Rumour has it that Manchester is the home of the Industrial Revolution. Here's something I nicked off a site to get things going.

"The term INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION originally referred to the developments that transformed Great Britain, between 1750 and 1830, from a largely rural population making a living almost entirely from agriculture to a town-centered society engaged increasingly in factory manufacture.

Other European nations underwent the same process soon thereafter, followed by others during the 19th century, and still others (such as Russia and Japan) in the the first half of the 20th century. In some countries this transformation is only now taking place or still lies in the future.

The Industrial Revolution started in England, because that nation had the technological means, government encouragement, and a large and varied trade network. The first factories appeared in 1740, concentrating on textile production.

Such English inventions as the flying shuttle and carding machines of John Kay, the water frame of Richard Arkwright, the spinning jenny of James Hargreaves, and the improvements in weaving made by Samuel Crompton were all integrated with a new source of power, the steam engine, developed in England by Thomas Newcomen, James Watt, Richard Trevithick, and in the U.S. by Oliver Evans.

Within a 35 year period, from the 1790s to the 1830s, more than 100,000 power looms with 9,330,000 spindles were put into service in England and Scotland."

Some say that the centre for this revolution was Manchester.

In terms of this forum, the revolution also created a new urbanism, and a new way of living that eventually lead to dramatic reforms and laws that are still with us today thanks to men like Engels.

Discuss. :-)

Well, for a start, Manchester was the first industrialised city on earth. Fact.

What i think is overlooked and is sometimes overshadowed by all the hard metal and mills and flying shuttles and that is that in Manchester the constructs were put in place to form global capitalism.
What we recognise as capitalism and the free market was developed by Manchester merchants and the philosophy of laissez faire economics was actually called the Manchester School.

There is certain irony in that as Manchester is also the birthplace of what we would call Labour politics and working class enfranchisement. Not only were the seeds of the current hegemony (global capitalism) sewn in Manchester but the only other real counter to that (Communism/ Marxism) was also conceived in Manchester.

Is it true that the TUC was formed in Manchester?

This conclusive article from the guardian (another spawn of manchesters industrial age) probably belongs in this thread.


On your Marx

Jonathan Schofield is sitting at one of the most important tables in the history of the world. "Parts of the communist manifesto were written right here," he says. Five hours into his tour of radical Manchester, Schofield lets his voice become reverentially hushed for the first time. "Marx would sit on one side of the table and Engels on the other. Whenever I bring people from the Chinese consulate here and get out the old books that Marx and Engels touched, they weep."

We're in the reading room of Chetham's library, a venerable and cloistered building. The bay window in which the table has sat for centuries was a preternaturally quiet spot to hone ideas of socialist revolution while the first city of capitalism seethed unseen and unheard outside.

This, at least, is the historian's contention about the city's importance in catalysing communism. "Without Manchester there would have been no Soviet Union," Schofield says with a challenging look. "And the history of the 20th century would have been very different." Imagine - no Lenin, no gulags, no Mao, no Nazi-Soviet Pact, no Cultural Revolution, no cold war, no nuclear arms race, no Che, no Che T-shirts, and, without doubt, no faithful Chinese communists crying among the bookshelves. Oh, Manchester (as Morrissey sang in a very different context), so much to answer for.

Can it really have such a central role in history? "Yes it can - and does," he says. Schofield directs me to a passage in Asa Briggs' Victorian Cities. "If Engels had lived not in Manchester but in Birmingham," wrote Briggs, "his conception of 'class' and his theories of the role of class in history might have been very different. The fact that Manchester was taken to be the symbol of the age in the 1840s ... was of central political importance in modern world history."

Engels arrived in 1842. His father, a Pietist, worried that little Friedrich was showing radical tendencies and sent him to work at a textile company in which he was a partner. "His father could not have thought of a worse place to send him," says Schofield. Nor a worse time. Victorian Manchester was a hotbed of radical ideas, where the Anti-Corn-Law League was agitating, where Chartists regularly rioted.

Two years after Engels hit town, Disraeli wrote in his novel Coningsby: "[B]The Age of Ruins is past. Have you seen Manchester? Manchester is as great a human exploit as Athens." To learn how the modern world was going, Engels might well have thought, better to immerse yourself in Manchester than classical Greece. "I would have loved to have lived in Manchester in the 1840s," says Schofield, "and possibly to have met Engels, who sounds a lovely man, even though he rode with the Cheshire hunt. Marx sounds like a lazy fat man who took Engels' money and his best ideas."

Schofield has made many similarly grand claims for the radical credentials of his favourite city in the 300-odd minutes since he met me at Piccadilly Station. He has alleged that vegetarianism took off as a mass movement thanks to the sermons of an early-19th-century Manchester preacher called the Rev William Cowherd. He has charged that the Trades Union Congress is a Mancunian invention. He has contended that the Free Trade Hall is the only building in Britain named after a principle. He has noted that the Women's Social and Political Union, stamping ground of the suffragette heroines Emmeline Pankhurst and Annie Kenney, was made in Manchester and that its militant civil disobedience bore all the bolshie hallmarks of Mancunian attitude.

All of this is declaimed in a ringing voice that stuns shoppers from their dogmatic slumbers as we walk. He forbears from moithering to me (as he has in print) about how the radical Manchester Guardian, forged in the wake of the city's Peterloo massacre, "fled to London in the 1960s", but he does recite me more verses by the Manchester punk poet John Cooper Clarke than anyone else can, with the possible exceptions of Mr Cooper Clarke and his mum. And, to return the favour, I don't quote him the words of Mark Twain: "I would like to live in Manchester. The transition between Manchester and Death would be unnoticeable."

It's just as well I don't, because Schofield seems guilty of an excess of civic pride, that rarest of English virtues. He has written books about Manchester and plans to write more, but you get the sense that this is where he gets most satisfaction as a historian - declaiming the city's history on the streets.

We start in Canal Street, where he points out a bar called Manto. "That's the first gay bar that came out," he says. So what? "Instead of being a hole in the corner affair, it was designed with big windows and terraces and balconies that said it had nothing to hide." Around the corner in Sackville Street, Schofield halts. "Typical Manchester," he says, "all fur coat and no knickers." He's alluding to the grandeur of the frontages of the renaissance-style palaces that sprang up as Manchester became Cottonopolis. The fronts may be dizzyingly ornamental, typical of the architectural energy of the Victorians, but the rear elevations are often modest. "Legend has it that Walter Gropius, the founder of Bauhaus, came to Manchester on his way to the US and realised that the Mancs had already done Bauhaus 100 years earlier on the backs of their buildings."

At the TUC building in Major Street, he tells me that Francis Fukuyama once did a reading there about the end of history. "It was towards the end of his world book tour and he got intellectually torn apart by 200 hardcore lefties. He told me he'd never come across such committed Marxists." True or just tall stories symptomatic of Manchester braggadocio? My money's on the latter.

On we go, to Manchester Art Gallery where there is a room embracing city icons from Pankhurst to Shaun Ryder, that Schofield reads as positing that they all have similarly radical sensibilities. "Manchester's the least aristocratic of British cities. There was no feudal system in Lancashire - there were churls, but no serfs. [A churl, you'll know, had a social position above a slave or serf but below a thane in Anglo-Saxon society.] The hand-loom weavers and cotton workers of Manchester were known for their bolshieness," he says, describing their cramped and disease-ridden cottages.

"They were moved by the injustice of their plight," says Schofield. "That's why so many of them went to St Peter's Fields in 1819." St Peter's Fields no longer exists, but Schofield stands in front of the International Convention Centre and describes the massacre that took place there on August 16 1819 in which 16 people died and 600 were injured. "The resonant thing was that British soldiers turned on their own people, and people who had gathered there for a serious peaceful demonstration to protest about the fact that big industrial cities such as Manchester had no political representation. The Peterloo massacre scandalised the middle classes and brought them behind the reform movement."

On we go, to the Free Trade Hall, where Schofield quotes with approval the words of his fellow townsman John Bright, the Rochdale orator and Anti-Corn-Law League stalwart, who said: "We were not born with saddles on our backs nor were the gentry born with spurs." Wasn't free trade just the rallying call of business? "No, the league was an alliance of middle classes and working classes. In years of bad harvest, the cost of bread went beyond the means of the poor because the Corn Laws guaranteed prices for British landowners." Today the hall named after a principle is a five-star hotel with radical prices of up to £1,000 a night.

Then on to the statue to the utopian socialist Robert Owen, to Chetham's library and its world-changing table, on to the beautiful choir of Manchester Cathedral, on to the Royal Exchange, centre of Mancunian capitalism. We've been walking for six hours and we still haven't visited some of the most important radical shrines - the Pankhurst Centre in Nelson Street, any of Engel's homes, the Griffin Inn in Great Ancoats Street where Chartist boozers boozed. Nor is there time to pay homage to the mass trespass of Kinder Scout in 1932 (organised by the Manchester Rambling Association). And doubtless more besides. But dusk is descending.

Schofield leaves me to visit another very important historical table alone. Why it wound up in the People's History Museum on Bridge Street isn't immediately clear. On it, though, Thomas Paine wrote part of Rights of Man in 1792, a book that was immediately banned by an outraged government. In it, Paine argued that all men over 21 should have the vote and the House of Lords be abolished. It is clearly a very radical table indeed, and for that reason alone its proper place of rest is Manchester.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1701933,00.html

Is it true that the TUC was formed in Manchester?


No - Sheffield - sorry!
The Football League was though!

This conclusive article from the guardian (another spawn of manchesters industrial age) probably belongs in this thread.



http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1701933,00.html

Sorry I didn't read the post linked to the above Guardian article but if it says something about Manchester and how amazing it is regarding the industrial revolution isn't that like the Birmingham Post running a similar article asbout Brum... I think you could put a pretty good spin on several other towns/cities (was Manchester actually a city in 17whatever???) holding claim to the title of the start of the Industrial Revolution or the first city to promote the Industrial Revolution, and considering this is the Manchester forum...

Rumour has it that Manchester is the home of the Industrial Revolution. Here's something I nicked off a site to get things going.

The term INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION originally referred to the developments that transformed Great Britain, between 1750 and 1830, from a largely rural population making a living almost entirely from agriculture to a town-centered society engaged increasingly in factory manufacture.

So the revolution of Industrial Advancement that was already taking place prior to this in places like Birmingham was nothing to do with the Industrial revolution... maybe we should refer to this age as the pre-Industrial Revolution.

Prior to the 1750's massive investment and ingenuity in metal working took place in the midlands.. and then as an example (Brum was by no means the main player here):

1738: Lewis Paul and John Wyatt, of Birmingham, patented the Roller Spinning machine and the flyer-and-bobbin system, for drawing Wool to a more even thickness. Using two sets of rollers that travelled at different speeds this was later to be used in the first Cotton spinning Mill during the Industrial Revolution.

1742: Paul and Wyatt opened a mill in Birmingham which used their new rolling machine powered by the humble Donkey, this was not profitable and soon closed.

1743: A factory was opened in Northampton, fifty spindles turned on five of Paul and Wyatt's machines proving more successful than their first Mill this operated until 1764.

1746: Sulphuric acid factory was set up at Steelhouse Lane to use the lead chamber process invented by its co-founder John Roebuck.

1748: Lewis Paul invented the hand driven carding machine. A coat of wire slips were placed around a card which was then wrapped around a cylinder. Lewis's invention was later developed and improved by Richard Arkwright and Samuel Crompton, although this came about under great suspicion after a fire at Daniel Bourn's factory in Leominster which specifically used Paul and Wyatt's spindles. Bourn produced a similar patent in the same year.

Sorry I'm not going to bore you with more crap (for those that aren't interested) so if you wish to read more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_and_invention_in_Birmingham

Sorry I'm not going to bore you with more crap (for those that aren't interested) so if you wish to read more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_and_invention_in_Birmingham

I already answered this on skybar... as I said, Manchester provided the platform for these technologies. The textile industry in the UK absolutely was born in Lancashire.

didn't all this come up on the City bashing thread?

I think you will find it started in Coalbrookdale, Shropshire

I think you will find it started in Coalbrookdale, Shropshire

There is no denying Coalbrookdale's contribution (or Birmingham's for that matter Elizabeth) to the Industrial revolution but thats all it was - a contribution.
For the gazillionth time - all the main factors that can clearly be seen as being the constructs of what we know as the Industrial revolution came together in Manchester.

Ask anyone where they think/know the IR started and they will say Manchester.

It's like asking people which is the second city in England and they will say....

It is undoubted that the Industrial Revolution was a collection of events that happened to the UK as a whole, but I wouldn't be so sure about Manchester's claim to the "coming together".

The start of the revolution is generally agreed to have originated in Coalbrookdale, Shropshire, with Abraham Darby I who first smelted iron with Coke in 1709.

The world's first factory was opened in Birmingham in 1765 by Matthew Boulton (the Soho Manufactory), with the larger Soho Foundry opening in the 1796 (which was, incidentally, the first place in the world for a single, large factory to be dedicated to one product - in this case machinery - steam engines).

It could be argued that Matthew Boulton is the father of multi-disciplinary industry, because he was the first person to produce more than one type of product.

Soho Foundry came about because James Brindley very kindly completed the Birmingham (-Wolverhampton?) canal in 1769, thus allowing the raw materials from the coal & iron fields of the Black Country to the production facilities in Smethwick & Birmingham town centre.

Wedgwood opened his first pottery factory in 1769.

And the Lunar Society (still around today) was formed, with Boulton, Watt, Darwin (Erasmus - Charlie's Grandad, Murdoch, Priestley and others forming a thinker's club to share ideas on science, art, industry and social matters.

Ask anyone where they think/know the IR started and they will say Manchester.

It's like asking people which is the second city in England and they will say....

Cheeky monkey! :tongue2:

I would say ask anyone, and they would say Ironbridge. So ask anyone in Manchester and they say Manchester, ask anyone in Birmingham and they say Ironbridge (that's presuming people actually know).

I wonder what people in London, Sheffield, Bristol say?

But, to be honest, it is not a case of opinion, it is fact. 90% of the country could say it is in Wakefield, but they would still be wrong...

Anyone see the Time Team dig in north Manchester (near the CIS) - when they un-earthed the earliest ever mechanised factory anywhere in the world.

First to use a water wheel to drive repetitive tasks - quite literally the first factory anywhere in our solar system.

Good thread b4mmy


http://www.manchester.com/features/first.php

Elizabeth I don't see why you have a problem with this thread being posted in the Manchester forum, it is after all about Manchester. You can't get away from the facts, the Industrial Revolution wasn't simply about inventing machines, I think it's fair to say there was a wealth of industrious men up and down the land that were busy inventing similar machines and a host of other things at that time. It was the working and living conditions of the people that brought about a lot of the BIG changes, political and social change that at times had the Government in London concerned about what was going on in this wayward northern town. Trust me there's more to it than who invented the Roller Spinning machine.

Anyone see the Time Team dig in north Manchester (near the CIS) - when they un-earthed the earliest ever mechanised factory anywhere in the world.

First to use a water wheel to drive repetitive tasks - quite literally the first factory anywhere in our solar system.

I havent seen that metro, have you got anything you can post up here?

Is it true that the TUC was formed in Manchester?

http://www.unionhistory.info/images/tl/photos/T0003.jpg
Manchester Mechanics Institution - site of the first Trades Union Congress
in 1868

It mentions the TUC in that link I've posted b4mmster

To say the IR started in Coalbrookdale is like saying the Russian Revolution happened in Manchester (oh .....wait a minute....it did....bad example)
My point being that the Industrial Revolution would not have developed in Coalbrookdale because it only had one specific function and speciality. Manchester brought together hundreds of disparate elements (some tangible, some quite oblique) and created a recognisable force.
The Russian revolution was the result of many differing elements coming together in one place at one time and Karl Marx sitting down at a desk in Chethams library and starting to write is just one of those elements but does not give Manchester the right to claim that the Russian Revolution happened there, in the same way Coalbrookdale cannot claim that the IR happened there.

http://www.unionhistory.info/images/tl/photos/T0003.jpg
Manchester Mechanics Institution - site of the first Trades Union Congress
in 1868

Yes i was being a bit too pedantic. My Big Bumper Book Of Labour History cites that the Association of Organised Trades (the foreruner of the TUC) first met in Sheffield in 1866 but, of course, you are right that the first Congress of the AOT was in Manchester.
Never let the facts get in the way of a good story (or if you trying to score points over some grumpy brummies!)

A comprehensive piece/article about 'The Origins of the Industrial Revolution in England'.

http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/lecture17a.html

Coalbrrokdale is significant for the introduction of new iron/steel making processes, but its the new social order and living conditions that are the more significant. Places like Ancoats were totally new, nothing like it had existed before. Hence the number of literary visitors, and the "shock horror" effect. The vast numbers of employeees working under one roof for one manufacturor, the cutting of ties with the seasons, the speculative housebuilding- these are the things that made Manchester the true cradle of the industrial revolution.

Sorry I didn't read the post linked to the above Guardian article but if it says something about Manchester and how amazing it is regarding the industrial revolution isn't that like the Birmingham Post running a similar article asbout Brum... I think you could put a pretty good spin on several other towns/cities (was Manchester actually a city in 17whatever???) holding claim to the title of the start of the Industrial Revolution or the first city to promote the Industrial Revolution, and considering this is the Manchester forum...

No it was about Manchester's history as a whole..

I don't know how people can ascribe the IR, something that was very much to do with people moving into the cities and urbanism etc, to places in the middle of nowhere. It's very odd. :ohno:

To say the IR started in Coalbrookdale is like saying the Russian Revolution happened in Manchester (oh .....wait a minute....it did....bad example)
My point being that the Industrial Revolution would not have developed in Coalbrookdale because it only had one specific function and speciality. Manchester brought together hundreds of disparate elements (some tangible, some quite oblique) and created a recognisable force.
The Russian revolution was the result of many differing elements coming together in one place at one time and Karl Marx sitting down at a desk in Chethams library and starting to write is just one of those elements but does not give Manchester the right to claim that the Russian Revolution happened there, in the same way Coalbrookdale cannot claim that the IR happened there.

I don't think anyone is claiming the IR happened in Coalbrookdale, but it is widely regarded as the place that spawned it. Coalbrookdale put the "Industrial" in the revolution that happened in the UK and then the world. Iron was made on an industrial scale, the first time anything had been made on an industrial scale (so the historians say).

I'd love to see evidence of industrial factories anywhere else in the world dating back to the 1780s.

http://www.manchester.ac.uk/aboutus/news/pressreleases/timeteam/



Fascinating details of Manchester's first cotton mill have been unearthed under a car park in central Manchester.

The dig - to be shown on Channel Four's Time Team on February 5 is being led by academics at The University of Manchester's Archaeological Unit. The excavations reveal the outline of the mill, its water wheel pit and the site of the steam engine used unsuccessfully to power textile machinery. They are believed to date from the early 1780s.

The programme was filmed last year when presenter Tony Robinson and the team spent three days excavating the site on Miller Street. The cotton mill burnt down after it was hit by a bomb in World War Two and has been the site of a car park ever since.

Time Team were assisted by eight specialist staff from The University of Manchester Archeology Unit including Director Mike Nevell. Volunteers from the Manchester Region Industrial Archaeology Society and the University's Dig Manchester community archaeology project also took part.

Dr Nevell said: "This site is of national and even international importance. The mill was built by Richard Arkwright who is often considered the father of the modern industrial factory system."

He added: "Within 18 years, Manchester became the biggest mill town in the world boasting around 50 mills. That set the pattern for every other industrial city and so it really is of international significance.

"Time Team really do carry out the work in three days and their enthusiasm was quite infectious. The mill was destroyed in the war so an ordnance expert was on site in case they unearthed any unexploded bombs - which made it even more exciting."

Notes for editors
Rubble at the mill: the birth of the industrial revolution in Manchester, will be broadcast on Sunday 5 February on Channel 4.

Dig Manchester, gives local communities the opportunity to sample archaeology in their own area. It is run by Manchester's Field Archaeology Centre.

For more details contact media officer Mike Addelman on 0161 275 0790 or 07717 881567
Email: michael.addelman@manchester.ac.uk

Bio - when did all this happen?

Well after the 1780's I suspect.

A comprehensive piece/article about 'The Origins of the Industrial Revolution in England'.

http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/lecture17a.html

Very interesting - I shall have a proper read at lunchtime :)

A quick scan gave me the impression that the conclusion is 'it is debatable'.

What I did find interesting, which I hadn't thought about before, was Watt's effect of having the steam engine allowing stuff to be made almost anywhere. I hadn't really thought about the impact it would have on cotton production - it meant that mills could be moved to areas without significant running water.

If I HAD to say any single item did the most for Britain and industry, I think it would be that Scotsman's invention.

Bio - when did all this happen?

Well after the 1780's I suspect.

(I posted on this earlier).

Iron was first smelted with coke in 1709 - first industrial scale production.

Factory was established by Boulton in 1765 (the phrase manufactory was coined).

The urbanisation of the West Midlands began before this, which is what created the demand for the canal network of the mid-1700s (and conditions were already dire).

FWIW - the Romans, 2k years ago had factories that pumped out iron, bricks etc.

Even in this country.

...these are the things that made Manchester the true cradle of the industrial revolution.

I like to think of Manchester as the womb of the industrial revolution. All those millions of sperm swimming around with no purpose and they all end up heading up the uterus to find the egg that has been made in Manchester's fallopian tube.

Coalbrookdale is just one of the sperm.

Even better Metrolink, the Greeks had mass produced furniture several hundred years earlier.

It all depends on what you mean by 'industrial' and 'factory'.

A comprehensive piece/article about 'The Origins of the Industrial Revolution in England'.

http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/lecture17a.html

...there's quite a lot of stuff out there that talks about the revolution in broad terms, and mentions certain specific technologies... but most of it talks in a global sense.

It is a matter of some debate (hopefully this one) where the Industrial Revolution actually became an identifiable movement. Worldwide even, no one can agree on specific times/places, and I think we should use this thread as an opportunity to investigate the origins/cradle/catalyst of the IR in terms of Manchester and its contribution.

I am suggesting that cotton was actually the catalyst for the whole thing, and support that with a few things that I said on skybar... Clearly many people will reject this, but many people also support it. Let's try and identify specific markers, and the chain of events... Few historians will actually go on record as saying the IR started in such and such a place, but I think that it can be attributed to specific events in Lancashire, notably: cotton, the railway between Manchester and Liverpool, the local economic factors, entrepreneurialism, the emancepation of workers... amongst other things....

I find this all very amusing, and sometimes equate a lot of Manchester's claims to the Soviet Union in the 1950's, where the establishment tried to "re-write" history for the perceived benifit of that Union, & try to brain wash it's population by mis-information, half truths & lies!

I'm not sure the Wrekin area of Shropshire, centred on Telford, Ironbridge & Coalbrookdale would have become a World Heritage Site & been allowed to use the words "WELCOME TO TELFORD, BIRTHPLACE OF INDUSTRY" on all the signage on it's major trunk roads in to the area, do you??!!

I find this all very amusing, and sometimes equate a lot of Manchester's claims to the Soviet Union in the 1950's, where the establishment tried to "re-write" history for the perceived benifit of that Union, & try to brain wash it's population by mis-information, half truths & lies!

I'm not sure the Wrekin area of Shropshire, centred on Telford, Ironbridge & Coalbrookdale would have become a World Heritage Site & been allowed to use the words "WELCOME TO TELFORD, BIRTHPLACE OF INDUSTRY" on all the signage on it's major trunk roads in to the area, do you??!!

...its a matter for debate. I dare say if Manchester had stuck up signs all over the place that it was the home of Communism (which it is) then that would have become fact as well....

I'm not sure the Wrekin area of Shropshire, centred on Telford, Ironbridge & Coalbrookdale would have become a World Heritage Site & been allowed to use the words "WELCOME TO TELFORD, BIRTHPLACE OF INDUSTRY" on all the signage on it's major trunk roads in to the area, do you??!!

You don't get it, it's the Industrial Revolution. People have said, we'd had industrial technology, mines, mills etc for millenia before. But this is the coming together of that technology which had indeed been developed in places like Telford (amongst others) to create the revolution. The industrial revolution wasn't some guy in a gorge experimenting with iron, it was hundreds of thoasands of people moving to the cities. So how can you call telford the birthplace of the industrial revolution?

You could argue that there is no birthplace to the IR, however it stands that Manchester was its cradle.


The complex of radical socioeconomic changes, such as the ones that took place in England in the late 18th century, that are brought about when extensive mechanization of production systems results in a shift from home-based hand manufacturing to large-scale factory production.

...its a matter for debate. I dare say if Manchester had stuck up signs all over the place that it was the home of Communism (which it is) then that would have become fact as well....


I'm not sure what the schools are teaching kids today in their History lessons, especially in Manchester, but when I was at school we were told the Industrial Revolution all started in the Severn Valley around Ironbridge & Coalbrookdale. What has changed since I was a kid then? Is Ironbridge now part of the "Manchester Region"????

Prior to the growth of Manchester the largest indusrtrial centres were the Royal Naval Dockyards at Chatham and Portsmouth. But obviously their produce was not for the mass market. The fact that Manchester was not an incorporated town helped, the local government was archaic. There were no trade guilds to restrict competition. It was a true laissez faire creation.

I'm not sure what the schools are teaching kids today in their History lessons, especially in Manchester, but when I was at school we were told the Industrial Revolution all started in the Severn Valley around Ironbridge & Coalbrookdale. What has changed since I was a kid then? Is Ironbridge now part of the "Manchester Region"????

In my school, I was told that Ironbridge/Coalbrookdale was the birthplace of erm... mass produced iron.

I'm not sure what the schools are teaching kids today in their History lessons, especially in Manchester,

As an ex history teacher (in Manchester/ Salford natch) i can tell you my kids got the truth!
Coalbrookdale was the soup of the day but Manchester was Steak and chips with all the trimmings.

In my school, I was told that Ironbridge/Coalbrookdale was the birthplace of erm... mass produced iron.


Well, without mass produced iron, not a lot else could be made!! Your looms in Manchester would not have been that good made out of twigs & wood, & your steam engines would have been most interesting too!!!!!

Well, without mass produced iron, not a lot else could be made!! Your looms in Manchester would not have been that good made out of twigs & wood, & your steam engines would have been most interesting too!!!!!

Its interesting FLD, but in another hundred years who will be recognised as the father of home computing... Bill Gates/Steve Jobs, or the man who invented electricity....

As an ex history teacher (in Manchester/ Salford natch) i can tell you my kids got the truth!
Coalbrookdale was the soup of the day but Manchester was Steak and chips with all the trimmings.

..... and whilst Manchester became "King Cotton", with it's one major industry, Birmingham, which was a tiny place compared to Manchester before the Industrial Revolution, became the "City of a Thousand Trades", and turned out to become the second biggest city in Britain!

what bitter nonsence

..... and whilst Manchester became "King Cotton", with it's one major industry, Birmingham, which was a tiny place compared to Manchester before the Industrial Revolution, became the "City of a Thousand Trades", and turned out to become the second biggest city in Britain!

mmmm, I dont think anyones bashing Birmingham matey. Manchester grew out of all proportion as a result of its foresight in the early 1700's... it contributed vastly to world trade, along with Liverpool. Birmingham will forever in my mind be associated with cars... which came rather later.

I hasten to add that Telford didn't exist as a town during the IR. However, the man, Thomas Telford, did. :)

..... and whilst Manchester became "King Cotton", with it's one major industry,

Myth i'm afraid. Cotton soon became just a small part of what Manchester was about and besides most of the cotton industry was based in and around Lancashire with Manchester being the trading centre. What made manchester the colossus it was was its ability to diversify and its knack of producing brilliant individuals who could make ridiculous amounts of money from any little thing (whilst the brummies did all the donkey work:) )
Birmingham became servile to the north, producing things to serve the dominant industries in the north. Birmingham would have withered on the vine if it didnt have the north to make things for.

mmmm, I dont think anyones bashing Birmingham matey. Manchester grew out of all proportion as a result of its foresight in the early 1700's... it contributed vastly to world trade, along with Liverpool. Birmingham will forever in my mind be associated with cars... which came rather later.


It may be forever in a mind that is quite narrow, but Birmingham was the centre of most major manufacturing industries (except ships ... for obvious reasons) for 2 centuries.

We made your swords, pistols, rifles & later planes to keep your country safe!

Myth i'm afraid. Cotton soon became just a small part of what Manchester was about and besides most of the cotton industry was based in and around Lancashire with Manchester being the trading centre. What made manchester the colossus it was was its ability to diversify and its knack of producing brilliant individuals who could make ridiculous amounts of money from any little thing (whilst the brummies did all the donkey work:) )
Birmingham became servile to the north, producing things to serve the dominant industries in the north. Birmingham would have withered on the vine if it didnt have the north to make things for.


Titter, titter! People from the North of Englands, Europe & Ireland were flocking to Birmingham & the Midlands to work in the factories that helped made this country the power it was 200 years ago, don't be flippant about it. Birmingham had, & attracted to the area, more than it's fair share of very clever industrialists & entrepreneurs.

These people, a lot from your part of the world also, were escaping the slums to work for a better life ...... and yes, in the process, more slums were created.

It may be forever in a mind that is quite narrow, but Birmingham was the centre of most major manufacturing industries (except ships ... for obvious reasons) for 2 centuries.

We made your swords, pistols, rifles & later planes to keep your country safe!

I was being flippant. Of course Birmingham is/was one of the world's capitals in terms of engineering. Probably the birthplace of 'engineering'. No one would ever dispute that. But that's a different subject is it not?

Myth i'm afraid. Cotton soon became just a small part of what Manchester was about and besides most of the cotton industry was based in and around Lancashire with Manchester being the trading centre. What made manchester the colossus it was was its ability to diversify and its knack of producing brilliant individuals who could make ridiculous amounts of money from any little thing (whilst the brummies did all the donkey work:) )
Birmingham became servile to the north, producing things to serve the dominant industries in the north. Birmingham would have withered on the vine if it didnt have the north to make things for.

Somethings never change Longy.:wink2:

I was being flippant. Of course Birmingham is/was one of the world's capitals in terms of engineering. Probably the birthplace of 'engineering'. No one would ever dispute that. But that's a different subject is it not?

Engineering (in it's many forms) is an industry is it not? Is this not an "industrial" thread?

didn't the Romans / Incas / Eygiptians all have engineers many millenia before anyone settled in Manchester or Brum???

Somethings never change Longy.:wink2:

No they don't, & Birmingham is developing it's micro chip industry ...... & as soon as we've made enough of them, we'll send them up to Manchester for you to 'insert' in to your shoulders!!!

Engineering (in it's many forms) is an industry is it not? Is this not an "industrial" thread?

I think we are going round in circles. The Industrial Revolution is what we are discussing... you have a view that somewhere else was more important than Manchester. I respect that view. But iron in itself is no different to electricity, or silicon as a commodity. The ingenuity and foresight of the businessmen and women of Manchester (and Liverpool) are what made the Industrial Revolution what it was... the marketing and production of cotton being its catalyst.

No they don't, & Birmingham is developing it's micro chip industry ...... & as soon as we've made enough of them, we'll send them up to Manchester for you to 'insert' in to your shoulders!!!

As in Kitkat's?:ohno:

FLD.

Click on introduction and read it.

I'll start you off. It was the first........... http://www.auvc.co.uk/index.htm

Perhaps you might understand now?

didn't the Romans / Incas / Eygiptians all have engineers many millenia before anyone settled in Manchester or Brum???

Yes, & I think the Romans had a lot to do with the birth of your city, not machines!!

I hasten to add that Telford didn't exist as a town during the IR. However, the man, Thomas Telford, did. :)

True but neither did Ironbridge it came after the bridge hence its name the area was previously called Madeley Wood

Yes, & I think the Romans had a lot to do with the birth of your city, not machines!!

What have the Romans ever done for us?

MSN Encarta

The industry most often associated with the Industrial Revolution is the textile industry. In earlier times, the spinning of yarn and the weaving of cloth occurred primarily in the home, with most of the work done by people working alone or with family members. This pattern lasted for many centuries. In 18th-century Great Britain a series of extraordinary innovations reduced and then replaced the human labor required to make cloth. Each advance created problems elsewhere in the production process that led to further improvements. Together they made a new system to supply clothing.

The first important invention in textile production came in 1733. British inventor John Kay created a device known as the flying shuttle, which partially mechanized the process of weaving. By 1770 British inventor and industrialist James Hargreaves had invented the spinning jenny, a machine that spins a number of threads at once, and British inventor and cotton manufacturer Richard Arkwright had organized the first production using water-powered spinning. These developments permitted a single spinner to make numerous strands of yarn at the same time. By about 1779 British inventor Samuel Crompton introduced a machine called the mule, which further improved mechanized spinning by decreasing the danger that threads would break and by creating a finer thread.

Throughout the textile industry, specialized machines powered either by water or steam appeared. Row upon row of these innovative, highly productive machines filled large, new mills and factories. Soon Britain was supplying cloth to countries throughout the world. This industry seemed to many people to be the embodiment of an emerging, mechanized civilization.

The most important results of these changes were enormous increases in the output of goods per worker. A single spinner or weaver, for example, could now turn out many times the volume of yarn or cloth that earlier workers had produced. This marvel of rising productivity was the central economic achievement that made the Industrial Revolution such a milestone in human history.

The Industrial Revolution also had considerable impact upon the nature of work. It significantly changed the daily lives of ordinary men, women, and children in the regions where it took root and grew.

New manufacturing towns and cities grew dramatically. Many of these cities were close to the coalfields that supplied fuel to the factories. Factories had to be close to sources of power because power could not be distributed very far. The names of British factory cities soon symbolized industrialization to the wider world: Liverpool, Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Sheffield, and especially Manchester. In the early 1770s Manchester numbered only 25,000 inhabitants. By 1850, after it had become a center of cotton manufacturing, its population had grown to more than 350,000.

What have the Romans ever done for us?

Roads!

M60, M56, M61, M62, M66, M67 The biggest motorway network in the UK. Manchester! Motorway City!(I'm sure that title belongs to another city?)

Roads!

M60, M56, M61, M62, M66, M67 The biggest motorway network in the UK. Manchester! Motorway City!(I'm sure that title belongs to another city?)

Daft film reference obviously lost on you JRBrian?

What have the Romans ever done for us?

Gave your city it's name for a start "Mancunium", was it not?

Aye, and that's latin for breast because Manchester was founded as a fort on hill that looked like a big tit to the romans.

Anywhere with the name 'Chester' used to be a roman fort btw. Manchester, Colchester, just Chester etc are all roman.

Gave your city it's name for a start "Mancunium", was it not?


A common error. Its "Mamucium" rather than Mancunium, a Victorian error. The Roman site was abandoned in dark ages and the settlement grew around the cathedral. apparently there was an as yet undiscovered motte and bailly castle up that end too after the Norman Conquest.

...Manchester was founded as a fort on hill that looked like a big tit to the romans.

I've seen that hill, and I must agree with the Romans, it looks exactly like Tony Wilson.

Manchester was the first industrial city. I realise that calling it the birthplace of the industrial revolution is open for debate but there is no doubt that it was the first city in the world of its kind.

Daft film reference obviously lost on you JRBrian?

Not at all Longhooley. Hence the 'daft' response.

Not at all Longhooley. Hence the 'daft' response.

Thought as much!
Lost on FLifeofD though it seems?

All this talk of Ironbridge has got me thinking of Worsley - has it got the potential to become manchester's telford-like tourist attraction? I know the council have organised heritage walks, but what about a museum? or a road diversion to really get this place on the map where it deserves to be.

http://www.bolton.org.uk/worsl1.jpg

http://www.bolton.org.uk/worsl2.jpg

http://www.bolton.org.uk/worsl3.jpg

http://www.brocross.com/iwps/images/newslett/jan06/worsley-delph.jpg

http://static.flickr.com/24/43481266_139bbb56c3_b.jpg

Heck it's even got its own iron bridge!

http://static.flickr.com/50/140443300_e687415529.jpg?v=0

...nice one kids, that water looks like its full of shite tho ;-)

Manchester was the first industrial city. I realise that calling it the birthplace of the industrial revolution is open for debate but there is no doubt that it was the first city in the world of its kind.

1. ok firstly was Manchester a city or a town when it was supposed have been the firs Industrial City??? lets make that point clear.

2. What is Industry, taken from Dictionary.com

Commercial production and sale of goods.
A specific branch of manufacture and trade
The sector of an economy made up of manufacturing enterprises: government regulation of industry.
Industrial management.
Energetic devotion to a task or an endeavor; diligence: demonstrated great intelligence and industry as a prosecutor.
Ongoing work or study associated with a specified subject or figure: the Civil War industry; the Hemingway industry.
A collection of artifacts or tools made from a specified material: a Mesolithic bone industry.
A standardized tradition of toolmaking associated with a specified tool or culture: a stone hand-ax industry; the Acheulian industry.

3. Most of the above could be applied to many many towns in Britain well before the cotton industry became synonymous with Manchester on such a large scale as is being suggested here. Birmingham as an example had a large metalwork industry form as early as the 16th century, and by the early 17th century the town was synonymous with arms and armour, so much so that the town supplied much of the weapons for the Parliamentarians, this is most definitely classed as an Industry, many people working together in various sized work houses and small factories producing a uniform product, skilled labour and taking advantage of metalwork foundries and furnaces which in turn were thought out and perfected during this age and many years before.

4. My take on it is that Manchester was the first Large Scale Industrial town, with regard to larger more coherent factories making similar goods, in this case cotton BUT even so, there were many other parts of the UK that acted as a precursor to these large scale factories and allowed them to happen quickly and efficiently, its a bit Naive in my opinion to say Manchester was the first Industrial town in the world, by saying this it implies that nothing industrial existed before Manchester's Large scale Cotton Industry.. not sure if that makes sense, not trying to take anything away from Manchester at all though, it played its part in a large scale way with workers and what we expect today from employers large and small (although I'm not hot on this).

Thats not water - its chocolate!

http://www.prestigioushomesflatfeeservices.net/images/ompa%20lumpa%20menbbb.jpg

The whole town / city argument is just semantics.
It is surely a measure of Manchester's importance and blistering growth that it was not even incorporated as a city until 1853. The most important trading city in the world apart from London in the early C19th was still officially a town. Some achievement!
That is why Manchester has a Town Hall and not a City Hall - surely the biggest and best Town hall in the world - a sign of manchester's significance and power.

I'm sorry but some people are showing some King Canute style denial. There is no argument to be had.
Just for fun type 'world's first industrial city' in to google and see what comes up. Hardly scientific but quite telling.

....its a bit Naive in my opinion to say Manchester was the first Industrial town in the world, by saying this it implies that nothing industrial existed before Manchester's Large scale Cotton Industry.. not sure if that makes sense, not trying to take anything away from Manchester at all though, it played its part in a large scale way with workers and what we expect today from employers large and small (although I'm not hot on this).

...the cotton industry in Lancashire was the testing ground for something called 'division of labour'. It's this that sets 'workshops' apart from 'factories'. There is a big difference between a forge that produced armour, and a very large mill that may have employed thousands of people all of whom were tasked with specific duties. The division of labour concept is just one of the things that enabled the Industrial Revolution to really gather pace.

...nice one kids, that water looks like its full of shite tho ;-)

:) Indeed b4mmy, apparently the Coal Authority offered to 'clean' it but the locals were up in arms about that and it fell through. I suppose it adds to the 'character' if the area.

I've been thinking about it, and unless tourists like the VRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMSSSSWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH from the motorway which is about 100 metres away, i don't think it's gonna be a major success anytime soon.

...the cotton industry in Lancashire was the testing ground for something called 'division of labour'. It's this that sets 'workshops' apart from 'factories'. There is a big difference between a forge that produced armour, and a very large mill that may have employed thousands of people all of whom were tasked with specific duties. The division of labour concept is just one of the things that enabled the Industrial Revolution to really gather pace.

'Industry' in pre revolutionary times was based around the concept of artisans. The Manchester Men rewrote the rule book (ripped it up and burnt it?) and moved 'industry' aware from a small-scale, skill-based practise in to a mechanised, high yield concept where human beings were just cogs in the machine. Pre revolutionary 'industry' was a based on a supply and demand dynamic wherein someone needed something and went and got it made from whoever made it. Manchester merchants were able to create a worldwide demand for their products - setting in stone the ideology behind global capitalism and the free market economy.
Now thats revolutionary!

That is why Manchester has a Town Hall and not a City Hall - surely the biggest and best Town hall in the world - a sign of manchester's significance and power.

Birmingham has A loverly big town hall as well thanks, a real gem.

I'm sorry but some people are showing some King Canute style denial. There is no argument to be had.
Just for fun type 'world's first industrial city' in to google and see what comes up. Hardly scientific but quite telling.

Lol not the old google bullshit again, do you know I typed a load of crap into wikipedia some years ago and its now been reproduced around the world literally thousands of times by other copycat websites, its true because I wrote it off the top of my head, I'm interested in facts not fiction, I rember Early Bird citing some sources on here about how all these websited now refered to Manchester as the second english city, quite telling until you discover the sites with saying this were Manchester-centric web sites lol.. its all a bit silly really.

'Industry' in pre revolutionary times was based around the concept of artisans. The Manchester Men rewrote the rule book (ripped it up and burnt it?) and moved 'industry' aware from a small-scale, skill-based practise in to a mechanised, high yield concept where human beings were just cogs in the machine. Pre revolutionary 'industry' was a based on a supply and demand dynamic wherein someone needed something and went and got it made from whoever made it. Manchester merchants were able to create a worldwide demand for their products - setting in stone the ideology behind global capitalism and the free market economy.
Now thats revolutionary!

It is a little known fact that Fritz Lang used 1800's Manchester as his inspirational model when he produced Metropolis. The film was almost called 'Manchester das Metropolis', but he bottled out when some upstarts from Birmingham protested.

Lol not the old google bullshit again, its all a bit silly really.

When i did my degree the internet took three and half days to load a page and google was a board game. I am not basing my arguments on a cursory google but 5 years (and beyond) of reading and writing about all this. For sake of brevity and because i have two children and a wife to make tea for and put to bed (not the wife she can manage that herself) i have not written a 15 000 word dissertation but just 'for fun' i directed you in the direction of a google.
Claiming that any site that claims Manchester is the first industrial city is bound to Manchester-centric is like typing in 'I Love Westlife' and being disappointed that you didnt find an article by Edward De Bono!

Well you may have got me there, I don't have a degree, it sjust interesting to know about... erm stuff basically, and I think the Industrial Revolution is an interesting subject because it is actually subjective in its self, you say Manchester is the first Industrial town but I don't and I think its fair to say that we both have pretty good arguments for both ideas, so really its better to agree on something that we both agree on if you get my meaning, as in Manchester and Birmingham were both equeally important in the Industrial revolution. Thanks.

Just for fun type 'world's first industrial city' in to google and see what comes up. Hardly scientific but quite telling.

Or alternatively try "the first manufacturing town in the world" :)

Well you may have got me there, I don't have a degree, it sjust interesting to know about... erm stuff basically, and I think the Industrial Revolution is an interesting subject because it is actually subjective in its self, you say Manchester is the first Industrial town but I don't and I think its fair to say that we both have pretty good arguments for both ideas, so really its better to agree on something that we both agree on if you get my meaning, as in Manchester and Birmingham were both equeally important in the Industrial revolution. Thanks.

The idea for the thread is to discuss the origins of the Industrial Revolution, and you have made some good points that are worth making. It's important to dig into this subject because there is no conclusive proof either way, and many historians shy away from making a de facto statement about its true origins. Birmingham, Coalbrookdale, Liverpool, Manchester and others all had their part... as did inventors and engineers the world over. For myself, I'm gathering knowledge as much as I share it... and it seems to me that if someone says, 'Manchester was the cradle of the Industrial Revolution', or 'Manchester was the worlds first industrial city'... there's no denying it unless a whole bunch of unknown stuff can be thrown at it. So, keep posting Elizabeth... I think its important, and interesting reading.

For more mixed results try "Hub of the industrial revolution"

For more mixed results try "Hub of the industrial revolution"

Sematics dear boy! Semantics!

What happens when you type 'Womb of the industrial revolution'?

Sematics dear boy! Semantics!

What happens when you type 'Womb of the industrial revolution'?

yes but who the hell is going to type in 'Womb of the industrial revolution'???

try typing "industrial revolution started in Birmingham dick head" and see what you get lol, I'm not aiming the Dick Head bit at you in malice. :cheers: :lol:

The idea for the thread is to discuss the origins of the Industrial Revolution, and you have made some good points that are worth making. It's important to dig into this subject because there is no conclusive proof either way, and many historians shy away from making a de facto statement about its true origins. Birmingham, Coalbrookdale, Liverpool, Manchester and others all had their part... as did inventors and engineers the world over. For myself, I'm gathering knowledge as much as I share it... and it seems to me that if someone says, 'Manchester was the cradle of the Industrial Revolution', or 'Manchester was the worlds first industrial city'... there's no denying it unless a whole bunch of unknown stuff can be thrown at it. So, keep posting Elizabeth... I think its important, and interesting reading.

well its an interesting subject, we have a lot to be proud of in the UK.

yes but who the hell is going to type in 'Womb of the industrial revolution'???

Me! :weird:

try typing "industrial revolution started in Birmingham dick head" and see what you get lol, I'm not aiming the Dick Head bit at you in malice.

None taken!

The Industrial Revolution officially started in Stalybridge, Cheshire on the 22nd October 1750, so you're all wrong.

On this date, a Mrs Elizabeth Staveleigh of Staley Hall, Stalybridge took it upon herself to employ the local peasant children and urchins to weave reinforced gussets into her collection of pantaloons and knickers. Such was the enormity of the job in hand, that she was forced to source cotton from America.

:lol:

Can't argue with that!

Cheers for them jourdan

I actually think that purely in terms of tourism potential and value, the M60 (on balance) does more for Worsley than it detracts from it. Yes, it's bizarre they didn't route it thru any of the abundant stretches of countryside to the edge of Worsley. The problem with Worsley is that despite it being incredibly stupidly pretty and vastly rich in world-important history, there are limited attractions there to tap into that. I believe you used to be able to go thru the underground canals on a tour, but that closed a long time ago. It needs more cafe's/galleries/etc.

There's also the fact that Worsley is now just essentially suburbia, i mean there's not just the motorway, there's the main road that slices right through the centre of the village on its way to Eccles- that is chockablock alot of the day. And there's also the fact that the-shit-hole-that-is-Winton is encroaching the village on this very road. There needs to be some sort of a by-pass here i reckon to get back to a villagey feel before we put galleries, cafes and the like around the area. It'd be a step away from commuter hell towards an environment you might want to spend an afternoon in. Perhaps there's a chance of this if we achieve World Heritage status.

It's true, I live just across the border in that s**thole of winton, I live on the main road, opposite some lovely black & white houses & the Grange Rd Estate (also lovely), we are on the same electrity circuit as Worsley, but about 5 houses down the road, they're on a seperate circuit.

This is because where i live actually used to be part of Worsley, until they built the stupid Westwood Park estate....Worsley kicked up so much of a fuss, they moved the border back and i now live in Eccles! Nice eh!

It's true, I live just across the border in that s**thole of winton, I live on the main road, opposite some lovely black & white houses & the Grange Rd Estate (also lovely), we are on the same electrity circuit as Worsley, but about 5 houses down the road, they're on a seperate circuit.

This is because where i live actually used to be part of Worsley, until they built the stupid Westwood Park estate....Worsley kicked up so much of a fuss, they moved the border back and i now live in Eccles! Nice eh!

Heh, I know alot of people round your way then choggers & I know what you mean about the grange rd estate, in fact i remember going trick or treating down that road about 4 years ago. Something i would definately not do across the road in the westwood park estate. :ohno:

....just wanted to make the 100th post... cheers

...nice one kids, that water looks like its full of shite tho ;-)

Not shite, it's Iron oxide in the clay type rock it is cut through around Worsley, and going into Patricroft. The canal water is not that colour along its entire length.

This settlement was not called Salford at the time obviously, (which is a name that only came later with the Anglo Saxons - which itself has two competing etymologies that I'm aware of). Incidentally I briefly met a retired city archivist today. He was like a strange monkish bumbling hermit - and apparently a thoroughly interesting chap and had been a perfect character for the job.

We'll talking about names coming later with the Anglo-Saxons, in that case Manchester itself was not called Manchester before Anglo-Saxon times either. The chester, ceister, caster postfixes for whatever town/city that holds them is entirely an Anglo-Saxon responsibility. Yes, it is derived from Latin Castrum, but as non of the current British derivatives of Chester, Caster, etc. are used outside of the British Isles, then it becomes apparent that their use is entirely Anglo-Saxon. The closest continental parallels being areas such as in Spain - Castilla, or the place I live, Castelló, but these places did not necessarily have a fort in Roman times (Castelló never did), but were named later after a much later castle, or in the case of Castilla a collection of such.

Going back to the name of Salford, it has nothing to do with Salt, that doesn't make sense in any fashion. The Anglo-Saxon "Ford" obviously comes from a settled place where a shallow river crossing exists. What exists on the banks of rivers? Willow trees love it. Latin for Willow? Salix as a noun, Salignus as an adjective. Even in modern Italic languages, in Spanish for example, a Willow tree is pronounced "Sauthe", Italian "Saliche", in French the word is "Saule". The fact that the town was a river crossing settlement, and the fact that Willows love river banks, makes this by far the most sensible answer to the origin of the name "Salford". There is no evidence of the Romans or anyone else doing anything of any significance with Salt in the area, so I think that can be totally discarded. However, it is known that the old core of Salford next to the River around Camp Street was the first Roman Settlement of Manchester, not Castlefield, the place must have been covered in Willow at the time.

Nobody knows what the Romans called this place, but Salicium is not beyond the stretch of imagination.

SLAP! For going so far off topic. But I do feel compelled to respond.

Going back to the name of Salford, it has nothing to do with Salt, that doesn't make sense in any fashion. The Anglo-Saxon "Ford" obviously comes from a settled place where a shallow river crossing exists. What exists on the banks of rivers? Willow trees love it. Latin for Willow? Salix as a noun, Salignus as an adjective. Even in modern Italic languages, in Spanish for example, a Willow tree is pronounced "Sauthe", Italian "Saliche", in French the word is "Saule". The fact that the town was a river crossing settlement, and the fact that Willows love river banks, makes this by far the most sensible answer to the origin of the name "Salford". There is no evidence of the Romans or anyone else doing anything of any significance with Salt in the area, so I think that can be totally discarded. However, it is known that the old core of Salford next to the River around Camp Street was the first Roman Settlement of Manchester, not Castlefield, the place must have been covered in Willow at the time.

Nobody knows what the Romans called this place, but Salicium is not beyond the stretch of imagination.

Nice argument-cum-fairy story, clearly meant to back up some weird 'Salford was the original Manchester' claim. But sadly for your daydreams, the Anglo-Saxon word for 'willow tree' was 'salh' or 'sealh', clearly the first syllable in the name, and there is nothing to suggest the name is any older, certainly not Roman 'Salicium'. Sorry.

I was always under the impression Salford came from Soily (as in muddy) Ford but i also thought the Bridgewater canal was fully of chocolate so i may be wrong

Like it or not, the Romans first set up camp in what is now Salford where evidence suggests that they did build their first fortifications, albeit wooden ones.

I'm not arguing with you Emma, it would take me more time than I currently have on my hands to tell you that "Salh" is not a Germanic word and that the Latin Salix has its roots in Indo-European, or that Latin was the unifying language of Europe which is why Germanic languages do borrow words from Latin and thus also Greek. However, the Saxon word for Willow was "Wilgia", thus why modern Germanic languages have this word in a form that is nothing to do with "Salix" or "Salh" or whatever. Swedish I think would be "velg", German "wilge", Dutch "wilg", English "Willow", etc.

The Saxons also generally changed the suffix of a town name, not the prefix unless they changed the name totally ie. Diva to Chester.

To suggest that they used a non-germanic word for something to change the prefix and then put their normal suffix on it is quite beyond the imagination.

And :lol: at Longford.

I won't post in this thread anymore after this, because I don't want to get into a fight, and it is entirely irrelevant anyway.

I'm not arguing with you Emma, it would take me more time than I currently have on my hands to tell you that "Salh" is not a Germanic word and that the Latin Salix has its roots in Indo-European, or that Latin was the unifying language of Europe which is why Germanic languages do borrow words from Latin and thus also Greek. However, the Saxon word for Willow was "Wilgia", thus why modern Germanic languages have this word in a form that is nothing to do with "Salix" or "Salh" or whatever. Swedish I think would be "velg", German "wilge", Dutch "wilg", English "Willow", etc.

The Saxons also generally changed the suffix of a town name, not the prefix unless they changed the name totally ie. Diva to Chester.

To suggest that they used a non-germanic word for something to change the prefix and then put their normal suffix on it is quite beyond the imagination.



Alright, two things.

My response to your first post was very offhand, I am sorry. But you needn't have taken up such a condescending tone, I am not a know-nothing.

Next, look up the word 'sallow', and you'll see that it is another English word for 'willow' which comes through Proto-Germanic from Indo-European 'sal(i)k', for which Latin 'salix' is a cognate and not the ancestor. You can see that it is a native English word because the final unvoiced velar plosive -k present in Indo-European has lenited to -h, according to Grimm's Law.

Nuff' said.

please keep posting Emma...I'm sure the weaster will apologise if you give him the opportunity... :)

I'm not apologising for anything, there is no need.

And Emma, I was not trying to be condescending, if you took it that way it's unfortunate, but I did say that I did not have the time to fully reply. It's also quite obvious that you are not a know-nothing and I never said that you were. You don't help your case however by accusing me of trying to "back up some weird 'Salford was the original Manchester' claim", because I don't care less which came first or not, neither were bound by their current political boundaries in Roman times in any case which makes it a very moot point. Current Salford was however the first Roman settlement next to the Irwell like it or not. They must have given that place a name.

I'm quite aware of the word Sallow, and as far a I understand it it refers to a specific species of Willow (South Eastern - Middle Eastern Willow), not the family of trees called Willow. That word is definitely derived from Latin in any case, which in turn is Indo-European in root as I briefly suggested, even old Persian has a similar word to "Salh".

That's not the point, the point is, the Romans must have had a name for the place, and it wasn't MAMVCIVM. Also, as I said, the place was settled before the Saxons arrived, and the Saxons did not normally change the prefix of a town name, only the suffix.

Sorry to have upset you.

Do i have to post my 'Homer in a mu-mu' picture to lighten the mood again?

You're supposed to be the bloody historian, you tell us the answer. :clown:

Where does the idea that Salford was the first roman settlement come from? The Roman road followed the line of Deansgate- wrong side of the Irwell.

The Anglo Saxon chronicle mentions the re fortification of Mamucium to hold against the Danes- this Salford business is new to me!!

Camp Street is where they first set up the settlement, basically a small wooden fortification and a load of tents. There was no ready built castle for them to occupy. ;)

Also, when they first arrived, there wasn't a road.

I thought Camp street was more to do with the Jacobites?

You're supposed to be the bloody historian, you tell us the answer. :clown:

Not my period i'm afraid!
As i understand it (ie not at all) i'm inclined to agree with Weatsie's assessment of Salford's Roman past and i believe Camp Street gets its name because of this.
The A6 (roman name?) was the first Roman road that came through the area and i believe that there was a Roman settlement on it in Salford first off and Castlefield only came about when other roman roads dissected the A6 there (the roman 'A6' road came down from the crescent, down across the irwell around near the regent road , water street junction a headed off through castlefield off towards hyde).

As far as the name goes:
The name of Salford derives from the Anglo-Saxon Sealhford = "sallow-tree ford", in reference to the willow (latin salix) trees that grow alongside the banks of the River Irwell that flows through the city. The city's crest is made up of three curved blue lines (representing the ford in the river) surrounded by sallow leaves.

I'm sorry Emma but Salford's pre industrial history is much richer than Manchester's.

Manchester is worth a hundred Salfords to some,
Salford, the silly suburb, that has been overcome,
It has its own government, what a silly idea,
What exactly is Salford, to Mancunians like gonorrhea

All this is true, in the last century I suppose,
Salford is Manchester, many juxtapose,
What about history though, have they never wondered,
100 years ago Manchester was in the Salford Hundred

The A6 is still on the Manchester side of the river- obviously the whole of Manchester was within Salford Hundred, but surely there was a manorial boundary coexistent with the river?

Brilliant thread.

It's like attending (local) History classes all over again. :)

The A6 is still on the Manchester side of the river- obviously the whole of Manchester was within Salford Hundred, but surely there was a manorial boundary coexistent with the river?

Sorry - i dont understand the question (i dont mean that in an arsey way - i just mean it in an i dont understand the question kinda way).

Anyway ive consulted by Bumper Book of Roman Salford Facts.
Apparently the Romans came up against some stiff resistence at Salford in their drive towards the west coast and waged guerrila operations for seven years. Apparently the Romans used caves on the Salford side of the Irwell as a base until a camp could be maintained.The A6 split into two at the junction of Cross St / Frederick (Camp) St the northerly road heading towards wigan the southerly heading towards Warrington and it is presumed this is the site of the camp.
It was only when Agricola relieved the beleagued troops in Salford that a proper fort was built at Castlefield but this was still in servitude to the main camp in Salford. Agricola eventually subdued the Britons and set about establishing new routes, new roads were built and Manchester became the more dominant settlement.

Im getting at the river boundary having been the same as the manorial boundary- there was a seperate manor of Manchester in medieval times. The time when the Manc/Salford distinction was firmly set. In ancient times no such boundary existed.

Sometimes I write things that make sense to me, but very few others.....

Modern roads are not always built directly on top of the Roman ones, and also, as I said, when the Romans first arrived, there was no road. Their first settlement in Manchester however was around Camp Street, which is now in the boundary of Salford, as Manchester once was in the Hundred sense anyway. I don't understand what the argument is here.

Emma May was arguing that the Romans never gave a name to this encampment at Camp Street and argued that the name Salford does not come from the Latin word Salix (which it quite obviously does - note Saxons and prefixes and Germanic words comments), but they must have done. I imaginatively proposed Salicium, and I hold my hands up to the fact that it is an imaginative proposal, but one that makes sense if having absolutely zero proof.

God forbid any of you should learn anything and of course being dead clever i already knew all about this but just found this on t'internet whilst looking for something else.
I have fun arguing that the most significant event in the Twentieth Century - the Russian Revolution - had its roots in Weaste.
Anyway interesting stuff about Engels below.

Engels arrived in Manchester in December 1842, aged 22. He was sent by his father to prepare him for business and to protect the family investment in the cotton manufacturing firm Ermen and Engels at Weaste, in Salford. His father, an orthodox religious man, thought that by sending his son into business he would rid him of his radical leanings. Engels though had other ideas. He hoped to study the social and political atmosphere of the city, at the centre of the industrial world.


Engels had experienced the nature of the factory system from a young age. Every morning he walked through the polluted streets of Bremen, on his way to school. He also observed the living conditions of the city’s working class, which he described as being worse than that of animals. He was an extremely well read young man and had a highly developed talent for language. He had met with Hegelian and socialist thinkers and was already writing under a pseudonym. He also enjoyed the trappings of a man of his social station. He had a love for fencing, riding and music. He came to Manchester hoping to learn more about the social and political struggles that were taking place there.
Engels lived a double life in Manchester. By day he worked for his father’s firm of ‘capitalist exploiters’, while at night he became a social investigator. He met with other industrialists and businessmen and followed the lifestyle of his bourgeois station. Meanwhile he devoted his spare time to exploring the political scene and the lives of the Manchester working class.

He wrote for several socialist and radical papers during this period, both in England and continental Europe, on a variety of issues. For Robert Owen’s ‘The New Moral World’ and the Chartist papers, the ‘Northern Star’ and ’Democratic Review’, he wrote on the campaigns of the day such as the ten hours bill and others that were attempting to improve peoples working conditions. He highlighted the lessons that could be learnt from them. He also described the characteristics of socialism and other political developments on the continent. For the continental papers he wrote about the economic developments and the lessons that could be learnt from the class struggle taking place in England.

Soon after his arrival in Manchester he began a relationship with a young woman, named Mary Burns. She was to become his partner until her death twenty years later. It is not certain where they met, although it is widely believed that she was a probably an employee at the Engel’s and Ermine mill. It was Mary who introduced and guided him through the dwellings of the Manchester working class.

During his first visit, Engels attended the Hall of Science, which was only five minutes from Ermine and Engels office. At weekends upwards of 3,000 people would attend lectures here on English social and political matters. It was a hot bed of radical activity. Chartists and socialists would meet there, to exchange ideas and circulate literature. Here he met Owenite socialists, the secularist John Watts, as well as leading Chartists such as James Leach and Julian Harney. He visited West Yorkshire and learned more about conditions in the factories from his compatriot George Werth in Bradford and met with Julian Harney the editor of the Leeds based Chartist newspaper The Northern Star.

Engels was deeply influenced by his first stay in Manchester. The social and political struggles taking place impressed him. Manchester was a focal point of the Chartists movement, the developing trade unions and cooperative societies, as it was for the factory agitations such as the campaigns to end child labour and to introduce a ten-hour day. He noted how politically active and well read a great number of the Manchester working class were.

His first visit to Manchester cemented his economic, social and political views. He now fully recognised the power that economic conditions played in the modern world, how these economic conditions led to class antagonism and that this antagonism gave rise to political parties and movements that represented these class interests. Engels left Manchester in 1844 and set about writing ’The condition of the working class in England’. This was published, in German, in 1845. It would be 50 years before an English translation would be available.

During the next few years, Engels continued his political journey. He met with Marx again in 1844. From that day a lifelong friendship and unity of purpose began. They wrote and published the ’Communist Manifesto’ together in 1848. During the summer of 1845, both Engels and Marx visited Manchester. Engels took Mary back to the continent with him and they were never separated again.

Engels returned to Manchester in November 1850. Again he came to work for the family firm. There were several reasons for this. One of which was to avoid possible arrest for his involvement in the uprisings in Germany during 1848 and 1849. Another though was in order to finance the work of Marx.

It was felt that Marx needed to devote all his time to researching and writing Das Kapital. Therefore someone would have to support him financially if he was to achieve this. Engels decided that he would have to do so. He did not do this purely out of friendship, although the bond between the two men was now very strong. He believed that Marx had the superior analytical mind and was therefore better suited to task of writing and researching what was to become Das Kapital.

Again Engels returned to the double life. On the overt side he was living as a respected businessman and leading figure of the Manchester German community. He was a member of the Albert club and Shiller-Anstalt, of which he became president in 1864, and participated in the Cheshire Hunt. He often entertained the ‘philistines’, as he described them, at his official lodgings. These society and business associates knew nothing of his great intellectual abilities. On the covert side he shared his unofficial home with Mary Burns, her sister Lizzie (Lydia) and her niece. Following Mary’s death Lizzie became Engels ‘wife’. Here he met with those who shared his communist and revolutionary convictions. He adopted secretive methods in order to keep these two lives separate.

During his second spell in Manchester, Engels was employed as a corresponding clerk and general assistant, in the family firm. For this he was paid a salary of £100 per annum and also received 10% of the firm’s profits. He hated this work intensely, but put up with it because he knew that he had to work, in order to support Marx.

He supplemented this income by writing on military matters, for journals both in England and America. It was this that earned him the nickname “the general”. He was greatly relieved when following the settlement of his father’s will he was left £10,000 and 20% of the firm’s future profits. Finally he had the freedom to devote himself to the struggle for communism.

Engels left Manchester in 1870 and settled in Regent’s Park Road, London. He devoted the remaining years of his life, until his death in 1895, to the struggle for communism. He continued writing on a variety of subjects and following the death of Marx, in 1883, he undertook the task of completing and edited volumes II and III of ’Das Capital’.

Words: Danny Crosby

Reminds me of that Communist Chair woman with the paintings. And Osama Bin Liner. Just another rabble-rouser rich kid who never did a day's work in his life.

Reminds me of that Communist Chair woman with the paintings. And Osama Bin Liner. Just another rabble-rouser rich kid who never did a day's work in his life.

:lol: And Marx who lived off family money until it ran out and then sent his wife out to work two jobs whilst he sat on his arse in the British Library.
Give Engels his dues though he actually had a job - although by all accounts he wasnt very good at it.

the Hall of Science was where the Air and Space Museum is now - next door to St Matthew Campfield.

http://www.manchester.gov.uk/libraries/central/history/pre.htm

(which also has a picture of Piccadilly with the library buildings on it - for those who think the former municipal gardens were a long-stading feature)

.-The Free Library stands in Camp Field, a little off Deansgate, with front toward Byrom-street; was originally the Hall of Science, built for the Socialists in 1839, and purchased by the Library committee in 1852 for £1,200; underwent then a thorough renovation, rendering it a bold, handsome, and commotions edifice, in the Italian style; was opened, as a library, with 16,013 volumes in the reference department, and 5,305 in the lending department; acquired such increase as to have a total of 77,774 volumes in 1866,-of which 38,426 were in the reference department; cost originally, for building and for books, £12,823, raised by public subscription; and is maintained by a rate levied under the Public Libraries act of 1850

From the Times yesterday:

"It is a parable for our times that Manchester is celebrating today because it has successfully bid to be the gambling capital of Britain. The place where cotton once was king, hub of the industrial revolution, the home of Victorian social reform, where Cobden, Bright and Owen championed the workers, has become . . . the city of bling. What were the odds? Seven to one against, evens or just pile all the money on red and hope for the best?"

Unfortunately manufacturing has been in decline in the UK for decades. This has been exacabated by the low cost competition particularly in the Far East. Unless we as consumers are prepared to pay a lot more for what we use on a daily basis this decline in UK output will continue. We could of course reduce wages to £1.00 a day to compete, or we could manufacture in line with our cost base but that would add huge cost in selling price for all of us. You can't have it all ways!

my sentiments entirely ubermiser... i think everyone in the world should earn exactly the same amount of money anyway... I wonder how much money there actually is in the world... I bet 99.9% of people would be better off...

i think everyone in the world should earn exactly the same amount of money anyway...

I 'll hold you to that one day.

Thats the second commie comment youve made in the last couple of days. Are we seeing an epiphany here?

I 'll hold you to that one day.

Thats the second commie comment youve made in the last couple of days. Are we seeing an epiphany here?


....oh bugger.

....oh bugger.

Its ok comrade - we are brothers in arms now. I'll guide you.

Its ok comrade - we are brothers in arms now. I'll guide you.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/State_Coat_of_Arms_of_the_USSR_%281958-1991_version%29_transparent_background.png

...I wonder how much money there actually is in the world...

None, b4mmy, none:

http://www.thescienceforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=4750&start=0

None, b4mmy, none:

http://www.thescienceforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=4750&start=0


Nice one. So how big a tab does the world have... there's gonna be a massive piss up one day :)

I tell you now guys, an equalising in society is coming. Its called global warming. Think about it...if you restrict carbon use how do you do it? Tax and/or limitation of use. The EU are already looking at car power restriction for the near future. Amagine footballers driving the same cars as Mr Average...its a real possibility. The same could be said of home omissions could'nt it? Oil and gas aint going to last beyond 2040ish so pressure on energy prices will become huge well before then. We need an alternative or we face economic ruin well before the thermometer starts to rise. Carbon restriction will be a great social equaliser if there is anything left to burn!!

Well i was watching a documentary called Star Trek: First Contact the other day and it will all be sorted out after WW3 apparently. Sometime around 2060 according some bloke called Jean Luc Picard.

I think old Jean may be a bit late Longthought, I suspect WW3 may have already started. Hope Eastgate and the strip joints in Salford Quays get finished before armegedon! Actually we'll probably get some even better sleaze on the east side now!!

We ought to have a competition to find and list all those subjects about which we can all have a really good old argument over - it might be a rather long list of
course!

There will be no coming together of the minds by the end of each subject as we shall all simply re-state our views and prejudices over and over until the opponent(s) give(s) up or die(s).

So, the patently obvious for starters : football.........!:bash:

The Industrial Revolution. Beginning in the 18th century, Britain began making our lives worse through the introduction of machines in the workplace. The health, safety, and wages of workers took a back seat to owners' greed for ever-higher output and profits. The skies above the city—first London, then the world—were filled with black smoke. Waters were poisoned with noxious chemicals. Under the careless watch Britain's elite, the Industrial Revolution got off to a horrible start, the consequences of which have continued to ring down through the centuries. The melting of the polar icecaps, the loss of countless plants and animal species, and the imperiled condition of the human race on a planet made poisonous by misapplied technology are all a consequence of British negligence and hunger to accumulate wealth at any cost.

http://www.britishreparations.org

:nuts:

The Industrial Revolution. Beginning in the 18th century, Britain began making our lives worse through the introduction of machines in the workplace. The health, safety, and wages of workers took a back seat to owners' greed for ever-higher output and profits. The skies above the city—first London, then the world—were filled with black smoke. Waters were poisoned with noxious chemicals. Under the careless watch Britain's elite, the Industrial Revolution got off to a horrible start, the consequences of which have continued to ring down through the centuries. The melting of the polar icecaps, the loss of countless plants and animal species, and the imperiled condition of the human race on a planet made poisonous by misapplied technology are all a consequence of British negligence and hunger to accumulate wealth at any cost.

http://www.britishreparations.org

:nuts:

Coming from an American!

Welcome to BritishReparations.org, the official site of the International Coalition for British Reparations. We are a global network of citizens who have suffered injuries at the hands of the British Empire over the last five hundred years. We've banded together to ask the United Kingdom to compensate the world for all the damage they've done.

Cheeky bastards. Send all reciprocal hate mail here. :)

http://whois.domaintools.com/britishreparations.org
Domain Name: BRITISHREPARATIONS.ORG

Administrative Contact :
Carnegie, Carrie **
fv3x87xz9fw@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN: BRITISHREPARATIONS.ORG
c/o Network Solutions
P.O. Box 447
Herndon, VA 20172-0447
Phone: 570-708-8780

--

ha, ha. Just found this quoute: They hate the British because of our....

Bad Inventions:
Machine guns, slums, prisons, child labor, bad hygiene, the Black Plague, concentration camps, you name it. If it hurts people, the British probably came up with it.

We invented slums, apparently. oh and the plauge. :)

So according to them the Iraq war is all our fault. Talk about shifting the blame:nuts:

Scarily though, they do kind of have a point! If you follow their logic, and that it really was industrialisation that made the world what it is today, then maybe we should stop bragging about the whole “hub of the revolution” thing! Of course if being a illiterate feudal serf was so much better, why is it so out of fashion…..

I do like this bit; I didn’t realise this sentence was such a get out of jail free card!

“Are you racists?
No. We don't believe this is due to any inherent defect in the character of the British people. Stretching more than a millennium to the crowning of Alfred the Great in 871, the British Monarchy is simply one of the oldest continuous governmental bodies on earth. For centuries, its power over its citizens was nearly absolute. By the dawn of the 20th century, it controlled nearly one third of the globe. But while other totalitarian reigns have been put on trial and forced to make amends, the British crown has maintained its grip on power, and so avoided being called to account for its numerous crimes against humanity.”

Maybe they should blame Darwin, because he started the whole evolution thing off that led to us become the first industrial nation.

Or was that Adam?

Scarily though, they do kind of have a point! If you follow their logic, and that it really was industrialisation that made the world what it is today, then maybe we should stop bragging about the whole “hub of the revolution” thing! Of course if being a illiterate feudal serf was so much better, why is it so out of fashion…..

I do like this bit; I didn’t realise this sentence was such a get out of jail free card!

“Are you racists?
No. We don't believe this is due to any inherent defect in the character of the British people. Stretching more than a millennium to the crowning of Alfred the Great in 871, the British Monarchy is simply one of the oldest continuous governmental bodies on earth. For centuries, its power over its citizens was nearly absolute. By the dawn of the 20th century, it controlled nearly one third of the globe. But while other totalitarian reigns have been put on trial and forced to make amends, the British crown has maintained its grip on power, and so avoided being called to account for its numerous crimes against humanity.”

They seem to forget that we actually executed a king and since 1688 Parliament has been sovereign.

William I was a French Speaking Viking, Henry II was French, William III was Dutch, George I and II were Germans.

The last three were King because Parliament invited them to be King.

I don't think they do have a point at all.

They say that we are to blame for all the pollution in the world. Well when the industrial revolution started we had no idea that it would harm the planet. However now that we do know it harms the planet, which country is still stubbonly refusing to cut down emmisions and and is one of the greatest contributors in the world??? USA! USA!

I'm my buisness the words "Date of Guilty Knowledge" is very important. They would do well to remember that.

Scarily though, they do kind of have a point!

Nah, I disgaree. Times were different back then. The world and the human race was a less civilised with less of a developed moral understanding of the people being the same as people.

Yes we took the piss at one point; but so did the French, the Belgians, Ghengis Khan and his mates, the Romans, Germainia. In fact everyone who was in the position to take the piss and take what ever they wanted, did so.

Look at the way India couldn't give a toss about their impact on the environment because their economy is booming. They are still a developing country which is why (agruably, of course) they can get away with it more than we could.

At least we created the commonwealth. We welcome to our coutry those who we colonised and leave a door open to anyone who no longer wants a part of it.

The only reason these people from America can stand on their high horse and spout shite about how dastardly we were in the olden days, is because the United States did not even exist in these uncivilised times. And if they did, and they had the power they have today, you can bet your life they'd be out taxing everyone they could the same way every other fucker did....and they managed to do that to their *only* neighbour, the native americans anyway.

I cant believe how seriously you are all taking it, its such a blatant piss take!

I don’t for a second think “we” are to blame for all ill in the world, its just quite funny.

I cant believe how seriously you are all taking it, its such a blatant piss take!

I don’t for a second think “we” are to blame for all ill in the world, its just quite funny.

And quite flattering as well:lol:

One other thing though. There history is our history. They are as connected to those events as we are.

It's amazing.

We invented global warming so therefore it's all OUR fault.

Makes me proud to be British :D

I also love it's advert they have there... they want reparations for the welsh, scots and irish too from the Evil British Empire.

Whoever made that site is a genius.

There is no denying Coalbrookdale's contribution (or Birmingham's for that matter Elizabeth) to the Industrial revolution but thats all it was - a contribution.
For the gazillionth time - all the main factors that can clearly be seen as being the constructs of what we know as the Industrial revolution came together in Manchester.
erm wasn't the industrial revolutino financed in the main by money from London...

so the actual geography may say M/cr but generally it would have taken place without money from the world stage...

just a thought

erm wasn't the industrial revolutino financed in the main by money from London...


No.

erm wasn't the industrial revolutino financed in the main by money from London...

so the actual geography may say M/cr but generally it would have taken place without money from the world stage...

just a thought

No, the London market provided a catalyst but the industrial revolution was in the main financed by small landowners, the minor aritocracy such as the Duke of Bridgewater and when the railways arrived, by the profits of the slave trade.

I blame Christianity for inventing Catholicism and Catholicism for inventing Protestantism and Protestantism for inventing the Industrial Revolution and the Industrial Revolution for inventing Keg Beer.

...and the Industrial Revolution for inventing Keg Beer.

which as we all know resulted in this:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/darkpowers/chav.jpeg

and this:

http://www.chavscum.co.uk/4images/data/media/1/chav-age.jpg

which as we all know resulted in this:
http://www.chavscum.co.uk/4images/data/media/1/chav-age.jpg

nothing wrong with her.

nothing wrong with her.

Seconded



I blame Christianity for inventing Catholicism and Catholicism for inventing Protestantism and Protestantism for inventing the Industrial Revolution and the Industrial Revolution for inventing Keg Beer.

Of course you do know that the main protagonists in the Industrial Revolution tended to be non-conformist types and, not as you state, Protestants.
Of course you knew that and was just using it to make a point werent you?
Werent you?

Non-conformists are protestants. Sole Fide, Sole Scriptorum, fuck the pope, that shit.

I meant Presbyterians, Quakers, Weslyns, Dissenters etc of which the pioneers of the Industrial revolution had its fair share.

I meant Presbyterians, Quakers, Weslyns, Dissenters etc of which the pioneers of the Industrial revolution had its fair share.

Still Protestants, more so than the Church of England who are just Popeless Catholics.

Still Protestants, more so than the Church of England who are just Popeless Catholics.

Yup - point taken and argument ceded.

I love arguing :)

Me too.

I do know what non-conformists are.

My Granddad's a quaker. I think if I had a God I'd have his. You sit in a room quietly and only say anything 'if the spirit moves you'. Sounds perfect for a hungover Sunday morning. Of course the spirit doesn't move him much anymore, but he is 103, so it's no surprise.

Anyway. I've been heartilly swayed by Tristram Hunt's (officially world's fittest historian) view, that the northern cities were fucked as soon as the middle class all stopped being non-conformists, because they stopped giving a shit about the cities and the lives of those who's labours they lived off and started having fun fun fun in the sun sun sun (hungry hippos optional, goldfish schoals nibbling at toes mandatory), and investing their money in land and railways in Paraguay. Knuts.

Go nuclear for a third industrial revolution

13 October 2007
NewScientist.com news service

We are on the brink of the "third industrial revolution", according to José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission - who believes it means nations may have to embrace nuclear power.

Europe's "low-carbon age" is the revolution Barroso spoke of last week at an energy conference in Madrid, Spain. "Member states cannot avoid the question of nuclear energy," he said, following the commission's announcement last month of a new research initiative for nuclear energy. The European Union should contribute to research, Barroso said.

However, not all of Europe shares his view. At a separate nuclear energy conference in Vienna last week, environment ministers from Austria, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Norway and Italy declared that global growth in nuclear power would severely increase the risks of nuclear proliferation. "Some European countries are almost religiously opposed to nuclear power," says Hans-Holger Rogner of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna

There was talk of having a nuclear energy plant quite close to Manchester recently... *honestly*... but it looks as though the option was rejected. Anyway, regardless of the EU, this is how it's looking like panning out...


British Energy eyes nuclear sites

British Energy says access to the grid is a key issue British Energy has named eight of its sites as possible locations for next-generation nuclear plants.

The firm earmarked Sizewell in Suffolk, Hinkley in Somerset, Bradwell in Essex and Dungeness in Kent for development.

It also named Heysham in Lancashire, Torness in East Lothian, Hunterston in Ayrshire and Hartlepool.

The firm said flood defence and coast protection could make nuclear power possible at all eight sites. The UK is to define its nuclear policy in 2008.

The news was part of a review of site work needed to counter the impact of climate change.

There have been concerns that rising sea water and increasingly heavy rains could threaten power stations on coastal sites.

But the report, based on research by engineering consultancy, the Halcrow group, found "the key conclusion is that flood defence and coast protection measure can be deployed to make replacement build a feasible option at all sites".

"Relying solely on current engineering methods and knowledge, the sites can be made robust against climate change impacts for the expected lifetimes of the replacement stations," it added.

However, the firm said access to the grid is likely to be an important constraining factor in selecting sites.

The firm has already embarked on transmission connection agreements with National Grid for each of the key sites it owns in the South of England at Sizewell, Hinkley, Dungeness and Bradwell, starting in 2016.

In October the firm took two reactors at Hartlepool and two at Heysham out of service after a routine inspection showed problems with the boiler units.

Studies to assess the different locations would vary but would include examinations of flora and fauna, fisheries and other marine ecology, landscape, geology, noise and air quality.

The firm said it remained "flexible" about how the sites would be developed and on the choice of reactor design.

Friends of the Earth's campaigner Neil Crumpton said that it was "crazy" to build a new generation of nuclear reactors.

"The new reactor designs are all untested prototypes, and the shortage of skills and component availability to build new stations would seriously compromise speedy or safe deployment," he said.

"We can meet our power needs, maintain energy security and tackle climate change through a comprehensive programme of renewables, energy efficiency and cleaner carbon technology."

Meanwhile the Liberal Democrat's spokesman for business, enterprise and regulatory reform, Lembit Opik, accused the government of having decided that it wanted new nuclear power stations before its consultation was over.

"While British Energy is entitled to do what it thinks best, its decision appears to indicate the government has already made up its mind," he said.

i'm pretty sure my flat would be left standing after a meltdown

I recently read the Oxford History Of Modern Europe and one of the articles (to do with Industrialisation) cited an amazing Manchester Fact. Edwin Chadwick (who was originally from Manchester) was commissioned by the government to produce a report that was to be known as 'The Sanitary Conditions of the Labouring Population', published in 1842. The report highlighted the plight of urban workforces, particularly of those who had recently moved into urban areas in search of work. Disease and deplorable living conditions were cited as reasons why, he felt, the public health system was in dire need of reform. Anyway, the bit that made me do a double-take was this: Chadwick claimed the life expectancy of a Manchester mechanic at this time was 17 YEARS OF AGE (compared to 38 years of age in a rural area, such as Rutland). A brief bit if further reading suggests the reforms he proposed in the report were ignored by the then government led by Sir Robert Peel. It wasn't until 1848 (under the Liberals) that a Public Health Act saw the light of day. This helped pave the way for local bodies to oversee sanitation, sewage systems, street cleaning and water supplies (the beginning of things like local water boards, etc).

I think I'll be reading more on this - I suppose it can be all too easy to forget the human cost of industrialisation, and very few records remain from those directly affected (which is why we rely heavily on documents such as state-sponsored reports to shed any light), but that's history for you.

wow that's young. probably the risk of cholera combined with the risk of ending up crushed by machinery.

I recently read the Oxford History Of Modern Europe and one of the articles (to do with Industrialisation) cited an amazing Manchester Fact. Edwin Chadwick (who was originally from Manchester) was commissioned by the government to produce a report that was to be known as 'The Sanitary Conditions of the Labouring Population', published in 1842. The report highlighted the plight of urban workforces, particularly of those who had recently moved into urban areas in search of work. Disease and deplorable living conditions were cited as reasons why, he felt, the public health system was in dire need of reform. Anyway, the bit that made me do a double-take was this: Chadwick claimed the life expectancy of a Manchester mechanic at this time was 17 YEARS OF AGE (compared to 38 years of age in a rural area, such as Rutland). A brief bit if further reading suggests the reforms he proposed in the report were ignored by the then government led by Sir Robert Peel. It wasn't until 1848 (under the Liberals) that a Public Health Act saw the light of day. This helped pave the way for local bodies to oversee sanitation, sewage systems, street cleaning and water supplies (the beginning of things like local water boards, etc).
.


Good old Liberals ;)

Chamberlain helped establish municipal socialism in his gas and water ownership in Birmingham which massively helped Brum's life expectancy.