Royal Victoria Gallery of Practical Science

The Royal Victoria Gallery for the Encouragement of Practical Science was an adult education institution and exhibition gallery in Victorian Manchester, a commercial enterprise intended to educate the general public about science and its industrial applications.

During the 1830s, the Manchester Mechanics' Institute was failing to attract students to its science lectures. On 21 March 1839, a meeting was held at the York Hotel to discuss the possibility of establishing an institution aimed solely at science education. The meeting was chaired by Hugh Hornby Birley, the leader of the troops at the Peterloo Massacre in 1819, who revelealed that the project was to be based on Jacob Perkins' Adelaide Gallery of Practical Science in London and was to:

William Fairbairn, Eaton Hodgkinson and John Davies were all at the meeting and gave their enthusiastic support. A prospectus was published in the Manchester Guardian seeking to raise capital through a , representing the Gallery as a sound financial investment. A committee was established to create the new Gallery and included, Hodgkinson, Fairbairn, Davies and Richard Roberts, the last three, all founders of the Mechanics' Institute.

Annual subscriptions were to be offered at one guinea with two guinea family subscriptions. The admission fee was to be one shilling, beyond the means of most of the Victorian working class and a rival committee held a meeting on 4 April proposing a not-for-profit alternative but without realising any of their ambitions. In due course, William Sturgeon was retained as superintendent of the Gallery and Queen Victoria was prevailed upon to offer her patronage.

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