Find out about how the people from the city where I was born and have lived most of my life, has affected the lives of thousands, if not millions of people worldwide.
Penguin Books Started in a Vending Machine.
Sir Allen Lane was born in in Bristol in 1902 and became founder of Penguin Books in 1935. Lane decided that good quality contemporary fiction should be made available at an attractive price and sold not just in traditional bookshops, but also in railway stations, tobacconists and chain stores. He sold paperbacks from vending machines for the same price as a pack of cigarettes.
The first Penguin paperbacks included works by Ernest Hemingway, André Maurois and Agatha Christie. They were colour coded, orange for fiction, blue for biography, green for crime and cost just sixpence. Years later Penguin is still one of the most recognizable brands in the world.
We made chocolate happen.
Fry’s was the oldest chocolate firm in Britain, and possibly in the world. Cocoa was mixed with flavourings and sugar in copper or tin pans, and then shaped into tablets. The tablets were put in a cup and hot water or milk was added. All chocolate was taken as a drink. The Quaker Joseph Fry was able to adapt the inventions and experience of others and first worked out how to make liquid chocolate into bar form. In 1776, one pound of Fry's famous chocolate retailed at 7/6d (35p), a sum only slightly below the average agricultural labourer's weekly wage.
Thesaurus, fizz and more
Dowry Square probably has the strangest associations having the affections of literary types, drinkers, dentists and drug addicts. Here, early in 1812, the economic migrant Jacob Schweppe opened his shop. His carbonated water factory was in Castle Street. Dr Thomas Beddoes also ran his clinic, attempting to cure consumption by introducing cows into the patients’ bedrooms. He and his assistant Humphrey Davy (Davy miners lamp fame) did much for the happiness of nations by producing nitrous oxide, popular as a recreational drug. Another assistant, Peter Roget, compiled the Thesaurus. Beddoes’ son, Thomas Lovell, was one of Bristol’s greatest poets.
Elizabeth Blackwell
Elizabeth Blackwell was born in Queen Square Bristol in 1821. The family emigrated to the USA in 1832. Elizabeth enrolled in a medical school, but lost the sight of one eye which prevented further progress as a surgeon. In the USA in 1851 she met hostility when opening the New York Infirmary for Women and Children with all female medical staff. She came back to England and became the first woman to be enrolled on the British Medical register and she went to work at St Bartholomew's in London. She campaigned for the admission of women and reforms in the medical profession, visiting Bristol frequently.
The First Gender Reassignment Surgery Took Place Here.
In 1946, staff at the Bristol Royal Infirmary performed the first ever gender reassignment surgery. Michael Dillon’s transition was so successful that he lived the rest of his life without anyone knowing he had been born biologically female.
IVF
In 1977, Steptoe and Edwards carried out a pioneering conception which resulted in the birth of the world's first baby to be conceived by IVF. Lesley Brown's blocked fallopian tubes meant getting pregnant naturally was impossible for her and her husband. Lesley signed up to the experimental procedure and it worked the first time. She made medical history on July 25th, 1978, when she gave birth to daughter Louise. Edwards was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Equality Came Here First!
The Red Lodge Museum on Park Row includes a room which was once the first school in England to educate girls.
And Bristol Has Been #Proud for a Long Time.
St Nicholas Street was once home to the first gay pub in Bristol. The Radmore Hotel opened in the 1930s and is still fondly remembered by its former customers as a safe haven for the people of Bristol at a time when homosexuality was still illegal.
Independent
Gloucester Road, for most of the last ten years, contained the longest unbroken chain of independent retailers in all of Europe.
Talk Like a Pirate.
"Pirate Talk" is thought to have originated from Robert Newton's genuine Bristolian accent in the 1950 adaptation of Treasure Island.
Links with North America
A decade before Columbus, Bristol sailors had fished the cod-rich seas off Newfoundland and had landed to split, salt and dry their catches for transport back to Europe, particularly to Spain and Portugal. Columbus seems to have learned of Bristol’s secret and in 1492 Columbus allegedly discovered the New World, a fact that the Bristol sailors disputed. A letter to Columbus pretty well clinches the matter. It reads, ‘It is considered certain that the cape of the said land was discovered in the past by men from Bristol, as your Lordship well knows’.
Bristol has been described as 'the Birthplace of America'. In 1497, John Cabot and his crew set sail from Bristol aboard The Matthew, hoping to find a new route to the Orient. Instead, he landed on the coast of Newfoundland, becoming the original documented 'discoverer' of North America
The name 'America' has been linked to that of Richard ap Merryk, also known as Ameryk, merchant and collector of custom dues for the Port of Bristol. In 1495 John Cabot and his three sons sailed to take possession in the King's name any lands they discovered. In 1497 Cabot set out from Bristol, financed by Ameryk and crossed the Atlantic Ocean in his ship ‘The Matthew’. The New Found Land he discovered was the mainland of North America, on Midsummer’s Day, 1497. The Bristol Guildhall also features the Amerike coat of arms which looks familiar with its stars and stripes design.
Towers to Cabot can be found in both Bristol and Newfoundland. The Bristol one was built in 1897 to commemorate John Cabot’s discovery of North America four hundred years prior, Cabot Tower sits atop Brandon Hill. A second Cabot Tower exists on Signal Hill, in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. It was built in 1898 to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Cabot's discovery and Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee.
Pennsylvania’s founder
William Penn was the son of Admiral Sir William Penn who helped restore Charles II to the throne. The King owed Penn and traded 47,000 acres of American land for cash. William and his Quaker community sailed over to America. On founding Pennsylvania in 1682 he declared, ‘Let every house be placed in the middle of its plot so there may be ground on each side for gardens or orchards or fields.’ A few years later came the edict, ‘Every owner of a house should plant one or more trees before the door that the town may be well shaded from the violence of the sun.’ The garden city had arrived thanks to a Bristolian.
In 1696 Penn's son, also named William, married Hannah Callowhill in the meeting house at Quakers Friars, Bristol. St John’s Chapel in St Mary Redcliffe Church, is now known as The American Chapel, and holds the tomb and armour of Admiral Sir William Penn.
Blackbeard
Bristol has a rogues’ gallery of reckless, vicious pirates but none of them approach the infamous Blackbeard. He hailed from Redcliffe and his real name was Edward or Edmund Teach. According to legend, The Llandoger Trow - Bristol's oldest pub - was Pirate Captain, Blackbeard's drinking hole. He terrorized shipping in the West Indies and eastern coast of the US and was responsible for more than 2,000 deaths during his reign. He was the most bloodthirsty of all pirates in the early 18th century. He wore a long black beard and during assaults on ships he thrust smoking fuses into his beard and matted hair. He met a violent death in 1718, when he was captured and killed by the Governor of Virginia and his soldiers. An anchor from Blackbeard's ship, Queen Anne's Revenge, was recently discovered off the coast of North Carolina.
First American Embassy
Number 37 Queen Square is where the first American Embassy was established in 1792, after the American Revolution. A plaque on the wall states Elias Vanderhorst of South Carolina was appointed by George Washington as the first US Consul.
Transatlantic crossings between Bristol and New York in the Victorian era
The SS Great Britain was an advanced passenger steamship designed for transatlantic service between Bristol and New York by daring Victorian engineer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel. She was built and launched in Bristol in 1843. In 1845, she was the first iron steamer to cross the Atlantic and she was also the largest vessel of the time. She transformed travel to America and on her maiden voyage to the United States she easily broke previous speed records.
Only museum of Americana outside the USA
The American Museum & Gardens near Bristol is the only museum of Americana outside the United States. Visitors are taken on a journey through the history of America, from its early settlers to the twentieth century and its remarkable collection of folk and decorative arts show the diverse nature of American traditions. Based at the beautiful Claverton Manor, there are also extensive grounds, which include an arboretum of American trees. The museum is currently undergoing a restoration project on its replica of George Washington’s Upper Garden, Mount Vernon, Virginia so that it represents the Upper Garden as it would have appeared in 1799, the year Washington died.
Bits of Bristol in New York
During World War Two, American supply ships needed ballast to make the return trip to the USA. There was plenty of rubble for them to fill their ships with in Bristol as the city had suffered heavy bombing. On arrival in New York, they dumped these former bits of Bristol in an area of the East River,. The area is now known as the ‘Bristol Basin’ and is built on top of, so essentially, some of New York City is constucted on fragments of Bristol. A plaque in each city commemorates the unusual connection.
The slave trade
At the end of the 17th century an organization of elite merchants in Bristol, who managed Bristol’s harbour, called The Society of Merchant Venturers wanted to participate in the lucrative African slave trade. Between 1697 and 1807, 2,108 known ships left Bristol to make the trip to Africa and onwards across the Atlantic with slaves. The Society of Merchant Venturers managed the harbour until the early 19th century. It is still a society today.
Bristol was one of the three points of the slave triangle, already a wealthy city, the city prospered even more. In Bristol there were the ship owners, merchants, slave-ship captains and crew. The ship owners invested money in the slaving voyages and provided the ships. The merchants invested money in the slaving voyages, by equipping the ship and the goods that were traded with Africa. The roles of slave traders, ship owners, and merchants often overlapped. At its peak it is estimated that 60% of Bristolians were directly or indirectly associated with this dreadful trade.
Edward Colston’s wealth was acquired through the trade and exploitation of slaves. In 1683 he is listed as a West India merchant who traded primarily in St Kitts. He was a member of the Royal African Company. He owned a large fleet of ships trading in sugar and a sugar refinery by St Peter's Church. Until 1992 three charities were in existence set up by Colston, The Colston Society, The Dolphin Society and the Anchor Society. The Merchants' impact on the city was enormous. They founded Bristol University, a navigation school and Bristol's first water supply company. They donated half of the Downs to the city, paid for the Suspension Bridge to be built, and financed the Great Western Railway.
In the early years Quakers were involved, both owning slave ships and sugar plantations. By the 1760s they began to campaign against the trade and went on to be leaders of the Abolitionist movement with reformers such as Mary Carpenter, Hannah More, William Wilberforce and Thomas Clarkson, speaking out against the slave trade and boycotting West Indian sugar in 1778. The landlord of The Seven Stars pub in St Thomas St helped Thomas Clarkson investigate the Slave Trade.
It was normal for up to a quarter of any crew and its prisoners to die from illness and disease during the voyage. Clarkson was the president of the world’s first human rights organization which is now called Anti-Slavery International. Opposition to the slave trade gained momentum during the late 18th century. The trade was abolished in British territories in 1807. Throughout 2007, Bristol played a leading role in the national commemoration Abolition 200, to mark the anniversary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act. Events and exhibitions took place throughout the year, including Charles Wesley's 300th birthday celebrations and the St Paul’s Carnival which celebrated its 40th anniversary.
Bristols around the globe
The first other 'Bristol' was founded in Massachusetts in 1632 by Bristolian, Robert Aldworth. There are 35 populated places in the world called Bristol, of which 29 are in the United States.
Penguin Books Started in a Vending Machine.
Sir Allen Lane was born in in Bristol in 1902 and became founder of Penguin Books in 1935. Lane decided that good quality contemporary fiction should be made available at an attractive price and sold not just in traditional bookshops, but also in railway stations, tobacconists and chain stores. He sold paperbacks from vending machines for the same price as a pack of cigarettes.
The first Penguin paperbacks included works by Ernest Hemingway, André Maurois and Agatha Christie. They were colour coded, orange for fiction, blue for biography, green for crime and cost just sixpence. Years later Penguin is still one of the most recognizable brands in the world.
We made chocolate happen.
Fry’s was the oldest chocolate firm in Britain, and possibly in the world. Cocoa was mixed with flavourings and sugar in copper or tin pans, and then shaped into tablets. The tablets were put in a cup and hot water or milk was added. All chocolate was taken as a drink. The Quaker Joseph Fry was able to adapt the inventions and experience of others and first worked out how to make liquid chocolate into bar form. In 1776, one pound of Fry's famous chocolate retailed at 7/6d (35p), a sum only slightly below the average agricultural labourer's weekly wage.
Thesaurus, fizz and more
Dowry Square probably has the strangest associations having the affections of literary types, drinkers, dentists and drug addicts. Here, early in 1812, the economic migrant Jacob Schweppe opened his shop. His carbonated water factory was in Castle Street. Dr Thomas Beddoes also ran his clinic, attempting to cure consumption by introducing cows into the patients’ bedrooms. He and his assistant Humphrey Davy (Davy miners lamp fame) did much for the happiness of nations by producing nitrous oxide, popular as a recreational drug. Another assistant, Peter Roget, compiled the Thesaurus. Beddoes’ son, Thomas Lovell, was one of Bristol’s greatest poets.
Elizabeth Blackwell
Elizabeth Blackwell was born in Queen Square Bristol in 1821. The family emigrated to the USA in 1832. Elizabeth enrolled in a medical school, but lost the sight of one eye which prevented further progress as a surgeon. In the USA in 1851 she met hostility when opening the New York Infirmary for Women and Children with all female medical staff. She came back to England and became the first woman to be enrolled on the British Medical register and she went to work at St Bartholomew's in London. She campaigned for the admission of women and reforms in the medical profession, visiting Bristol frequently.
The First Gender Reassignment Surgery Took Place Here.
In 1946, staff at the Bristol Royal Infirmary performed the first ever gender reassignment surgery. Michael Dillon’s transition was so successful that he lived the rest of his life without anyone knowing he had been born biologically female.
IVF
In 1977, Steptoe and Edwards carried out a pioneering conception which resulted in the birth of the world's first baby to be conceived by IVF. Lesley Brown's blocked fallopian tubes meant getting pregnant naturally was impossible for her and her husband. Lesley signed up to the experimental procedure and it worked the first time. She made medical history on July 25th, 1978, when she gave birth to daughter Louise. Edwards was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Equality Came Here First!
The Red Lodge Museum on Park Row includes a room which was once the first school in England to educate girls.
And Bristol Has Been #Proud for a Long Time.
St Nicholas Street was once home to the first gay pub in Bristol. The Radmore Hotel opened in the 1930s and is still fondly remembered by its former customers as a safe haven for the people of Bristol at a time when homosexuality was still illegal.
Independent
Gloucester Road, for most of the last ten years, contained the longest unbroken chain of independent retailers in all of Europe.
Talk Like a Pirate.
"Pirate Talk" is thought to have originated from Robert Newton's genuine Bristolian accent in the 1950 adaptation of Treasure Island.
Links with North America
A decade before Columbus, Bristol sailors had fished the cod-rich seas off Newfoundland and had landed to split, salt and dry their catches for transport back to Europe, particularly to Spain and Portugal. Columbus seems to have learned of Bristol’s secret and in 1492 Columbus allegedly discovered the New World, a fact that the Bristol sailors disputed. A letter to Columbus pretty well clinches the matter. It reads, ‘It is considered certain that the cape of the said land was discovered in the past by men from Bristol, as your Lordship well knows’.
Bristol has been described as 'the Birthplace of America'. In 1497, John Cabot and his crew set sail from Bristol aboard The Matthew, hoping to find a new route to the Orient. Instead, he landed on the coast of Newfoundland, becoming the original documented 'discoverer' of North America
The name 'America' has been linked to that of Richard ap Merryk, also known as Ameryk, merchant and collector of custom dues for the Port of Bristol. In 1495 John Cabot and his three sons sailed to take possession in the King's name any lands they discovered. In 1497 Cabot set out from Bristol, financed by Ameryk and crossed the Atlantic Ocean in his ship ‘The Matthew’. The New Found Land he discovered was the mainland of North America, on Midsummer’s Day, 1497. The Bristol Guildhall also features the Amerike coat of arms which looks familiar with its stars and stripes design.
Towers to Cabot can be found in both Bristol and Newfoundland. The Bristol one was built in 1897 to commemorate John Cabot’s discovery of North America four hundred years prior, Cabot Tower sits atop Brandon Hill. A second Cabot Tower exists on Signal Hill, in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. It was built in 1898 to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Cabot's discovery and Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee.
Pennsylvania’s founder
William Penn was the son of Admiral Sir William Penn who helped restore Charles II to the throne. The King owed Penn and traded 47,000 acres of American land for cash. William and his Quaker community sailed over to America. On founding Pennsylvania in 1682 he declared, ‘Let every house be placed in the middle of its plot so there may be ground on each side for gardens or orchards or fields.’ A few years later came the edict, ‘Every owner of a house should plant one or more trees before the door that the town may be well shaded from the violence of the sun.’ The garden city had arrived thanks to a Bristolian.
In 1696 Penn's son, also named William, married Hannah Callowhill in the meeting house at Quakers Friars, Bristol. St John’s Chapel in St Mary Redcliffe Church, is now known as The American Chapel, and holds the tomb and armour of Admiral Sir William Penn.
Blackbeard
Bristol has a rogues’ gallery of reckless, vicious pirates but none of them approach the infamous Blackbeard. He hailed from Redcliffe and his real name was Edward or Edmund Teach. According to legend, The Llandoger Trow - Bristol's oldest pub - was Pirate Captain, Blackbeard's drinking hole. He terrorized shipping in the West Indies and eastern coast of the US and was responsible for more than 2,000 deaths during his reign. He was the most bloodthirsty of all pirates in the early 18th century. He wore a long black beard and during assaults on ships he thrust smoking fuses into his beard and matted hair. He met a violent death in 1718, when he was captured and killed by the Governor of Virginia and his soldiers. An anchor from Blackbeard's ship, Queen Anne's Revenge, was recently discovered off the coast of North Carolina.
First American Embassy
Number 37 Queen Square is where the first American Embassy was established in 1792, after the American Revolution. A plaque on the wall states Elias Vanderhorst of South Carolina was appointed by George Washington as the first US Consul.
Transatlantic crossings between Bristol and New York in the Victorian era
The SS Great Britain was an advanced passenger steamship designed for transatlantic service between Bristol and New York by daring Victorian engineer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel. She was built and launched in Bristol in 1843. In 1845, she was the first iron steamer to cross the Atlantic and she was also the largest vessel of the time. She transformed travel to America and on her maiden voyage to the United States she easily broke previous speed records.
Only museum of Americana outside the USA
The American Museum & Gardens near Bristol is the only museum of Americana outside the United States. Visitors are taken on a journey through the history of America, from its early settlers to the twentieth century and its remarkable collection of folk and decorative arts show the diverse nature of American traditions. Based at the beautiful Claverton Manor, there are also extensive grounds, which include an arboretum of American trees. The museum is currently undergoing a restoration project on its replica of George Washington’s Upper Garden, Mount Vernon, Virginia so that it represents the Upper Garden as it would have appeared in 1799, the year Washington died.
Bits of Bristol in New York
During World War Two, American supply ships needed ballast to make the return trip to the USA. There was plenty of rubble for them to fill their ships with in Bristol as the city had suffered heavy bombing. On arrival in New York, they dumped these former bits of Bristol in an area of the East River,. The area is now known as the ‘Bristol Basin’ and is built on top of, so essentially, some of New York City is constucted on fragments of Bristol. A plaque in each city commemorates the unusual connection.
The slave trade
At the end of the 17th century an organization of elite merchants in Bristol, who managed Bristol’s harbour, called The Society of Merchant Venturers wanted to participate in the lucrative African slave trade. Between 1697 and 1807, 2,108 known ships left Bristol to make the trip to Africa and onwards across the Atlantic with slaves. The Society of Merchant Venturers managed the harbour until the early 19th century. It is still a society today.
Bristol was one of the three points of the slave triangle, already a wealthy city, the city prospered even more. In Bristol there were the ship owners, merchants, slave-ship captains and crew. The ship owners invested money in the slaving voyages and provided the ships. The merchants invested money in the slaving voyages, by equipping the ship and the goods that were traded with Africa. The roles of slave traders, ship owners, and merchants often overlapped. At its peak it is estimated that 60% of Bristolians were directly or indirectly associated with this dreadful trade.
Edward Colston’s wealth was acquired through the trade and exploitation of slaves. In 1683 he is listed as a West India merchant who traded primarily in St Kitts. He was a member of the Royal African Company. He owned a large fleet of ships trading in sugar and a sugar refinery by St Peter's Church. Until 1992 three charities were in existence set up by Colston, The Colston Society, The Dolphin Society and the Anchor Society. The Merchants' impact on the city was enormous. They founded Bristol University, a navigation school and Bristol's first water supply company. They donated half of the Downs to the city, paid for the Suspension Bridge to be built, and financed the Great Western Railway.
In the early years Quakers were involved, both owning slave ships and sugar plantations. By the 1760s they began to campaign against the trade and went on to be leaders of the Abolitionist movement with reformers such as Mary Carpenter, Hannah More, William Wilberforce and Thomas Clarkson, speaking out against the slave trade and boycotting West Indian sugar in 1778. The landlord of The Seven Stars pub in St Thomas St helped Thomas Clarkson investigate the Slave Trade.
It was normal for up to a quarter of any crew and its prisoners to die from illness and disease during the voyage. Clarkson was the president of the world’s first human rights organization which is now called Anti-Slavery International. Opposition to the slave trade gained momentum during the late 18th century. The trade was abolished in British territories in 1807. Throughout 2007, Bristol played a leading role in the national commemoration Abolition 200, to mark the anniversary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act. Events and exhibitions took place throughout the year, including Charles Wesley's 300th birthday celebrations and the St Paul’s Carnival which celebrated its 40th anniversary.
Bristols around the globe
The first other 'Bristol' was founded in Massachusetts in 1632 by Bristolian, Robert Aldworth. There are 35 populated places in the world called Bristol, of which 29 are in the United States.