddfod held in Liverpool (and
in 1851, 1884,1900 and 1929). World’s first photograph developing and
printing service. 1841 - Society for the prevention of Cruelty to Animals, later RSPCA,
founded. First British purpose-built office block (Brunswick Buildings). 1842 - World’s first public Baths and Wash-houses founded by Kitty
Wilkinson (Upper Frederick Street). 1844 - First girl’s day grammar school in England (Blackburne House). 1846 - Albert Dock opened by Prince Albert, now the country’s largest
group of Grade 1 listed buildings. 1847 - World’s first Medical Officer of Health (Dr William Duncan). 1848 - First British trades council (Liverpool Trades Guardian
Association). 1850 - First borough to establish a Library Committee. Royal Liver
Friendly Society (a burial club) formed, it later became a major insurance
company that built the Royal Liver Buildings. 1851 - First provincial children’s hospital (Upper Hill Street). 1857 - World’s first Rugby Club (Liverpool Rugby Club). Britain’s
first Chess Club (Liverpool Chess Club). 1859 - First nurse to be paid for looking after the poor (employed by
William Rathbone). 1860 - First purpose built public library. 1861 - Britain’s first ecumenical conference. First shot in the
American Civil War was fired from a gun made by Liverpool firm Fawcett and
Preston (also see 1865). 1862 - First provincial School of Nursing. 1864 - First major Slum Clearance Scheme, the Liverpool Sanitary
Amendment gave the Medical Officer of Health the power to order the
demolition of unsafe and unfit buildings. 1865 - The last confederate ship to surrender at the end of the
American Civil War (Shenandoah, 6th November, to the Mayor at Liverpool Town
Hall). 1867 - Liverpool Corporation brought Britain’s first steamroller.
Britain’s first cycling club (Liverpool Velocipedes). World’s largest train
shed (200 ft/61 meters). 1868 - First borough to secure and Act of Parliament to establish a
tram system. 1869 - Britain’s first municipal housing (St Martins Cottages,
Silvester Street). 1870 - First society of accountants (Liverpool Society of
Accountants). 1875 - First disarmament campaign (Liverpool Peace Society) 1877 - First British public Art Gallery (Walker art Gallery) 1880 - Queen Victoria grants Liverpool the right to call itself a city
(11th may). Liverpool’s first Bishop appointed (Rev John Ryle). T.P. O’Connor
elected as the first Irish Nationalist MP to represent an English
constituency (Liverpool Exchange). 1883 - The Liverpool Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to
Children, later the NSPCC, founded on April 19th by T.F. Agnew and Samuel
Smith. 1884 - Britain’s first woman to qualify as a doctor opens a practice
in Liverpool. 1886 - First under-river railway tunnel constructed under the River
Mersey. First purpose-built ambulance in Britain (at the Northern Hospital) 1889 - First pre-payment gas meters installed by the Liverpool Gas
Company (Cazeneau Street). Liverpool’s Police Force the first to be equipped
with rubber soled boots for night duty. 1890 - Football goal nets invented by ex-City Engineer John Brodie. 1892 - The first Marine Biological Station (at Liverpool University). 1893 - World’s first overhead electric railway opened by the Marquis
of Salisbury on February 4th. League of Welldoers founded by an American, Lee
Jones. Queen Victoria grants Liverpool the right to have a Lord Mayor (August
14th). 1895 - First British School of Architecture and Applied Art. 1896 - First British use of x-ray in medical diagnosis (at the
Southern Hospital). 1897 - First to employ women health visitors. 1898 - First to appoint a Municipal Bacteriologist. 1899 - Britain’s first School of Tropical Medicine opened on April
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Liverpool History
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