Bangor University

Bangor University (Welsh: Prifysgol Bangor) is a public research university in Bangor, Gwynedd, Wales. It was established by Royal Charter in 1885 as the University College of North Wales (UCNW; Welsh: Coleg Prifysgol Gogledd Cymru), and in 1893 became one of the founding institutions of the federal University of Wales. In 1996, after structural changes to the University of Wales it became known as the University of Wales, Bangor (UWB; Welsh: Prifysgol Cymru, Bangor). It became independent of the University of Wales in 2007, adopting its current name and awarding its own degrees.

It has over 10,000 students across 3 academic colleges and 11 schools, as well as several large research institutes. Its campus makes up a large part of Bangor, and extends to nearby Menai Bridge as well, with a second campus in Wrexham for some healthcare courses.

Its total income for 2022/23 was £178.0 million, of which 19% came from research grants, and it has an endowment of £8.2 million. Its alumni includes multiple fellows of the Royal Society, heads of state, and Nobel Prize winners.

The university was founded as the University College of North Wales (UCNW) on 18 October 1884, with an inaugural address by the Earl of Powis, the college's first President, in Penrhyn Hall. There was then a procession to the college including 3,000 quarrymen, as quarrymen from Penrhyn Quarry and other quarries had subscribed more than 1,200 pounds to the university. The foundation was the result of a campaign for better provision of higher education in Wales that had involved some rivalry among towns in North Wales over which was to be the location of the new college.

Originally based in a former coaching inn, the college was incorporated by Royal Charter in 1885. It opened with just 58 students, who would receive degrees from the University of London until 1893 when UCNW became a founding constituent institution of the federal University of Wales. In that year there was a dispute that led to the closure of the Women's Hall and Frances Hughes who was in the eye of the storm to leave the college.

In 1903, the city of Bangor donated a 10-acre site at Penrallt for a new college building, and with funds raised by local people. The new building, now known as the Main Arts Building, was opened in 1911.

During the Second World War paintings from national art galleries were stored in the Prichard-Jones Hall at UCNW to protect them from enemy bombing. They were later moved to slate mines at Blaenau Ffestiniog. Students from University College London were evacuated to continue their studies in a safer environment at Bangor.

During the 1960s, the university shared in the general expansion of higher education in the UK following the Robbins Report, with many new departments and new buildings. On 22 November 1965, during construction of an extension to the Department of Electronic Engineering in Dean Street, a crane collapsed on the building. The three-ton counterweight hit the second-floor lecture theatre in the original building about thirty minutes before it would have been occupied by about 80 first-year students. The counterweight went through to the ground floor.