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ONCE claimed to be the world's biggest shipbuilding town. Shipbuilding had been carried out in the city since Medieval times, but shipbuilding is no more. Sunderland grew from the settlements of Monkwearmouth, Bishopwearmouth and Sunderland which means 'Sundered Land'. The Venerable Bede records his birthplace as the Sundered land and the nearby monastery at Monkwearmouth, where he began his career, was famed throughout Europe during the Golden Age of Northumbria, along with its twin monastery at Jarrow. Monkwearmouth was founded by Benedict Biscop, a Northumbrian noble, who introduced some of the earliest stained glass and Britain's first Gregorian chanters to the monasteries. Glass making has long been important in Sunderland and this is one reason why Sunderland is now the site of the National Glass Centre. In the nineteenth century Monkwearmouth was famed for its coal mining and was the site of the country's deepest pit, but sadly it became famed at the end of the twentieth century as the last pit in the ancient Durham coalfield to close, bringing an end to the final chapter of one of County Durham's greatest industries. The mine is now the site of the Sunderland Stadium of Light. Sunderland has been thoroughly modernised in recent years and was granted city status in 1992.