3-071-040 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Sketches at Liverpool during the Frost, 1881. 'Curious scene in Lord Street; Please give what you can spare to help Feed the Hungry of Liverpool and Cheshire, faithfully yours W. Simson; Simson's bowl for the poor birds; "Simson's Bowl"; Labourers clearing the snow from the Landing stage...Mr. Simpson, the well-known proprietor of the refreshment-room at the Landing Stage, made an effort to give relief for the poor by setting out his customary "bowl," with a placard requesting all passengers to give what they could spare for that kindly purpose...A very curious freak of the frost, in the display of icicles which nature produced in a back yard of 53, Lord-street...The house was being pulled down by builders' labourers; so that by looking through an opening of the back wall of the shop, into the yard behind, there was a good view of this extraordinary spectacle. The festoons and pendants of ice, with one perfect arch of ice, were like a scene in a Christmas pantomime. An enterprising speculator rented this show for a few days, charging threepence to see it, and made a handsome sum of money...The work of clearing the snow, as well from that place as from the quays and wharves of the docks, gave frequent employment to a number of labourers'. From "Illustrated London News", 1881.