A History of Blackpool & Blackpool Tower
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Britain’s Most Iconic Seaside Resort
Blackpool is seen by many as an illuminated anachronism of the very worst, and the very best of the English seaside resort, but whatever your feelings it’s a step back into a time almost forgotten. Once there, and you’ve taken in several deep breaths of very fresh, very bracing Irish Sea air, climb aboard one of the original corporation trams and you’ll soon notice that Blackpool has a past that can be seen, and heard, as you clank and rattle passed three of the most beautiful Victorian piers you’re ever likely to see. Stay aboard the green and cream tram and you’ll witness a parade of 19th and early 20th century architecture at its most robust. And when you eventually get off the tram at the Pleasure Beach you can indulge yourself in the delights of one of the oldest fairgrounds in the world, with one of the biggest big dippers in the world too.
If you don’t fancy the big dipper you can still laugh along with the original Laughing Policeman — you might even spot a real policemen — and when giddy from the innumerable, and terrifying rides, you can (pink candy-floss in hand) take a horse drawn carriage back along the Golden Mile to the Tower Ballroom and watch, and listen, as the ‘Mighty Wurlitzer’ organ rises from beneath the stage in a fog of dry ice with the familiar chords of ‘Oh I Do Love To Be Beside The Seaside’, encouraging hundreds of ballroom dancers to their feet. After a quick-step or two why not take a ride up the Tower itself — 125 years old — and from your 518 ft (and 9 inches) advantage point see the lights of the Grand Theatre, the Opera House, and the Winter Gardens, venues that still pack in the paying audiences every summer. The political Party conferences have now gone elsewhere. After that visit the ‘original’ Gypsy Rose Lee can still read your palm, if you dare. You can then easily top that eerie experience with a visit to the Tower Circus, or a show at the Opera House, or any one of the piers, followed by some of the best fish & chips in the world, all washed down with a pint or two of Tetley’s ale.
Blackpool is a living, breathing, historical monument that seems to constantly re-invigorate its own past by keeping it very much in the present. Just walk up and down the Promenade and I swear you’ll see those black and…
