51 Facts About Blackpool: History, Soccer Team, Tourism, And More

Blackpool is a large town located in Lancashire, England.

Its history takes us back to a time when the town was a flourishing resort. It still is the most famous seaside resort currently in the United Kingdom.

Blackpool has many beautiful places, like Blackpool Tower Ballroom, Blackpool Tramway, Sandcastle Water Park, and many more, which can attract people of all ages. It has football, an amusement park for children and fun adults, and ballrooms, theaters, and opera shows for people looking for something sophisticated. Read on to know more about Blackpool.

Facts About Blackpool

Blackpool is a seaside port and a large town located in Lancashire, mainly on the northwest coast of England.

• Blackpool is located 40 mi (64 km) northwest of Manchester and 27 mi (43 km) north of Liverpool between the Wyre and Ribble Rivers and the Irish Sea.
• Blackpool is named after an old drainage channel that released dark boggy water into the sea, which formed a black pool.
• Residents of Blackpool are called Blackpudlian, Sandgrown'uns, or Sandgrownians.
• Blackpool Zoo is a tourist attraction place built on the site of Stanley Park Aerodrome, which before was Blackpool Municipal Airport.
• Blackpool Illuminations is an annual festival of lights that started in 1879. This festival runs from late August to early November for 66 days.
• Blackpool Illuminations every year include more than 500 designs of lights.
• Every year more than a million bulbs were used for the Blackpool Illuminations that run for 6.2 mi (10 km).
• It takes people around 14 weeks on average to take down all the lights hung during Blackpool Illuminations.
• The first live DVD of 'The White Stripes,' the American rock duo, was named after the Empress Ballroom of Blackpool.
• One of the best seaside foods of England is the Blackpool rock which is a solid colorful stick of sugar.
• The Blackpool Tower was the tallest structure made by men in the British Empire when it first opened.
• The Blackpool Tower is the 125th tallest tower, the mainly freestanding tower in the world.
• The Blackpool Tower was designed after the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

Blackpool's History

Blackpool holds a lot of history, and many of them surround the beautiful tourist attractions the town has.

• Blackpool was incorporated in 1876 as a borough governed by a town council of its own.
• In 1881, the town was a flourishing resort with donkey rides, public houses, piers, theatres, and more.
• In the Amounderness Hundred of Lancashire, the town was a coastal hamlet throughout the early modern and medieval periods.
• The early popularity of Blackpool leads back to William Hutton, the British science writer who made seawater's health-giving properties popular.
• Building the famous Blackpool Tower started in 1891, and the tower opened in 1894.
• The tower was painted gold to celebrate its 100th birthday in 1997 and was painted silver to celebrate Queen Elizabeth II silver jubilee in 1977.
• Blackpool is the only town in England with three piers, a South Pier, a Central Pier, and a North Pier.
• This stretch between the South and North Pier is known as the 'Golden Mile,' but the town used to expand more towards the south.
• The North Pier was completed in 1863, the Central Pier was completed in 1868, and the South Pier was completed in 1893.
• Since 1934, every year, a celebrity switches on the Blackpool Illuminations. This celebrity list includes even a famous racing horse, Red Rum.
• When the Blackpool Pleasure Beach opened, The Big One used to be the tallest and the steepest roller coaster in the world.
• Blackpool became the first-ever town in the world with electric street lighting in 1879.
• Blackpool also became the first-ever town to introduce the permanent electric street tramway in 1885.

Blackpool's Tourist Attractions

Blackpool has many tourist attractions, like Blackpool Tramway, Sandcastle Water Park, Blackpool Tower, and more.

• The Blackpool Tramway is the only surviving tramway to still have the first-generation tramway in the United Kingdom.
• Blackpool is called the home of ballroom dancing owing to the famous Blackpool Tower Ballroom, which has housed dancers for the show 'Strictly Come Dancing' many times.
• The British National Dance Championships also occur every year in the Empress Ballroom of the Winter Gardens.
• The Winter Gardens has all accommodations, including a ballroom, theater, and conference facilities.
• Annual conferences of trade unions and parties occur at the Winter Gardens on a daily basis.
• Owners of the facilities claim that since World War II, every Prime Minister has addressed an audience there.
• It takes people around seven years to paint the entire Blackpool Tower.
• It will take you 69 seconds in the elevators to reach the top of Blackpool Tower at 518 ft (158 m) height.
• A laser was placed in the Blackpool Tower in 2007, which you could see from a distance of 30 mi (48 km).
• It takes about 30 minutes for all the chandeliers of the Blackpool Tower Ballroom to be lowered to the floor, while it takes a team of six people a week to clean them.
• The North Blackpool Pier was the only one to cater to the 'better-class' market with comedians performing and orchestra concerts and charged admission until 2011.
• The oldest ride of Blackpool Pleasure Beach is Sir Hiram Maxim Captive Flying Machine. It's also Europe's oldest working amusement park ride.
• The Big One of Blackpool Pleasure Beach is currently the tallest roller coaster in England, with a height of 213 ft (65 m).

Blackpool's Soccer Team

Blackpool Football Club may not have seen many good days, but the team is full of passion and history.

• Blackpool Football Club was founded in 1887, and the club became a founder member of the Lancashire League in 1889.
• Blackpool FC also has a women's team named 'Blackpool FC Ladies,' founded in 2008.
• Blackpool FC has many nicknames, like 'The Tangerines,' 'The Pool,' or 'The Seasiders.'
• The record transfer fee with the highest amount paid for Blackpool FC was £1.25 million for the English forward, DJ Campbell.
• Blackpool FC holds the record for advancing from League Two to the English Premier League in only nine years by playing the play-offs in all four divisions.
• Coach Ian Holloway joined Blackpool FC in the season 2009-10. It took him only nine months to get the club promoted to the English Premier League for the first time.
• One of the great English footballers of all time, Sir Stanley Matthews, tops the club legends list of Blackpool FC.
• The Blackpool FC legend Sir Stanley Matthews joined in 1947 when he was 32 years old and appeared in 391 matches in 14 years.
• The English footballer Jimmy Armfield appeared most times for Blackpool FC with 569 appearances in 14 years.
• The English footballer Jimmy Hampson scored the most goals for Blackpool FC with 252 goals in 11 years.
• In the season 1923-24, The Seasiders wore their tangerine kits for the first time. Referee Albert Hargreaves suggested them these colors after he watched Holland vs. Belgium.
• Blackpool FC's home stadium, Bloomfield Road, has a hotel inside that was first opened to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the club in 2012.
• During the club's only season in the Premier League, the Blackpool FC fans were declared the fifth-loudest fans owing to them clocking in at 85 decibels.