Didsbury the Mersey at Didsbury in the Jacobite march south from Manchester to Derby, and again in the subsequent retreat. Didsbury was largely rural until the mid-19th century, when it underwent development and urbanisation during the Industrial Revolution. It became part of Manchester in 1904. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds was formed in Didsbury in 1889. Didsbury derives its name from the Anglo-Saxon "Dyddi's burg", probably referring to a man known as Dyddi whose stronghold or township it was on a low cliff overlooking a place where the River Mersey could be forded. In the 13th century Didsbury
Didsbury, Alberta group who came west in 1894. 1897 saw the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway, which pushed forward the town's development. The CPR constructed a station in the town in 1904. Didsbury was incorporated as a village in 1905 and as a town on September 6, 1906. Fires in 1914 and 1924 destroyed the early "boomtown" commercial streetscape and led to the passing by Town Council of a bylaw which required masonry construction for all new downtown commercial buildings. Many of these brick buildings stand today. In the 2016 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, the Town of Didsbury