Italian art numbering altogether about 180 pictures, collected at the beginning of the 19th century by William Roscoe, were deposited in the gallery. The Picton circular reading-room, and the rotunda lecture-room were built by the corporation and opened in 1879. Alterations in the museum were completed in 1902 by which its size was practically doubled. The literary and philosophical society was established in 1812. The Royal Institution, established mainly through the efforts of Roscoe in 1817, possessed a fine gallery of early art in the Walker Art Gallery, and is the centre of the literary institutions of the town.
Education.—Sunday schools were founded for poor children in 1784, as the result of a town’s meeting. These were soon followed by day-schools supplied by the various denominations. The first were the Old Church schools in Moorfields (1789), the Unitarian schools in Mount Pleasant (1790) and Manesty Lane (1792) and the Wesleyan Brunswick school (1790). In 1826 the corporation founded two elementary schools, one of which, the North Corporation school, was erected in part substitution for the grammar school founded by John Crosse, rector of St Nicholas Fleshshambles, London, a native of Liverpool, in 1515, and carried on by the Corporation until 1815. From this date onward the number rapidly increased until the beginning of the School Board in 1870, and afterwards. Mention should be made of the training ship “Indefatigable” moored in the Mersey for the sons and orphans of sailors, and the reformatory institution at Heswall, Co. Chester, which has recently replaced the training ship “Akbar” formerly moored in the Mersey. Semi-private schools were founded by public subscription—the Royal Institution school (1819), the Liverpool Institute (1825) and the Liverpool College (1840). The first has ceased to exist. The Institute was a development of the Mechanics’ Institute and was managed by a council of subscribers. It was divided into a high school and a commercial school. Under a scheme of the Board of Education under the Charitable Trusts Act this school, together with the Blackburne House high school for girls, became a public secondary school and was handed over to the corporation in 1905. Liverpool College was formerly divided into three schools, upper, middle and lower, for different classes of the community. The middle and lower schools passed into the control of the corporation in 1907. The Sefton Park elementary school and the Pupil Teachers’ College in Clarence Street were transformed into municipal secondary schools for boys and girls in 1907; the corporation has also a secondary school for girls at Aigburth. There are several schools maintained by the Roman Catholics, two schools of the Girls’ Public Day School Company and a large number of private schools. A cadet ship, the “Conway,” for the training of boys intending to become officers in the mercantile marine, is moored in the Mersey. There are two training colleges for women, one undenominational, and the other conducted by the sisters of Notre Dame for Roman Catholic women. The central municipal technical school is in the Museum Buildings, and there are three branch technical schools. There are also a nautical college, a school of cookery and a school of art controlled by the Education Committee.
Liverpool University, as University College, received its charter of incorporation in 1881, and in 1884 was admitted as a college of the Victoria University. In the same year the medical school of the Royal Infirmary became part of the University College. In 1900 a supplemental charter extended the powers of self-government and brought the college into closer relations with the authorities of the city and with local institutions by providing for their fuller representation on the court of governors. In 1903 the charter of incorporation of the university of Liverpool was received, thus constituting it an independent university. The university is governed by the king as visitor, by a chancellor, two pro-chancellors, a vice-chancellor and a treasurer, by a court of over 300 members representing donors and public bodies, a council, senate, faculties and convocation. The fine group of buildings is situated on Brownlow Hill.
Trade and Commerce.—In 1800 the tonnage of ships entering the port was 490,060; in 1908 it reached 17,111,814 tons. In 1800 4746 vessels entered, averaging 94 tons; in 1908 there were 25,739, averaging 665 tons. The commerce of Liverpool extends to every part of the world, but probably the intercourse with North America stands pre-eminent, there being lines of steamers to New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, Galveston, New Orleans and the Canadian ports. Cotton is the great staple import. Grain comes next, American (North and South) and Australian wheat and oats occupying a large proportion of the market. An enormous trade in American provisions, including live cattle, is carried on. Tobacco has always been a leading article of import into Liverpool, along with the sugar and rum from the West Indies. Timber forms an important part of the imports, the stacking yards extending for miles along the northern docks. In regard to exports, Liverpool possesses decided advantages; lying so near the great manufacturing districts of Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire, this port is the natural channel of transmission for their goods, although the Manchester ship canal diverts a certain proportion of the traffic, while coal and salt are also largely exported.
Manufactures.—The manufactures of Liverpool are not extensive. Attempts have been repeatedly made to establish cotton mills in and near the city, but have resulted in failure. Engineering works, especially connected with marine navigation, have grown up on a large scale. Shipbuilding, in the early part of the 19th century, was active and prosperous, but has practically ceased. During the latter half of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th, pottery and china manufacture flourished in Liverpool. John Sadler, a Liverpool manufacturer, was the inventor of printing on pottery, and during the early period of Josiah Wedgwood’s career all his goods which required printing had to be sent to Liverpool. A large establishment, called the Herculaneum Pottery, was founded in a suburb on the bank of the Mersey, but the trade has long disappeared. Litherland, the inventor of the lever watch, was a Liverpool manufacturer, and Liverpool-made watches have always been held in high estimation. There are several extensive sugar refineries and corn mills. The confectionery trade has developed during recent years, several large works having been built, induced by the prospect of obtaining cheap sugar directly from the Liverpool quays. The cutting, blending and preparing of crude tobacco have led to the erection of factories employing some thousands of hands. There are also large mills for oil-pressing and making cattle-cake.
Docks.—The docks of the port of Liverpool on both sides of the Mersey are owned and managed by the same public trust, the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board. On the Liverpool side they extend along the margin of the estuary 612 m., of which 114 m. is in the borough of Bootle. The Birkenhead docks have not such a frontage, but they extend a long way backward. The water area of the Liverpool docks and basins is 418 acres, with a lineal quayage of 27 m. The Birkenhead docks, including the great float of 120 acres, contain a water area of 165 acres, with a lineal quayage of 912 m. The system of enclosed docks was begun by the corporation in 1709. They constituted from the first a public trust, the corporation never having derived any direct revenue from them, though the common council of the borough were the trustees, and in the first instance formed the committee of management. Gradually the payers of dock rates on ships and goods acquired influence, and were introduced into the governing body, and ultimately, by an act of 1857, the corporation was superseded. The management is vested in the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board, consisting of twenty-eight members, four of whom are nominated by the Mersey Conservancy commissioners, who consist of the first lord of the Admiralty, the chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster and the president of the Board of Trade, and the rest elected by the payers of rates on ships and goods, of whom a register is kept and annually revised. The revenue is derived from tonnage rates on ships, dock rates on goods, town dues on goods, with various minor sources of income.
Down to 1843 the docks were confined to the Liverpool side of the Mersey. Several attempts made to establish docks in Cheshire had been frustrated by the Liverpool corporation, who bought up the land and kept it in their own hands. In 1843, however, a scheme for docks in Birkenhead was carried through which ultimately proved unsuccessful, and the enterprise was acquired in 1855 by Liverpool. The Birkenhead docks were for many years only partially used, but are now an important centre for corn-milling, the importation of foreign cattle and export trade to the East. In addition to the wet docks, there are in Liverpool fourteen graving docks and three in Birkenhead, besides a gridiron on the Liverpool side.
The first portion of the great landing stage, known as the Georges’ stage, was constructed in 1847, from the plans of Mr (afterwards Sir) William Cubitt, F.R.S. This was 500 ft. long. In 1857 the Prince’s stage, 1000 ft. long, was built to the north of the Georges’ stage and distant from it 500 ft. In 1874 the intervening space was filled up and the Georges’ stage reconstructed. The fabric had just been completed, and was waiting to be inaugurated, when on the 28th of July 1874 it was destroyed by fire. It was again constructed with improvements. In 1896 it was farther extended to the north, and its length is now 2478 ft. and its breadth 80 ft. It is supported on floating pontoons about 200 in number, connected with the river wall by eight bridges, besides a floating bridge for heavy traffic 550 ft. in length and 35 ft. in width. The southern half is devoted to the traffic of the Mersey ferries, of which there are seven—New Brighton, Egremont, Seacombe, Birkenhead, Rock Ferry, New Ferry and Eastham. The northern half is used by ocean-going steamers and their tenders. The warehouses for storing produce form a prominent feature in the commercial part of the city. Down to 1841
