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Manchester is a city in North West England. The metropolitan borough of Manchester, which has city status, has a population of 441,200, making it the most populous district of the Greater Manchester metropolitan county. The Greater Manchester Urban Area has a population of 2,240,230, making Manchester and its surrounding area England's third largest conurbation. Manchester is historically notable for being one of the world's first industrialised cities and for the subsequent central role it played during the Industrial Revolution. It was the dominant international centre of textile manufacture and cotton spinning. During the 19th century it was nicknamed Cottonopolis, denoting that the area was a metropolis of cotton mills. Manchester City Centre is now on a "tentative list" of UNESCO World Heritage Sites, mainly due to its network of canals and mills, which facilitated its development during the 19th century. Sometimes described as the "Capital of the North", and forming part of the English Core Cities Group, Manchester today is a centre of the arts, the media, higher education and commerce and is considered by many of its citizens to be England's second city. It is the third most visited city in the United Kingdom by foreign visitors, after London and Edinburgh. Manchester is well known for its sporting connections, being associated with two major Premier League football teams, Manchester City and Manchester United and internationally renowned as a centre of sporting excellence having hosted the XVII Commonwealth Games in 2002. In January 2007, Manchester was awarded the licence to build the only supercasino allowed in the UK.
History
Early history The Manchester area was settled in daighys arse or before Roman times. The original fort was constructed by General Gnaeus Julius Agricola as a staging post between Chester (Deva) and York (Eboracum). This Roman settlement was named Mamucium (Celtic for "breast-shaped hill") after the hill that it was sited on to be better defensible. The original location of the fort is now in the City of Salford. The fort was abandoned in the Dark Ages, and at some point in time the focus of settlement shifted from this spot to the confluence of the rivers Irwell and Irk. In medieval times, this area included a fortified manor house. Thomas De La Warre, a manorial lord who also happened to be a priest, gave the site to the church for use as a College of Priests around 1422, and commenced the construction of the Collegiate Church. The former is now Chetham's School of Music, and the latter Manchester Cathedral. Around the 13th century, Manchester grew heavily due to an influx of Flemish settlers who founded Manchester's new cotton industry and sparked the growth of the city to become Lancashire's major industrial centre. Industrial Revolution In the late 18th century, Manchester perhaps became the site of England's first entirely artificial canal when James Brindley built the Bridgewater Canal to bring coal from the eponymous Duke of Bridgewater's mines at Worsley. During the 19th century Manchester grew to become the centre of Lancashire's cotton industry and was dubbed "Cottonopolis". During this period the canal system grew, and Manchester became one end of the world's first passenger railway - the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. Manchester quickly grew into the most important industrial centre in the world, and, significantly, the first industrial society. The pace of change was fast and frightening. At that time, it seemed a place in which anything could happen — new industrial processes, new ways of thinking (the so called 'Manchester School', promoting free trade and laissez-faire), new classes or groups in society, new religious sects, and new forms of labour organisation. It attracted educated visitors from all parts of Britain and Europe. "What Manchester does today," it was said, "the rest of the world does tomorrow." Also during this period Manchester saw a rise in its population as Lancastarians, the Irish, Jews and many other people immigrated to the city. As well as being a centre of capitalism the city saw its fair share of rebellion by the working and non-titled classes, with the most famous being the events on St Peter’s Field on 16 August 1819 which have become known as 'Peterloo'. The first Trades Union Congress was held in Manchester (at the Mechanics' Institute, David Street), from 2 to 6 June 1868. Manchester was the subject of Friedrich Engels' The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844, Engels himself spending much of his life in and around Manchester. Manchester was also an important cradle of the Labour Party and the Suffragette Movement. Manchester's golden age was perhaps the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Many of the great public buildings (including the Town Hall) date from then. The city's cosmopolitan atmosphere contributed to a vibrant culture, which included the Hallé Orchestra. In 1889, when county councils were created in England, the municipal borough became a county borough with even greater autonomy. During this period, the Manchester Ship Canal was created by the canalisation of the Rivers Irwell and Mersey for 36 miles from Salford to the Mersey estuary at the port of Liverpool. This enabled ocean going ships to sail right into the Salford docks. The docks functioned up until the 1970s, with their closure leading to a large increase in unemployment in the area.
Manchester suffered greatly from the inter-war depression and the underlying structural changes that began to supplant the old industries, including textile manufacture. Recent history During World War II, Manchester was involved in heavy industrial construction — it was home to Avro (now BAE Systems) which built countless aircraft for the RAF, the most famous being the Avro Lancaster bomber. The city was attacked a number of times by the Luftwaffe, particularly in the "Christmas Blitz" of 1941, which destroyed a large part of the historic city centre and seriously damaged the Cathedral. In 2002, the city successfully hosted the XVII Commonwealth Games, earning praise from many sources. Manchester has twice failed in its bid to host the Olympic Games, losing to Atlanta in 1996 and Sydney in 2000. Rapidly developing institutions attract crime and disorder; see main article crime and policing in Manchester. Bombing
Redevelopment Since the regeneration after the 1996 IRA bomb, and aided by the XVII Commonwealth Games, Manchester's city centre has changed significantly. Large sections of the city dating from the 1960s have been either demolished and re-developed or modernised with the use of glass and steel; a good example of this transformation is the Manchester Arndale. Many old mills have been converted into apartments, helping to give the city a much more modern, upmarket look and feel. Some areas, like Hulme, have undergone extensive regeneration programmes and many million-pound lofthouse apartments have since been developed to cater for its growing business community. The 169 metre tall, 47-storey Beetham Tower, completed in 2006, provides the highest residential accommodation in the United Kingdom - the lower 23 floors form the Hilton Hotel, while the upper 24 floors are apartments. The 23rd floor includes a 'sky bar' where you can enjoy a cocktail 23 floors above the ground. The Beetham Tower is the tallest building in the UK outside London. Research Tips
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