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The name of the city is thought to have derived either from the
Celtic ‘Duntaw’ - the hill on the Tay – or from
the Iron Age fort on top of Dundee Law called
‘Dun Diagh’.
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Dundee’s current population is approximately 145,000. 200
years ago, Dundee had a population greater than that of Glasgow.
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Dr George Alexander Pirie started his investigations at
Dundee Royal Infirmary in the late 19th century. He was
one of the first doctors to use X-rays in the field of medicine. He
began producing X-ray images in 1896.
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Dundee bookseller James Chalmers invented the adhesive postage
stamp.
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Ninewells
Hospital – first new teaching hospital to be built in Britain
after the Second World War.
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James Bowman Lindsay, who lived in Dundee in the early 19th
century, demonstrated not only the world’s first visible electric
light, but also wireless telegraphy through water. His greatest achievement,
however, lay in his prophetic vision of the information society.
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In the early 20th century, Preston Watson achieved
powered flight, five months before the Wright Brothers.
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The Tay Railway Bridge is just over two miles long and still remains
the longest in Europe. The section closest to Dundee was completed
in 1887, to replace a section that was destroyed in 1879 by a storm.
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Dundee maintains a spectacular position on the Tay Estuary and
is dominated by a dormant volcano called “The
Law”. It is the highest point in Dundee, offering a great
view over the city and the surrounding area.
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Margaret Fenwick was the first woman trade union leader
in Britain – General Secretary of the Jute, Flax & Kindred Textile
Operatives’ Union.
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Sir Robert Watson Watt, the radar pioneer, attained a first-class
science degree from University College, Dundee. In 1912 he was appointed
an assistant to the Professor of Physics. His studies of thunderstorms
during the First World War led him to draw up the world’s first
practical radar scheme.
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Dundee was the home port of the Antarctic exploration ship RRS
Discovery, the historic vessel which took Captain Robert Scott
to Antarctica. The Discovery, carefully restored, is now the centrepiece
of an award-winning tourist and visitor centre at Dundee’s waterfront.
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Dundee was once among the world’s leading whaling ports.
The ready availability of whale oil in Dundee led to the establishment
of the jute industry in the city in the 1830s. The oil was used to
soften the rough jute fibres. Dundee soon became the centre of the
world’s jute industry.
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Kingsway was the first ring road system in Britain.
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Mrs Keiller produced marmalade from a consignment of bitter
oranges, whilst, in the 1870s, that glory of British gastronomy –
the chip – was first sold by Belgian immigrant Edward De
Gernier in the city’s Greenmarket.
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At one time there were more millionaires per head in Dundee than
anywhere else in Britain.
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The Howff
burial ground is a historic graveyard given to the people of Dundee
by Mary, Queen of Scots. The carved gravestones, which date back to
the sixteenth century, feature the signs and symbols of the old craft
guilds.
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Verdant
Works, an award-winning site and former jute mill, tells the story
of Dundee’s important jute and textiles history. At one time
there were as many as 43,000 people employed in the textiles industry
in Dundee.
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Sir James Ivory, a famous 18th century mathematician
and astronomer, said to have ranked alongside Newton, was the son
of Dundee Watchmaker, James Ivory, who made the clock for the steeple
of St Andrew’s Church, Cowgate.
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Williamina Fleming, born and educated in Dundee, achieved
fame as an astronomer at Harvard College Observatory in the USA, where
she specialised in developing the uses of photography in astronomical
research.
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James MacDonald, the voice of Mickey Mouse from 1946 to
1976 was born in Dundee.
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