EVERTON legend Dixie Dean has been named greatest Merseysider of all time, after a vote by ECHO readers.
The all-England record-breaking soccer superstar, who scored a still unsurpassed 60 goals in one season, won the Spirit of Liverpool competition to mark the city’s 800th anniversary.
The award was collected from ECHO editor Alastair Machray by Dixie Dean’s daughter, Barbara, at a gala presentation.
She said: “This is wonderful. My father would have been very proud, especially as the votes came from the local people.”
Mr Machray said: “It’s certainly true what they say about Dixie, he was the ultimate master sportsman, and was never booked or sent off during his entire career.
“He makes a wonderful winner, and this resounding result is a fitting conclusion to a contest at a defining moment in the city and the region’s history.”
Other category prize-winners honoured in the six-month competition, presented in partnership with Alliance and Leicester Commercial Bank, were The Beatles, Ken Dodd, the author and broadcaster Brian Jacques; Professor Janet Hemingway, director of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine; Jospice International founder Father Francis O’Leary, the human rights campaigner James Mawdsley; Liverpool city guide Steve Binns; Meccano inventor Frank Hornby and the politician William Gladstone.
All the section winners had specially commissioned portraits of them unveiled at the World Museum Liverpool event, hosted by the Liverpool-born screen and stage star Claire Sweeney.
One of the artists, John Kneen, from Anfield, won an ECHO contest to paint a picture of veteran comedian Ken Dodd.
Father-of-three John, 51, said: “Perhaps now I will be able to take painting up full-time.”
The other artists were chosen by city-based arts agency Dot-art.
Claire Sweeney said: “Spirit of Liverpool is the very best competition of its type, when the judging is driven by the knowledge and enthusiasm of fellow Scousers.”
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