Heritage Hat-Trick For Played In Britain
The history of Liverpool’s sporting heritage is revealed and celebrated in an English Heritage book launched in the city today (31 May 2007). From the city’s lesser known sporting treasures, including the dockside location of Britain’s first municipal swimming baths, to the renowned football clubs of Liverpool and Everton the book guides the reader through a city at play.
Played in Liverpool is the seventh title in English Heritage’s groundbreaking Played in Britain series and the third text devoted entirely to celebrating the sporting and recreational heritage of British cities – the predecessors to this volume being Played in Manchester (2005) and Played in Birmingham (2006).
In Played in Liverpool, social historian Ray Physick takes the reader on an intimate tour of a city and rediscovers its ingrained and impressive sporting heritage. The text is divided in to four sections. The first looks at the five clusters of sporting venues in Liverpool exploring how and why they emerged. This is followed by chapters on sport related enterprises – from the manufacture of billiards equipment to the creation of the football pools industry. The book is then devoted to specific building types or sports that are characteristic of the city.
The book reveals:
• Liverpool is the home of what is now thought to be the oldest quoits club in the world, the Childwall Quoiting Club, formed in at least 1811, but possibly in existence as early as 1795. The club has just twelve members, all elected, and is based at the Childwall Abbey Hotel;
• Liverpool staged a series of Olympic Festivals during the 1860s, three decades before the birth of the modern Olympic Games in 1896. Some of the Liverpool pioneers played a key role in starting the British Olympian movement;
• During the course of his researches author Ray Physick tracked down two priceless artfefacts relating to Liverpool’s sporting history: a decorative silver plate, dated 1884, the only known memento of the influential Liverpool Gymnasium on Myrtle Street, and the 1932 datestone from the Liverpool Stadium, one of Britain’s most famous boxing venues. Both artefacts have been handed over to the safekeeping of the Liverpool Museum, and;
• The book also features the original plans of the Liverpool Kop at Anfield, from 1928, never seen in public before, plus artefacts from Britain’s largest collection of snooker and billiards equipment and memorabilia.
Henry Owen-John, English Heritage’s Planning and Development Director, North, said: “Liverpool has a quite remarkable sporting tradition and this book has helped to rediscover that unique heritage. It shows how sport has dramatically shaped the character of this magnificent city through its parks, greens, open water, sports grounds and buildings”.
The book also underlines the importance of caring for sporting heritage and, where appropriate, finding new uses for former sporting venues especially at a time of dynamic change in Liverpool. The book concludes with practical and sensitive approaches for safeguarding this aspect of a city’s heritage
Author Ray Physick, a lecturer at Liverpool John Moores University, said: ‘Like most Liverpudlians sport has been a part of my life since I was a child, but the last two years of research have revealed to me just how much of Liverpool's sporting heritage has gone unrecorded. Many of Merseyside’s sports clubs are run by incredibly committed individuals, and Played in Liverpool reflects their determination to maintain the diversity of sport in the region. The book also reveals a rich sporting heritage dating back hundreds of years, a heritage that we feel deserves to be celebrated more widely.’
Played in Britain series editor Simon Inglis added: ‘One of the joys of the Played in Britain series generally has been the discovery or rediscovery of gems from our sporting past, including some locations and stories which even local people have not known about. Working in this amazing city over the last two years has been a revelation, and I am sure that this book will be of interest not only to Liverpudlians but to readers outside the region who may know of Anfield, Goodison Park and Aintree, but not of the city’s many other fascinating locations.’
The book was launched at an event at the BBC Radio Mersyside where Ray Physick and Simon Inglis gave a presentation to an invited audience.
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