A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



Birmingham sharpened this feeling, and in 1 90 1 a 

 movement began for the securing of a separate univer- 

 sity charter. This demand, which involved the dis- 

 solution of the Victoria University, met with keen 

 opposition. But it also aroused a quite remarkable 

 and unexpected popular interest in the city. An 

 endowment fund of j{[ 180,000 was raised in a few 

 months ; the city council unanimously supported the 

 application, and later voted an annual grant of 

 j^ 1 0,000 ; and in 1 903, after a searching inquiry by 

 the Privy Council, a royal charter was granted 

 establishing the University of Liverpool. It began its 

 career distinguished among British universities by 

 the intimate relations in which it stands to the city 

 which is its seat, an intimacy which time increasingly 

 accentuates. 



Since the grant of the charter, the growth of the 

 university has been remarkable ; despite the large 

 subscription of 1903, each year since that date has 

 brought gifts of the average value of ^£'3 0,000. A 

 series of new buildings, including the George Holt 

 Physical Laboratory, the William Johnston Laboratory 

 of Medical Research, a new medical school building, 

 laboratories of zoology and electrical engineering, and 

 the first British laboratory of physical chemistry, built 

 by Mr. E. K. Muspratt, have been erected. Thir- 

 teen new chairs have been endowed, besides numerous 

 lectureships, fellowships, and scholarships. The num- 

 ber of students has grown rapidly, from 581 in 1 901 

 to 1,007 in 1907. But perhaps the most striking 

 feature of these years has been that while the more 

 utilitarian studies, to which some hostile critics ex- 

 pected the whole strength of the new university to be 

 devoted, have by no means been starved, the greatest 

 developments have been in the field of advanced 

 research in pure arts and science. Several chairs 

 exist exclusively for the encouragement of research. 

 Perhaps the most astonishing result of the establish- 

 ment of the university has been the institution, in a 

 trading town, of the most powerfully-organized school 

 of archaeology in Britain, a school which possesses 

 three endowed chairs, has got together admirable 

 teaching collections, and has organized expeditions for 

 the excavation of sites in Egypt, Central America, 

 and Asia Minor. 



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 represent- 

 ing donors and public bodies, a council of 3 2 members, 

 a senate of 42 members, a convocation of graduates, 

 and five faculties. Its capital amounted in 1907 to 

 j^7 3 5,000,™ entirely provided by private gifts, and its 

 annual income to j^6l,ooo, derived in part from inter- 

 est in endowments (j^l 7,000), in part from government 

 grants (over ^^ 1 2,000), in part from municipal grants 

 (over j^i4,ooo, of which the largest item is j^i 1,750 

 per annum from the Corporation of Liverpool), and in 

 part from students' fees (j^l 5,000). The university 

 is divided into five Faculties — Arts, Science, Medicine, 

 Law, and Engineering. Of these the Faculty of Arts 

 is the largest, both in the number of students and in 

 the number of its endowed chairs ; the University of 

 Liverpool having been from its initiation distinguished 

 among modern English universities by the prominence 

 which it has given to arts studies. AH the principal 

 hospitals of the city are connected for clinical pur- 



poses with the Faculty of Medicine, while St. Aidan's 

 College, Birkenhead, Edge Hill Training College, and 

 the Liverpool Training College are affiliated to it. 



Elementary education began in Liver- 

 SCHOOLS pool with the provision of a number of 

 Sunday-schools for the poor, founded as 

 the result of a town's meeting in 1784.™ These 

 were rapidly followed by the institution of day- 

 schools, provided either by various denominations or 

 by endowment. The earliest of these schools were 

 the Old Church School in Moorfields (1789), the 

 Unitarian Schools in Mount Pleasant (1790) and 

 Manesty Lane (1792), and the Wesleyan Brunswick 

 School (1790). In 1823 there were thirty-two day- 

 schools ' for the education of the poor "" educating 

 7,441 children, of which 14 were Church Schools with 

 2,914 pupils, 2 Roman Catholic with 440 pupils, and 

 18 Nonconformist with 4,087 pupils. The number 

 of schools largely increased between 1823 and 1870, 

 so that there was no very serious deficiency of 

 school places when, in 1870, education became univer- 

 sal and compulsory. When the school board began 

 its work in Liverpool in 1871 there were already 

 two public elementary schools, founded by the cor- 

 poration in 1826, and transferred to the administra- 

 tion of the board ; and the provision of school places 

 in voluntary schools was above the average for England; 

 but many new places had to be gradually provided by 

 the erection of board schools. The following table 

 shows the state of elementary education in 187 1, and 

 the progress made up to 1902 : — "^ 



No detailed account can be given of the work of the 

 board during the thirty years of its work, but two or 

 three features deserve note. In a city which beyond 

 most others is torn asunder by religious strife, the intru- 

 sion of this strife was throughout avoided, owing to the 

 wise policy initiated in the early years, largely by Mr. 

 S. G. Rathbone and Mr. Christopher Bushell. The 

 school board was distinguished almost &om the be- 

 ginning by the attention which it gave to the training 

 of teachers. As early as 1 875 a Pupil Teachers' College 

 was established in two houses in Shaw Street, the rent 

 of which was provided by Mr. S. G. Rathbone. In 

 1898 the college entered upon its handsome premises 

 in Clarence Street, and in 1906 it became the Oulton 

 Secondary School. It was largely also through the 

 zeal of members of the school board that the Edge 

 Hill Training College for women teachers was founded 

 in 1884. A further striking feature of the work of 

 the board was its intimate association with the Liver- 

 pool Council of Education, founded in 1 873, which 

 in the days before any public authority was empowered 

 to undertake such work provided a scholarship ladder 



9"R. Muir, Tbe Univ. o/Liv. : Its fri- 

 tent state, 1907. 



''" Picton's Ltv, Munic. Rec, ii, 284. 

 ^^ Smithers, Liverpool, 264. 



54 



^^ Information lupplied by the Educa- 

 tion Office. 



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