Mydilsburgh is the earliest recorded form of Middlesbrough's name and dates to Saxon times. 'Burgh' refers to an ancient settlement, or perhaps a fort of pre-Saxon origin which may have been situated on slightly elevated land close to the Tees. 'Mydil' was either the name of an Anglo-Saxon or a reference to Middlesbrough's middle location, half way between the Christian centres of Durham and Whitby. In Anglo-Saxon times Middlesbrough was certainly the site of a chapel or cell belonging to Whitby Abbey but despite this early activity, Middlesbrough was still only a small farm of twenty five people as late as 1801.

In 1829 a group of Quaker businessmen headed by Joseph Pease of Darlington purchased this Middlesbrough farmstead and its estate and set about the development of what they termed `Port Darlington' on the banks of the Tees nearby. A town was planned on the site of the farm to supply labour to the new coal port - Middlesbrough was born.

Joseph Pease, `the father of Middlesbrough' was the son of Edward Pease, the man behind the Stockton and Darlington Railway. By 1830 this famous line had been extended to Middlesbrough, making the rapid expansion of the town and port inevitable. In 1828 Joseph Pease had predicted there would be a day when;

"..the bare fields would be covered with a busy multitude with vessels crowding the banks of a busy seaport".

His prophecy was to prove true, the small farmstead became the site of North Street, South Street, West Street, East Street, Commercial Street, Stockton Street, Cleveland Street, Durham Street, Richmond Street, Gosford Street, Dacre Street, Feversham Street and Suffield Street, all laid out on a grid-iron pattern centred on a Market Square.

New businesses quickly bought up premises and plots of land in the new town and soon shippers, merchants, butchers, innkeepers, joiners, blacksmiths, tailors, builders and painters were moving in. Labour was employed, staithes and wharves were built, workshops were constructed and lifting engines installed. Indeed such was the growth of this port that in 1846 one local writer observed;

"To the stranger visiting his home after an abscence of fifteen years, this proud array of ships, docks, warehouses, churches, foundries and wharfs would seem like some enchanted spectacle, some Arabian Night's vision."

By 1851 Middlesbrough's population had grown from 40 people in 1829 to 7,600 and it was rapidly replacing Stockton as the main port on the Tees. An old Teesside proverb had proven true; -

"Yarm was, Stockton is, Middlesbrough will be "
Iron and Steel

In 1850 Iron ore was discovered in the Cleveland Hills near Eston to the south of Middlesbrough and Iron gradually replaced coal as the lifeblood of the town. The ore was discovered by John Vaughan, the principal ironmaster of Middlesbrough who along with his German business partner Henry Bolckow had already established a small iron foundry and rolling mill at Middlesbrough using iron stone from Durham and the Yorkshire coast. The new discovery of iron ore on their doorstep prompted them to build Teesside's first blast furnace in 1851.

Iron was now in big demand in Britain, particularly for the rapid expansion of the railways being built in every part of the country. More and more blast furnaces were opened in the vicinity of Middlesbrough to meet this demand and by the end of the century Teesside was producing about a third of the nation's iron output.

The status of Bolckow and Vaughan reached great heights in Middlesbrough and in 1853 Bolckow became the town's first mayor and fifteen years later became its first M.P. The development of Middlesbrough as an `Iron Town' spurred on its continuous growth and by 1860 its population had increased to an incredible 20,000. Two years later, the town was visited by the Victorian minister Gladstone who remarked;

"This remarkable place, the youngest child of England's enterprise, is an infant, but if an infant, an infant Hercules"

By the 1870s, steel, a much stronger and more resilient metal was in big demand and Middlesbrough had to compete with Sheffield. In 1875 Bolckow and Vaughan opened the first Bessemer Steel plant in Middlesbrough. At first phosphorous ores had to be imported from Spain for the making of the steel, but by 1879 methods were developed which could use local iron ores. The Tees was destined to become 'the Steel River'. In 1881 one commentator described how the ironstone of the Eston Hills processed at Middlesbrough, had been used in the building of structures throughout the world.;

The iron of Eston has diffused itself all over the world. It furnishes the railways of the world; it runs by Neapolitan and papal dungeons; it startles the bandit in his haunt in Cicilia; it crosses over the plains of Africa; it stretches over the plains of India. It has crept out of the Cleveland Hills where it has slept since Roman days, and now like a strong and invincible serpent, coils itself around the world. Sir H.G Reid
Bridges of Tees, Tyne and Sydney Harbour

Associated with the making of steel on Teesside is the construction of bridges, one of the industries for which the area has achieved international recognition. Chief among the bridge building firms was Dorman Long, a firm which began as an iron and steel works in 1875 manufacturing bars and angles for ships. A natural progression from this was to become involved in the construction of bridges particularly when Dorman Long took over the concerns of Bell Brothers and Bolckow and Vaughan in the late 1920s.

The most famous bridge ever constructed on Teesside was Dorman Long's Sydney Harbour Bridge of 1932. This was partly modelled on the 1929 Tyne Bridge, a construction regarded as the symbol of Tyneside's Geordie pride, but also a product of Dorman Long's Teesside workmanship. The great example of Dorman Long's work on Teesside itself is of course the single span Newport Lifting Bridge. Opened by the Duke of York in February 1934 it was England's first vertical lifting bridge. With a lifting span of 270 feet and 66 feet in length it is constructed from 8000 tons of Teesside steel and 28,000 tons of concrete with towers 170 feet high. The electrically operated lifting mechanism allowed the road to be lifted 100 feet in one and a half minutes by means of ropes passing through sheaves in the four corner towers.
The Transporter Bridge

The most notable Teesside Bridge is the Transporter Bridge, which was designed by the Cleveland Bridge and Engineering Company of Darlington and opened on 17th October 1911, by Prince Arthur of Connaught. A kind of a cross between a ferry and a bridge, vehicles are transported across the river by means of a moving car which is capable of carrying 600 persons or 9 vehicles across the Tees to Port Clarence in two and a half minutes. Like the later Newport Bridge it was designed to facilitate the movement of ships along the River Tees. It has a 160 feet clearance above the river.

Transporter Bridge

Above: Transporter Bridge, Middlesbrough - photo David Simpson
The Incredible Growth of Middlesbrough

The expanding iron and steel industry of Middlesbrough in the 1860s and 1870s spurred on the growth of Middlesbrough with a population of 19,000 in 1861 increasing to 40,000 only ten years later. The residents of this early town came mainly from neighbouring Yorkshire and the North East, but later from Cheshire, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and a some European countries.

At the turn of the century Middlesbrough's population had more than doubled to 90,000 and it must have been hard to believe that only seventy years earlier the town did not exist. Today Middlesbrough has a population of 150,000 and is undoubtedly the heart of the Teesside connurbation and the modern `Capital' of the area. In English history nothing compares to Middlesbrough's rapid growth. It is no wonder that Middlesbrough has been described as the `oldest new town' in England.
Middlesbrough Today and 'Over the Border'

Middlesbrough's town centre today is quite different from the original town planned by Joseph Pease and Partners in 1829. The early town, now called 'St Hilda's' after the parish church that stood here until 1969, was centred on a market square, where the first town hall was built in 1846. Immediately to the south of this early town, lay the railway line and station of 1877. As Middlesbrough grew, its boundaries quickly expanded south of the railway, leaving the old town somewhat isolated between the railway and river. Gradually the centre of commerce, trade and local government shifted south of the railway and in 1899, the old town hall, was succeeded by the grand structure, in Corporation Road.

The town hall and its municipal buildings vaguely resemble the Houses of Parliament and are still an impressive headquarters for local government in Middlesbrough. At the turn of the century, Linthorpe Road, also south of the railway, had become the main shopping street. This road followed the course of an old country route from Linthorpe to Middlesbrough called Linthorpe Lane. Today Linthorpe Road, along with Albert Road, Grange Road and Corporation Road, form the modern centre of Middlesbrough, with the University, the Central Library, the Law Courts, radio stations, shopping centres, car parks and busy shopping streets all located within easy reach.

'Over the border', to the north of the railway, some features of the earlier town can still be seen. Middlesbrough's oldest pub, the Ship Inn, in Stockton Street is still there as is the old Town Hall, which has seen better days. More impressive are the Georgian style houses, (now offices) in Queens Terrace, which belonged to the first Middlesbrough owners and nearby, the one time house of the ironmasters Bolckow and Vaughan. From here a short walk leads to the magnificent Transporter Bridge, ensuring that the old part of town still gets some of the attention.

Middlesbrough is the capital of Teesside and the Tees Valley and is famed for its industry, football club and its bridge, including the Transporter Bridge, the undisputed symbol of Teesside.
The Tees Estuary and Seal Sands

To the north of Redcar, the entrance to the Tees estuary is clearly marked on the coast by the pier breakwaters on either side of the river estuary. These are the half mile long North Gare and the two and a half mile long South Gare. The gares were built following a great storm in 1861 in which 50 vessels were wrecked on the sand bars between Redcar and Hartlepool in the vicinity of the estuary. Both Gares are under the management of the Tees and Hartlepool Port Authority and the South Gare is the sight of a Coastguard station which monitors the busy shipping activity of the estuary.

The Tees estuary is one of the biggest on the North Eastern coast and is dominated on either side by the large areas of reclaimed industrial land called Seal Sands on the northern bank and Bran Sands on the southern bank. Seal Sands is the site of an Oil Refinery and a Chemical Works. The two hundred and twenty mile long EKOFISK oil pipeline has its terminus at Seal Sands by which oil and gas liquids are piped ashore from the Ekofisk oilfield for processing at one of the largest plants of its kind in the world. Today oil exporting is one of Teesside's most important industries.

Despite all the heavy industry the Tees estuary is surprisingly important for its wildlife. Seal Sands now only half its original size due to land reclamation is still the Winter home to thousands of wildfowl and waders. Seals may still be seen `basking' in their man made surroundings. Autumn and Winter is the best time of the year for viewing wildlife at the Tees estuary. The main species are Little Stints, Curlew Sandpipers, Ruffs, Greenshanks, Wood Sandpipers, Bar-Tailed Godwits and Whimbrels. In Winter time Golden Plovers may also be seen but Winter is best for Duck-Watching when the main species are Shoveler Ducks, Widgeon, Long-Tailed Ducks, Goldeneye and Teal.