11 QUIRKY RANDOM FACTS YOU MIGHT NOT KNOW ABOUT NOTTINGHAM

Everybody knows about the legend of Robin Hood, the beginning of Boots, and the cave network in Nottingham. You certainly should if you live here.

But aside from these well known stories, we love a bit of trivia about our fair city and the wider country. And there's some pretty weird and wonderful connections out there.

We've rounded up some of them - you never know they could come in handy one day at a pub quiz.

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From West Leake to West End

The Pet Shop Boys' first hit West End Girls was one of the most memorable songs of the 80s. But did you know Neil Tennant came up with the opening lyrics while staying with his cousins in West Leake in 1983?

He'd watched a gangster film starring James Cagney and was about to go to sleep when he came up with the lines "Sometimes you're better off dead, there's a gun in your hand and it's pointing at your head."

He turned the light on and wrote down the lyrics. On his return to London, he went with it... and ended up with a massive hit. The song is about class and inner-city pressure. Tennant once said that some listeners thought the song was about prostitutes, but was actually about rough East End boys getting together with posh West End girls.

The song was performed at Splendour, Nottingham's biggest music festival, in 2010 - and no doubt he'll be singing it when the duo hit the stage at Motorpoint Arena this June.

Elton John's cousin once played for Nottingham Forest

Long before Elton had hits with Rocket Man and Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, a relative was playing football for the Reds. Roy Dwight was the cousin of Elton, whose real name is Reginald Dwight.

Roy moved on to Nottingham Forest in the summer of 1958 for a 'substantial' fee, reported to be £10,000. Dwight was a member of Forest's FA Cup winning team in 1959, scoring the first goal after ten minutes. But then disaster struck in the game against Luton Town when he broke his leg after a tackle with Luton's Brendan McNally.

He watched the victorious side as they paraded the cup around the stadium from his hospital bed. Roy and fellow players returned to the City Ground in 2002 to receive a photograph of the winning side.

Introduction of celery

Newdigate House, now part of Nottingham's fine dining restaurant World Service, is where 18th century French aristocrat and military commander, Camille d'Hostun de la Baume, duc de Tallard, became a POW after the battle of Blenheim. Rather than being imprisoned, he paid 50 shillings a week to rent a room at the grand house in Castle Gate and on parole, was able roam freely around the area

Tallard, who brought his own chef to Nottingham, wrote a cookbook to show locals how to bake French breads and pastries. The 52-year-old is also reported to have taught the women of the house how to make salads, which were unknown in Britain at that time.

He is credited with introducing celery to Britain during his stay in Nottingham. While out riding in Lenton he spotted wild celery growing in the marshes. It appeared to have been used as a medicine, as an aphrodisiac and a cure for hangovers (though there is no proof that it worked at all) but he recognised it and appreciated how it could be eaten as a food as it had been in his native France.

He cultivated it in the garden at Newdigate House, using methods not seen before in this country. Today, the restaurant's dining rooms are named after him and the war that brought him to the UK. The house cocktail, the Field Marshal - created with rum, pineapple, Sauvignon Blanc - is also inspired by his discovery, and uses celery as a secret ingredient.

Lady Bay Bridge

Lady Bay Bridge spans the River Trent and connects the main Radcliffe Road in the south, to Meadow Lane, in the north. But in 1982 it took on a new persona as an Eastern Bloc railway crossing in the television series Smiley’s People. The series starring Sir Alec Guinness and based on the novel by John le Carre.

Originally, the bridge was the rail crossing for the Midland Railway from Melton Mowbray to Nottingham Station. When the line was abandoned in 1968, plans were made to convert the river crossing and relieve pressure on Trent Bridge, with work completed in the early 80s.

The Whomobile

The futuristic vehicle which appeared in Doctor Who was designed and built in Nottingham in 1973 by Peter Farries, the chairman of the Nottingham Drag and Custom Club.

The third doctor Jon Pertwee asked him to design a custom-built car that would suit his futuristic character - the result was a jet-propelled cross between a racing car and a hovercraft, that was capable of flying. It took six months to make and was even legally roadworthy.

In the script it was described as 'the Alien' but Pertwee dubbed it the Whomobile in his memoir. It measured 14ft long and 7ft wide. To create the illusion that it was a hovercraft, an 8in rubber skirt hid the wheels. It could reach a speed of around 100mph and was classified as an "invalid tricycle."

The Whomobile first appeared in Invasion of the Dinosaurs and make its second and last appearance in Planet of the Spiders.

Sonic Screwdriver magazine writer Andrew Dean said he'd heard rumours that Pertwee wanted to be buried in the Whomobile but since the futuristic silver finish had faded to a poor shade of yellow at the time of his death it was decided it would be unfitting for the star.

Bull in a barber's shop

Not a bull in a china shop, but a bull in a barber's shop made headlines in the 19th century. The bullock was being led to slaughter but managed to escape on a Nottingham street and careered straight through the glass window of the barber's shop, dragging the youth in charge with it.

The animal headed for a chair, in which a customers was being shaved and flung both the man and chair into a corner of the room. He suffered severe head injuries. The boy lathering him was tossed into another corner.

The bullock smashed everything in the shop before being captured. The headline in the Illustrated Police News read 'Startling scene in a Nottingham barber's."

World's longest running play

Nottingham's Theatre Royal staged the premiere for Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap in 1952, which went on to become the world's longest running play. On the opening night the crime writer sat in one of the boxes and watched the audience instead of the play.

After that she called it her "lucky theatre." The Mousetrap was expected to run for a week. In 2022 to mark the 70th anniversary, the play returned to the theatre where it first began. As of November 2022, there had been 28,915 performances.

First out of town supermarket

West Bridgford was the location for Britain's first major out of town supermarket. The store, which opened in Loughborough Road, in 1964 was called GEM.

It pioneered an American concept of one-stop shopping, where a vast range of goods were available under one roof. The acronym stood for Government Employees Mart and was aimed at helping busy American civil servants get their shopping done quickly, and cheaply, and then get back to work.

Built and stocked in just 10 weeks, the 110,000 sq ft store was described as a “long windowless box.” Around 30,000 people turned up on opening day. British Pathè News sent a film crew and accompanied the newsreel with a commentary that today would be condemned as sexist, suggesting that women could do their shopping in the morning, with husbands following them round to pay the bills... and then go off to the cinema in the afternoon. In 1999, GEM was replaced by Asda.

Poultry aka Cuckstool Row

Poultry flanks Nottingham Council House - the street on the right. If that seems a peculiar name, it used to be called Cuckstool Row, as it was there a ducking stool was kept. The old-fashioned form of punishment was used to duck women in water who were "scolds" - a woman who made a public nuisance of herself by being noisy, quarrelsome or abusive.

History has it that the ducking stool had been out of action after pressure from locals who branded it demeaning. However, according to Nottingham Hidden History Team, a dignitary decided that a notorious scold needed teaching a lesson.

During the ducking the stool broke, due to lack of maintenance, and the woman drowned. This led to the authorities ordering the destruction and burning of the stool and the filling in of the pond. The thoroughfare went on to be renamed Poultry.

Little John

London has Big Ben - here in Nottingham we have Little John, the Council House bell that chimes every quarter of an hour resonating across Old Market Square and beyond. The bell is said to be the fifth heaviest in the UK at 10.5 tonnes, has the deepest tone in the country, and on a clear day it can be heard up to seven miles away in the Trent valley.

The bell was cast by the world-famous bell founders John Taylor & Co of Loughborough in 1927.

Jane Birkin

Nottingham is home to the Birkin building, in Broadway, which was once the international headquarters of the world-famous lace manufacturers Birkin & Co. But did you know that singer Jane Birkin, who died last year, was the great, great, great granddaughter of the founder Richard Birkin.

Jane, an iconic actress and singer who duetted with Serge Gainsbourg on the controversial 1969 song Je t'aime... moi non plus, frequently visited the building as a child.

2024-01-07T08:43:52Z dg43tfdfdgfd