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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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