Late Twentieth Century Torquay: decline and renewal
Not everyone had a great holiday experience in post-war Torquay. Some complained about crowded roads, unreliable trains, unpredictable weather, low-quality...
Invaders, raiders, and pirates: Torbay under attack
Today Torbay is viewed as a place of peaceful seagoing recreation, and we often see our three towns as the...
Fun with flags in Devon and Torbay
“A garish flag, to be the aim of every dangerous shot” William ShakespeareWhen a Torquay town centre pub was having...
Torquay’s Almost Opera House
Torquay wanted an opera house. Torquay deserved an opera house.We were the richest town in England, the leisure epicentre of...
Continental Influences: The Torquay Suntan
“Some were in the sea, some were lying stretched out in the sun, and some were anointing themselves carefully with...
Torquay’s Lav Affair with the Public Toilet
Public toilet, lavatory, bog, public convenience, khazi, loo, the ladies and gents, the water closet, and other, less polite, or...
Torquay’s 170 Pubs & Clubs
Torquay’s pubs and clubs were never just places to drink. They were social centres, the focus of community life and...
The Devil and his Dogs at Daddyhole
“The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist”, Charles Baudelaire (1864)Not far from Torquay...
How Torquay Votes
On 4 July 2024 Liberal Democrat Steve Darling was elected as Member of Parliament for Torbay. This was an atypical...
“Moral pollution needs a solution”: Torquay’s Culture Wars
During the ‘Swinging Sixties’ Torquay found itself in the frontlines of a series of culture wars.These were debates between groups...
Fear the Workhouse
During the course of the nineteenth century Torquay grew to become the richest town in Britain. Many millionaires lived or...
Torquay’s Comedy Heritage
“I think of Torquay as being the home of British comedy. The first time I saw Bruce Forsyth was in...
Fighting Boney: Torbay’s Pressed Men
During the wars against Napoleon the residents of Torbay could be forced into joining the Royal Navy.It wasn’t always...
Torquay Cemetery. A garden town for the dead
Torquay’s burial grounds change as the town changes.As Torquay developed during the nineteenth century, the town’s traditional burial grounds of...
The Fleet: Mother of Torquay
The Fleete Mill in 1793 by Reverend JB Swete: just about where WH Smiths now isBehind Torquay harbour two...
Italian villas, French apartment blocks & Spanish haciendas: Torquay’s Property Patchwork
Vane Tower on the skyline above the harbourside In a ten-minute drive around Torquay, you can pass nineteenth and twentieth...
Searching for a mermaid’s tears on a Torbay beach
"Old ladies in wheelchairs with blankets over their legs, I don’t think so… they’re retired mermaids”, Milton Jones Mermaids have...
Why Torquay doesn’t have a pier
Paignton has a pier; Teignmouth has a pier. But Torquay does not.We do, of course, have Haldon Pier, built in...
Torquay’s Pubs: an imbibing evolution
Back in 1774 an Exeter printer by the name of Andrew Brice journeyed to the coast and found that “Tor...
Towards a Torbay of many faiths and of none
On the 6th of November 1914 a headline in the Western Times read, ‘Col. Burn’s Late Son: Torquay’s Expression of...
