The Postcard
A postally unused postcard that was published by Charles Howell, Official Photographer, Pleasure Beach, Blackpool. The card has a divided back.
Blackpool
Blackpool is a seaside resort in Lancashire on the northwest coast of England. The town is by the Irish Sea, between the Ribble and Wyre rivers, and is 27 miles (43 km) north of Liverpool and 40 miles (64 km) northwest of Manchester.
At the 2011 census, Blackpool had a population of 139,720, making it the most populous settlement in Lancashire. It is home to the Blackpool Tower, which when built in 1894 was the tallest building in the British Empire.
Throughout the Medieval and Early Modern period, Blackpool was a coastal hamlet in Lancashire's Amounderness Hundred, and remained as such until the mid-18th. century, when it became fashionable in England to travel to the coast in the summer to improve well-being.
In 1781, visitors attracted to Blackpool's 7-mile (11 km) sandy beach were able to use a new private road, built by Thomas Clifton and Sir Henry Hoghton.
Stagecoaches began running to Blackpool from Manchester in the same year, and from Halifax in 1782. In the early 19th. century, Henry Banks and his son-in-law John Cocker erected new buildings in Blackpool, which increased its population from less than 500 in 1801 to over 2,500 in 1851. St John's Church in Blackpool was consecrated in 1821.
Blackpool rose to prominence as a major centre of tourism in England when a railway was built in the 1840's connecting it to the industrialised regions of northern England. The railway made it much easier and cheaper for visitors to reach Blackpool, triggering an influx of settlers.
By 1881, Blackpool was a booming resort with a population of 14,000 and a promenade complete with piers, fortune-tellers, public houses, trams, donkey rides, fish and chip shops, and theatres.
By 1901, the population of Blackpool was 47,000, by which time its place was cemented as the archetypal British seaside resort. By 1951, the town had grown to 147,000 people.
Shifts in tastes, combined with opportunities for British people to travel overseas, affected Blackpool's status as a leading resort in the late 20th. century. However its urban fabric and economy both remain relatively undiversified and firmly rooted in the tourism sector, and the borough's seafront continues to attract millions of visitors every year.
Blackpool's major attractions and landmarks include the Blackpool Tower, Blackpool Illuminations, Pleasure Beach, Blackpool Zoo, Sandcastle Water Park, the Winter Gardens and Blackpool Tramway, which is the UK's only surviving first-generation tramway.
