A brief history of The Christie

Richard Copley Christie was born on 22 July 1830 at Lenton in Nottinghamshire. In 1853, he graduated from Oxford in law and history and went on to become a barrister and a professor at Owens College in Manchester (now part of the University of Manchester).

In 1861, Richard married Mary Ellen (also known as Helen). Both Richard and Mary were committed philanthropists and supported charitable causes throughout their lives.

After Sir Joseph Whitworth died in 1887, Richard was appointed as one of the 3 legatees of his will. He was left £300,000 in the will, with the instruction to use this for charitable and educational purposes.

The 3 legatees of the will donated some of the money to Owens College, but Richard Christie urged the other legatees to support the founding and supporting of a new cancer hospital. This was a special interest of his wife, Mary Christie. Later, Richard would admit that he wasn’t sure about the idea for the cancer hospital, and it was his wife who had convinced him how important it was.

Christie promised financial support of £1,000 and with other donations from other backers, he was able to raise £10,000 to build the new cancer hospital.

The committee that Richard formed identified a part of the land that Owens College had just purchased in 1888 with the Whitworth money, known as the Stanley Grove estate as a possible site for the cancer hospital. The estate included 11 houses with 12 and a half acres of ground and is where the present Manchester Royal Infirmary now stands.

On 7 November 1892, the Cancer Pavilion and Home was opened under the presidency of Richard Christie. On the following day, Professor Sheridan Delepine proposed that a ward be named after Mrs Helen Christie in recognition of her contributions. 2 months later, Mrs Christie donated a bed and named it after her sister, Jane Rogers, who had also contributed about £1,000 towards the founding of the hospital.

In October 1899, the freedom of the city of Manchester was conferred upon Richard Christie. He died at Ribsden in January 1901, with his wife surviving him. Richard left his collection of books to the Owens College, as well as money to maintain its Christie Library. He also left legacies to the Royal Holloway College, to the Library Association of the United Kingdom, and to various medical and other charities.

Following the death of Richard Christie, the Board of Management of the Cancer Pavilion and Home recommended a change of name to ‘The Christie Hospital’. This was a ‘lasting memorial of the great services rendered to the Charity by the late Mr Christie and Mrs Christie.’

In 1902, 2 bronze busts of Mr and Mrs Christie, sculpted by Mr John Cassidy, were given to the Board by Treasurer, Mr SL Helm to display in the entrance hall. These are still in The Christie boardroom today.

A portrait of Richard Christie by Mr. T. B. Kennington is in the Christie Library at the University of Manchester, where it was placed by his friends shortly before his death.

Ralston Paterson was born on 21 May 1897 in Edinburgh. After leaving the army in 1919, he worked as a consultant radiologist in South Africa, and taught radiology at the University of Chicago.

During his time in the United States, Ralston married Edith Jones. When Ralston was made Director of the Holt Radium Institute in 1931, he and Edith moved to Manchester and stayed there until his retirement.

Ralston Paterson played a pivotal role in establishing Manchester as the leading centre of radium therapy in Britain and in promoting the professionalisation of radiotherapy. He developed the Manchester system of radium dosimetry, and a regulatory framework for standardised treatment for a population of more than 4 million. Later he sought to educate the public to overcome their fears of cancer, and introduced social and psychological services for patients.

In addition to improving the treatment of cancer, Paterson also engineered better safety measures for staff and patients, and increased support of clinical and laboratory research.

In early 1932, Paterson spent 3 weeks in Brussels and returned with a new method of making moulds for the application of radium. The mould room at The Christie was soon built for this purpose.

In 1933, Edith Paterson began unpaid work at the hospital researching tissue culture. 10 years after she began this work, she was formally appointed to the hospital staff as a research radiobiologist. Edith later became an internationally-recognised researcher in the fields of biological radiation dosimetry, childhood cancers and cancer drug treatment methods.

Ralston Paterson retired from The Christie in 1962 and he Edith spent the rest of their lives running a cattle and sheep farm in Stenreishill in Scotland. Ralston died in August 1981, and his wife lived until September 1995.

The former Paterson building and the current Paterson cancer research centre at The Christie were named for the Patersons’ contributions to cancer research. A drawing of Ralston Paterson now hangs in The Christie boardroom.