Southend-on-sea

 Southend-on-Sea

 Southend-on-Sea was not always called Southend-on-sea the town started its life has a village called Prittlewell. Prittlewell was originally a stone age village and was made more accessible to people by the Romans. The Romans had a lot of influence in the area. The Romans built dwellings like farmhouses, villas and roads that had a major effect on the area. It brought new skills and new ideas to the people of Prittlewell. The Romans also brought new social structures that help Prittlewell become a thriving village. 

 

The town continued to grow at a slow rate over the years and only started to become the Southend we love and know, until the Georgian era. The Georgian era put Southend on the map has it had became very popular with tourists from London. The tourists were attracted to the seven miles of beaches that were ideal for bathing. The art of bathing had become very popular at this time in history. The town also had good railway links, which made it very easy for Londoners to visit the seaside town and return home within a day.

Has the town became more popular, it was thought that a pier would be a good idea. In 1828 work started on the pier and the work was completed in 1830 and the pier opened that year. The first original pier was only reached 600ft and was made of entirely of wood. Building work continued to extend the pier over the years and after 16 years in 1846 the pier reach a grand one and quarter miles. This made the pier the longest in Europe and prove to be a major attraction to the public. In 1888 work started on a new iron pier to replace the wooden one. The new pier was designed by Mr James Brunlees and cost £80,000 with £10,000 on the money being spent on a new electric railway that would travel the whole length of the pier. The new pier opened its doors on 24^th August 1890. In 1890 it was decided to extend the pier again. The pier now reach 7080ft making it the longest pier in the world. A record that has not changed since the pier was built. In 1908 an extension was built creating an upper deck, they also turned the single track railway into a double track. The Prince George steamer extension was add in 1929.

Following the end of world war II the pier started to become very popular with the British public again after the hardships of war. During the season of 1949/1950 the pier trains carried a whooping 4,713,082 passengers and with another million choosing to walk along the pier. This was the hay days of Southend pier. Since the 1950's the seaside resort has being slowly declining. This was especially seen in the 1970's, were it was decided to franchise the entertainments on the pier because of falling trade. In 1976 the there was a huge fire that cause extensive damaged to the pier head leaving a repair bill of 1.4 million. To add salt to the wounds the piers railway had to closed due to safety reasons that was only two years after the fire in October 1978. In 1980 the local council made plans to close the entire pier for good in September that year. These were very sad times for Southend pier.

The council did not really want to close the pier for good, so after much debate within the council cambers. They came up with a rescue package with a local building firm and work stared on the pier in 1984. The work was to include a new 3 foot gauge railway to replace the old out of date one. The work was completed in 1986 but just before the pier was due to open a ship called the “Kings of Abbey” which was 180ft long collided with the pier causing some minor damage and some of the pier being sectioned off. This only delayed the opening for a short time and later that year the newly refurbished pier was opened by Princess Anne.

In 1989 the pier museum opened at the shore end of the pier. The museum showed the history of the pier from its early days has a wooden pier. In June 1995 a fire started at the shore end of the pier. The fire destroyed most of the pier shoreward end and the bowling ally that was adjacent to it. The railway was damaged has well and had to close. The pier shoreward end was rebuilt in 1998 with a grant from the Heritage Lottery fund which was rejected at first. In 2000 the RNLI station and gift shop were opened at the pier head. In October 2005 fire struck again this time damaging the pier head station and 130ft of the pier. This was repaired like all the other disaster before. Southend's pier has had a lot of setbacks, ups and downs throughout its history but it has stood the test of time being around for nearly two hundred years.

Southend his still a great place to visit especially if you live in London taking only an hour to reach there by car. It is and always will be a favourite place for Londoners to visit and it is one of England's great seaside resort. I myself visit southend at lease two to three times a year and enjoy it very much.

Butlin's Holiday Camp

Butlin’s Holidays

A

British institution

History of Billy Butlin

Billy Butlin was born William Heygate Colbourne Butlin in Cape Town, South Africa on the 29^th September 1899. Butlin’s father was the son of a clergyman who had been sent to South Africa as a sort of punishment for being the black sheep of the family. Billy’s mother, Bertha Hill was the daughter of a baker turned fairground, traveling showmen. The marriage between his parents did not last very long and Billy’s mother soon found herself, young Billy and his brother living back in Bristol England with Bertha’s sister Jessie. Soon after arriving in Bristol Bertha decided to spend the summer traveling around different fairgrounds running a gingerbread stall for her brother, whilst her sister look after the two young boys. Unfortunately soon after they arrive back in England, Billy’s brother sadly died of infantile paralysis. This prompted Bertha to take Billy with her on her travels. During his younger years Billy Butlin travelled to many different places around the world. Whilst in Canada the First World War broke out so Billy went and signed up for the Canadian army against his mother’s wishes.

After the war ended Billy stayed in Canada to 1921, then Billy decided to return to England. Shortly after arriving back in Bristol, he started to look for work. It wasn’t long before he found work at Dorney’s Yard, which was a winter’s retreat for a travelling fairground. He started work on fixing and painting the rides for the summer fair. After settling in and working hard his uncle helped Billy to set up a small stall. The stall was a hoopla hoop type stall, the sort you throw the hoop over the little wooden blocks to win a prize. His first fair was held at Axebridge and it was a big success giving Billy a £10 clear profit a lot of money in those days. This amount was much better than the other stallholders. Instead of making it hard to win a prize Billy thought that it would be a good idea to let people win more offend by making the block smaller so the hoop would go over the block easier. This was so that people would tell their friends and return to spent more money. It was like they were almost guaranteed a prize at Billy’s stall and people love it. It wasn’t long before Billy started to think about expanding his business and came up with the idea of having a goldfish stall as well as the hula hoop stall. To make it look professional he kitted out his team with uniforms, made by Wildman’s a local business near Skegness. This consisted of a Red Blazer, White shirt, Red stripe tie and white trousers. The famous B on the pocket was added a bit later on. This made Billy’s workers the first workers to wear a uniform at an amusement park in the British Isles. Also he used the colours blue and yellow to paint he's stall. The same colour scheme he would use in the first Butlin's Holiday camp at Skegness.

The first camp did not come along that easy. Billy had all the plans, ideas and the backing for the camp but he did not have a location. One morning as the story goes Billy was being driven from his home in Skegness to an amusement park in Mablethrope. As the driver drove along they came very close to a village called Ingoldmells. At that point something in Billy’s head switch on and he told the driver to stop and he got out of the car and said, “I’m going to build my camp right here”. The site didn’t look much just turnip fields and bad farming land but it was on the main road to Skegness and something inside Billy just clicked. Work started on the first camp in October 1935 and the camp was opened on Easter Sunday 1936 by Amy Johnson who was the first woman to fly from England to Australia.

Butlin’s launched a big advertising campaign in the Daily Mail to promote the holiday camp. Billy Butlin was offering three meals a day all for 35 shillings or £3.00 a week according to the time of year. This had never been done before and the English holiday camp was born. Mr Butlin thought that the holidaymakers had settled in well and were enjoying them self’s, but he thought that something was missing they were lacking enthusiasm. So Billy came up with one of he’s best ideas and The Redcoat was born and Butlin’s would become a household name.

Bognor Regis Camp

The Bognor Regis camp was opened in 1960 and covered 60 acres being located a short distance from the town. The camp could hold 5,000 campers and had space to accommodate up to 5,000-day visitors. As the camp was being built heavy rain caused flooding that hampered the building. This made it hard for the workers to build on and the building programme fell behind. When the first holidaymakers arrived, the camp was not finished and the campers were offered alternative accommodation at the Clapton on Sea site. Some people decided to go but a lot of the holidaymakers stayed and they helped to finish the camp. Billy was so happy with these campers that he brought each one of them a bottle of champagne to say thank you for their help.

In the early eighties a lot of Butlin’s camps closed as cheap overseas holidays became more popular with the public. The Bognor Southcoast World. There was a newly built indoor water complex and all the holidays’ chalets were refurbished and updated. In 1998 there was another refit to the Bognor Regis site costing around £45 million this time. The refit was to bring Bognor into line with the other two sites Minehead and Skegness, which are the only other two surviving camps. The site was totally redesigned and was to have a centrepiece like Skegness and Minehead; this was a large under cover, structure called The Skyline Pavilion. This enables all the entrainment and other facilities to be undercover and accessible all year round. There also upgraded the chalets and the uniform was redesign for the Redcoats. In 2005 the Shoreline Hotel and surrounding landscaping was added costing £10 million the hotel has 160 rooms with all the normal hotel comforts as well as all the use of the Butlin facilities. The hotel was a big success and in 2009 a second hotel called The Ocean Hotel was opened. These hotels are very popular and Butlin’s are building a third hotel on the site called The Wave Hotel which will be opened later on this year.

Butlin's is a great place to visit and is geared up for young family's and young children. It has everything a young child could wish for and more. Butlin's still has its charm that it had all those years ago went I went there as a kid. 

The Palace Pier

Brighton's

The Palace Pier

The Palace Pier in Brighton started its life as an old chain pier in 1823. The pier was mainly use as a landing stage for passenger ships that sailed from Dieppe in France. The owners of the chain pier realized the potential of the pier and started charging a fee of 2d to walk along the pier. The owners also decided to add some kiosks, selling souvenirs and confectionery along with entertainment stalls that featured fortune tellers and silhouettists. This prove very popular and fashionable with the public. When the pier was open which was less often that you would think. This was because of the major storms that battered the pier over the next ten years from 1824 to 1834. The storms caused irreparable damage to the piers structure. When the storms had finally finished the pier carried on as a fashionable and popular attraction for another 55 years

 In 1889 the Pier was sold to The Marine Palace &Pier Company. Later on that year in early December the pier was totally destroyed again by a raging storm. Over the next decade The Marine Palace & Pier Company suffered lots of set backs. One storm resulted in the old chain pier being completely washed away and they had to start again. There were lots of building and construction work going in that ten year period, till the pier was finally finished in1899. The Palace Pier officially opened on the 20^th May 1899 and the final cost for all the building and construction work was £27,000. This was a small fortune at that time in history. The open night saw the pier lit up with 3,000 light bulbs on the steel arches, which still can be seen today by the Palm Court and the fish and chip restaurant.

In 1905 it was thought that the pier would benefit from having some amusements machines installed on it. The amusements became a great success and put Brighton on the map for being the first to have the latest video games and amusements. The pier was the first place in England to have the video game Space Invaders in stalled. This was back in the eighties. After the amusements came the idea to build a concert hall. The hall open in 1907 and by 1911 it had become a theatre, which was a big success. Over the years Brighton Palace Pier has developed by introducing all sorts of entertainment. There was a bandstand that stage free concerts throughout the summer months. The theatre hall brought to Brighton a wealth of stars including Dick Emery, Tommy Trinder and Doris &Elsie Waters throughout the summer months. They all played at the theatre well into the late 1970's.

These days the pier is still a great place to go and visit. On a warm summer day with a gentle breeze or on a warm summers evening. The pier with its fun fair, arcades and restaurants as become a great British tradition. Just to go and walk along the pier admiring the view and taking in that lovely clean fresh sea air. A chance to get away from hustle and bustle of the city life and do something different for a change. If you have the chance to visit Brighton I highly recommender to visit the Palace Pier.