Agree.. the information you list punctures the nonsensical notion that has been peddled in recent years that somehow Liverpool and the wider Merseyside region has been affected to a greater extent by the decisions taken by the London metropolitan elite/establishment than other parts of the UK.
Out of this has grown the (self-referencing and frankly ridiculous) claim that somehow people from Merseyside are 'Scouse, not English' and with that emergence has come the poor collective behaviours such as booing Royalty and the National Anthem.
I don't claim to know quite how this phenomenon has developed but it strikes me that the commodification of 'being Scouse' in recent years has echoes of a similar turn of events across town from us with the way 'Munich 1958' has been appropriated by the marketing johnnies at Old Trafford since the early 90s.
Prior to that time, Manchester's disaster was commemorated in an understated manner in February of each year, with a few 'In Memoriam' notices in the Manchester Evening News. As a child, I attended the Albert Square welcome home for the defeated United Cup Final team in 1958 with parents, family and neighbours, United and City together. Many of us would argue that United's behaviour post-Munich was really based on the club preferring to sweep the thing under the carpet and forget about it, if only to reduce costs and insurance liabilities to those involved. My own, brief conversations with Albert Scanlon, a friend of my parents, during the early 70s suggest this was so to me.
Come the early 90s and the flotation on the Stock Exchange and suddenly it all changed. I have no doubt that the marketing boys saw an opportunity to develop the narrative, the myths surrounding the club by incorporating the Munich story in how they were presenting the club to the world.
Similarly with this 'Scouse, not English' thing, etymologists, sociologists and so on have written about this and covered its history better than I ever could. But to add, my recollections of how people from Liverpool presented themselves when I was growing up in the 50s and 60s reflect what those scholars tell us:
1 - That prior to the First World War, most Liverpool people spoke with a similar dialect to the Lancashire accent (for example, comedian Rob Wilton was born in Everton but always retained a broad, Lancashire lilt). It wasn't until the late 19th century that Irish and other immigration began to impact on the dialect, with air pollution/ill health of the population being a similar, contributory factor in its development.
2 - That 'Scouse' was in usage but not as widely as the self-references 'Wackers' (or 'Whackers') for men and 'Judies' for women. (Edit: I forgot to add here - In the 60s, the folk group The Spinners had a few minor hits, including 'Everbody Loves Saturday Night', a W African folk song adapted by Pete Seeger, which they adapted to include a Liverpool verse proclaiming 'Wackers and judies love Saturday night/ Wackers and judies, wackers and judies..' etc)
3 -That 'Scouse' wasn't even recognised as a term until the mid-40s by the Oxford English Dictionary.
4- That 'Scouse' gained traction in the UK after the arrival of 'Til Death Us Do Part' on BBC TV in the mid-60s, together with the 'Learn Yerself Scouse' book that came out when various World Cup games were played at Goodison Park in 1966.
As I say, I understand who was behind the commodification of United's change of direction but as to who stands to gain from selling this latest piece of nonsense the from the other end of the East Lancs, well your guess is as good as mine!
