OSHER 717 - Armchair Traveler Goes to Liverpool, the City of Seafarers, Immigrants, and The Beatles

Known primarily as the birthplace of The Beatles, Liverpool is the United Kingdom's veritable cultural capital and a port city steeped in maritime history. While smaller than Leeds, Manchester, or Birmingham, Liverpool boasts more cultural institutions than any other British city except London and more Georgian buildings than Bath. In this interactive conversation, we will focus on the city's connection to the sea. Liverpool existed as a town in the early 1200s, but its real growth dates from the late 1700s, when it became a center for the transatlantic slave trade and a vital cog in the Industrial Revolution. After the abolition of slavery in Britain in 1807, most people who traveled to and from the port of Liverpool were immigrants from all corners of Europe. Here many of them boarded ships destined for America, whereas others remained in Liverpool, making it a melting pot of different peoples and cultures. Especially significant immigrant communities in the city were the Scandinavians, Irish, and Welsh. This melting pot gave birth to the particular dialect of Liverpool, which is known as the "Scouse" or the "Scouser" dialect. In the first half of the 20th century, Liverpool was the home port for three iconic ships: RMS Titanic, RMS Lusitania, and RMS Queen Mary. During World War II, Liverpool was at the heart of the Atlantic and Arctic convoys, which brought much-needed goods and personnel from North America and then took them further on to the Soviet port of Murmansk.