Excursion 2013

Manchester and N-W England

10-19 Sept. 2013

About Manchester

What Manchester does today, the world does tomorrow.

Ever heard old folks talking about “Manchester-Hose”? – a good clue as to what Manchester was once all about. “Cottonopolis” they called it in the 19th century: the world’s first industrial city, dominated by huge cotton mills and warehouses, exporting textiles all over the world.
“Where there’s muck, there’s money” – a good old north-country saying. And Manchester has had its share of both. With the wealth and upheaval of the Industrial Revolution came exploitation of the workers and unhealthily overcrowded slum housing. No surprise, then, that Manchester gained a reputation for radicalism. The founding of Emmeline Pankhurst’s suffragette movement, the killing of 15 political reformers at the 1819 Peterloo Massacre, the founding of the Trade Union Congress, legendary visits by Marx and Engels all put Manchester at the forefront of political radicalism.
But the list of Manchester firsts is much longer – from steam-powered cotton mills to votes for women, from electro-magnets to splitting the atom, from first computer to first inter-city passenger railway, from first waterproof raincoat (mackintosh) to first canal in Britain – and with Manchester United the first English football club to win the European Cup! Not forgetting the UK’s longest running TV soap, Coronation Street.

Transformed by a rebuilding programme that puts it in the vanguard of modern British urban design, Manchester today surprises many first-time visitors with its top-class attractions, such as the impressive Gothic Town Hall, the Bohemian Northern Quarter, Chinatown or the famous Gay Village, the world-famous Halle orchestra (with German connection!), excellent theatres and cinemas and a thriving café and club scene, which services its 90,000 resident students.

What’s more, on Manchester’s doorstep you’ll find some of the finest countryside in the UK.