John Collier (caricaturist)

[1] Born in Urmston, Lancashire, the son of an impoverished curate, he moved to Milnrow at the age of 17 to work as a schoolmaster.

People in the pubs would ask him to draw portraits of them and their friends and he would charge on the basis of the number of heads in the picture.

[3] The Lancashire dialect poetry collection, Human Passions Delineated, a work which he both wrote and illustrated, appeared in 1773.

[2][3] He wrote his own epitaph 20 minutes before he died, "Jack of all trades...left to lie i'th dark" which is inscribed upon his gravestone.

[3] In 1792 Sir Walter Scott visited the grave and suggested that a public subscription be raised to refurbish it.