Rainhill is a smallish town about 15 miles from the centre of Liverpool in the North West of England.
Rainhill has several schools, the largest of which is a comprehensive school,
Rainhill High School,
which I attended for 7 years throughout my GSCE's and 'A' Levels.
Rainhill High is a fairly well equipped modern school, which was built fairly recently (it was still under construction when I started school there in 1986). There is also a smaller private school, Tower College, whose web pages I designed!
Rainhill has a long history, dating back many hundreds of years. The history can be traced back to the 13th centuary, though a cross at the top of the hill is thought to be a meeting place used many centuaries before this by the village leaders. More recent buildings, dating from the 17th centuary, are the Catholic Church, St. Bartholomews, the Manor Farm, now used as a pub, and the building now used by Tower College School. A passage between these three sites, now mostly blocked off, was used as an escape route for Catholic Priests from the church during the civil war in the 17th centuary.
Rainhill is most famous for the
Rainhill Trials
in 1829.
Here, a number of steam locomotives were tested to see which could be used on the first steam train service. A number of steam engines were built, and tested in a race through Rainhill, and under the Skew Bridge - the first bridge to be built to cross a railway line at an angle! The challenge was won by the now famous Stephenson's Rocket. The Skew Bridge, and the station can still be seen in Rainhill to this day.