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St Helens is a town in the metropolitan county of Merseyside in North-West England, and within the historic borders of Lancashire. It gives its name to the metropolitan borough of St Helens, and is the largest town within it. The population of the town is 102,629 and that of the larger metropolitan borough 176,843.

Geography

The St Helens Borough covers roughly 30 sq/km over an area of soft rolling hills used primarily for agricultural purposes, mainly pastoral. The highest point in the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens is Billinge Hill, 3.75 miles north from the town centre. The town is landlocked with a stream running through, Mill Brook/Windle Brook running through Eccleston and connecting with the (disused) St.Helens Branch/Section of the Sankey Canal in the town centre. St Helens is around 160 feet above sea level.

History

As late as the start of the 19th century, St Helens did not exist. It was formed from the townships of Eccleston, Windle, Parr and Sutton, townships of the parish of Prescot which became civil parishes on their own in 1866.

St Helens takes its name from St Helen's Parish Church in Hardshaw, within Windle. The parish church was rebuilt in 1816 and rededicated to St Mary. However, after the church was rebuilt between 1916 and 1926 following a fire, the dedication returned to the historic "St Helen, St Helens".

The town was built both physically and metaphorically on coal: the original motto on the borough coat of arms was "Ex Terra Lucem" and local collieries employed up to 5,000 men as late as the 1970s, whilst during the boom years of the British coal industry (1913 being the peak year of production with 1 million employed in UK mining) the St.Helens division of the Lancashire and Cheshire Miners' Federation (the local miners' union) had the largest membership (10%) of that federation. Owing primarily to the abundance of winnable coal reserves, the quality of local sand, the near availability of Cheshire salt and the transport revolution -- first the Sankey Canal and then the railways from 1830 onwards -- a glass and chemical industry was established in St Helens. The Sankey Canal was opened in 1757 to transport coal from the pits in Haydock and Parr to the River Mersey. An extension to the canal (the St.Helens section) was made in 1775 linking the canal to St.Helens. In the 1830s, the St Helens and Runcorn Gap Railway was built for the same purpose.

In 1868, St Helens was incorporated as a borough, and was then made a county borough in 1889. The town hall was built between 1872 and 1876. Its clock tower originally had a steeple but this was destroyed in a fire in 1913. In the centre of the modern town centre, adjacent to the town hall, is the Gamble Building, built in 1896 and named after Sir David Gamble, who was the first mayor and who also gifted the land for the building. Today, the Gamble Building serves as the central library and also houses other municipal offices and archives. Other buildings of note are the Friends' Meeting House, the Beecham Clock Tower - which is now part of St Helens College - and St Mary's Lowe House Catholic Church. The town, and old county borough, included the suburbs of Clock Face, Sutton and part of Windle. In 1974, under the provisions of the Local Government Act 1972, St Helens became the centre of the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens in the newly created Merseyside Metropolitan county.

A major point of debate in St Helens continues to centre around the town's true place within national county boundaries. Many of the town's residents, point towards its Lancashire heritage and argue that Merseyside, introduced in 1974, refers only to the administrative needs of the town. Some argue that local government reforms in 1974 were repealed in 1986, when Merseyside County Council was abolished, or that St Helens has always remained part of Lancashire.

The glass industry is no longer the major employer it once was, however it still employs over a thousand people in the town. The large Pilkington Brothers works dominates the town's industrial quarter although major investment is currently transforming the quarter into a retail and communications hub with former industrial land being reclaimed for use as hotels, shopping areas and housing. The many coal mines on the outlying districts of St.Helens, (most of which were closed before St.Helens borough was created and were, therefore, never in St.Helens) including Clock Face, Ravenhead, Sutton Manor, Bold, Wood Pit (Haydock), Lyme Pit(Haydock), Old Boston(Haydock) and Lea Green, were closed between the 1950s and early 1990s. The last colliery in the modern Metropolitan Borough and in the St.Helens area of the South Lancashire Coalfield, was Parkside, in Newton le Willows, and was closed in 1992.

Transport

Road

St Helens lies in close proximity to the motorway network with the M6 running a few miles to the eastern side of the town, with Junction 23 at Haydock. The M62 runs a couple of miles to the south of the town with Junction 7 at Rainhill Stoops. The M57's Junction 2 lies several miles east of St.Helens, at Prescot. The M58 is several miles north of St.Helens. The A580 East Lancashire Road runs north of the town centre alongside Eccleston, Moss Bank and Haydock. It is a former trunk road taking traffic from Manchester to the Liverpool Docks. It was built between 1929 and 1934 and was opened by King George V. It was intended to take pressure away from the A58, a major road running from Prescot (M57) through St.Helens to the M1 at Weatherby, Yorkshire. The Rainford By-Pass A570 is the transport route from Southport and west Lancashire through St Helens and the M62 at Rainhill Stoops. A major development in communication was the opening of the St Helens Linkway (classified as part of the A570) in 1994, which linked the town directly with the M62 and, by proxy, an alternative connection to the M6. The A572 takes traffic from the town centre through Parr to Earlstown and Newton-le-Willows.

Rail

Rail is a growing means of transport in the borough. St Helens Central serves as the town's main railway station, which lies on the Wigan to Liverpool line. Other stations on this line in the town are Thatto Heath and Eccleston Park. The Liverpool to Manchester line serves St Helens at Rainhill, St Helens Junction railway station and Lea Green which was opened in 2000 in order to bring people away from the now dilapidated St Helens Junction Station. St Helens Central is currently undergoing redevelopment at a cost of £6 million, which the Council argues will encourage investment, create more jobs and improve the gateway into the town.

Air and sea

St Helens has no airport. The nearest airport is Liverpool John Lennon Airport, about 12 miles (19 km) south-west of the town, and is connected with a direct bus service. Manchester Airport is approximately 25 miles (40 km) away. St Helens is a landlocked borough, but with easy access to the ports of Liverpool and those on the River Mersey and River Dee. The St Helens Canal is no longer used for transporting goods.

Religion and ethnicity

Christianity is the main religion in St Helens, being about 87% according to the 2001 census. This makes St Helens the "most Christian town in Britain".. There is a very small ethnic minority in St Helens and one of the lowest in the country with 98.8% British white.

Education

Primary Schools

The Borough of St Helens has one nursery school, one infant school, one junior school and fifty two primary schools. There are three special schools; Mill Green, Lansbury Bridge and Penketh. Performance in the Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 SATs has been consistently above national averages over the past 5 years.

Secondary Schools

The Borough of St Helens has eleven secondary schools. These are Cowley Hard Lane Site, Cowley Broadway Site, De La Salle, St Augustine's, St Aelred's, Newton, Haydock, Sutton, Rainhill, Rainford and St Cuthbert's.

Further education

The town has seven sixth form colleges in Cowley Language College, Rainford High, Rainhill High, St Alred's High, Sutton High, Carmel College and St Helens College. Carmel College is a leading college in the country with a value added score of 328. The college forms part with the University of Liverpool. St Helens College offers a great variety of courses mainly AVCEs and GNVQs in specialised subjects and it has a growing reputation for its standards and its improving grades. There is no university in St Helens; locals who stay in the area and go to university often take advantage of the surrounding universities such as Edge Hill (Ormskirk), Liverpool, Manchester and Chester.

Media

St Helens has no television or radio broadcasters. However 102.4 Wish FM gives the second part of its name (sh) to St Helens while the first half goes to Wigan (Wi), where it is based. There are two local weekly newspapers which are freely distributed. These are the St Helens Star and the St Helens Reporter.

St Helens College has previously broadcasted temporary, limited service radio broadcasts from their Town Centre Campus, headed by the late Paul Dempsey, who previously worked as a presenter on BBC Radio.

Tourism, entertainment & investment

The past 20 years have seen major redevelopments in the town centre. This has included mass pedestrianisation of much of shopping area, with traffic being directed around the town centre on existing roads. The principal theatre is the Theatre Royal, which has been recently renovated externally with a modern glass exterior, however it has failed to have internal refurbishment and is known locally as the 'grott hole'. It has a large capacity and stages many performances, including comedy, music, drama and pantomime, although its reputation as a theatre has diminished slightly over recent years with few top theatre groups chosing the theatre to perform in. The highly acclaimed Citadel Arts Theatre is a smaller theatre on Waterloo Street and is open more to alternative music and the arts. It has only a small capacity.

The principal hotel is the four star Hilton Hotel, built during a massive period of commercial augmentation in the town during the mid-1990s. Other large hotels are the Holiday Inn, Travelodge and Thistle Hotel in Haydock. There are numerous smaller hotels, inns and B&Bs across the borough. The World of Glass Museum, which opened in 2000, incorporating the Pilkington Glass Museum, has received many awards including North West Attraction of the Year. The St Helens Canal (1845), originally the Sankey Canal, (opened in 1757), has been cleaned up in recent years and has become a habitat for aquatic plants, marine life and birds. The St Helens Transport Museum on Hall Street, which opened in 1980 but closed in 2000 due to massive underinvestment, is currently undergoing a multi-million pound redevelopment, including a more modern exterior.

The George Street Quarter regeneration programme left an impressive stamp on the town. The George Street area receives foot traffic from the railway station so the area was enhanced to leave a positive impression on tourists. Major improvements were made to building exteriors, parking, security, street furniture and paving. This has attracted several new businesses to the quarter including award-winning restaurants. The surrounding areas are now receiving attention, with the Hardshaw Centre receiving a new car park exit stairway into the George Street quarter. The stairway spirals around a tall needle-like structure and is named 'The Needle'. However this new and modern looking stairway is in stark contrast to the brown, square and brick built 'Hardshaw' Centre. The main shopping areas, Church Street and Church Square, are currently undergoing extensive regeneration and there is a proposal for Duke Street, which extends into the town centre, to also receive funding. The main problem in St.Helens has been the virtual elimination of all the old buildings in the 1960s and 1970s, leaving the town with a large selection of grey, square blots and few traditional buildings. It is due to its 'fragmented' town centre, the results of years of poor planning in the 1960s - 1980s that it is not as well appreciated as the neighbouring towns of Wigan and Warrington. The current council is working hard to solve these problems with good results.

Traditionaly, the town is known for its social clubs, mainly connected with The Labour Party and the Roman Catholic Church. In recent years, the boom in Britain's 'binge drinking' culture in the mid 1990s has fuelled the nightlife industry over the past 10 years. The town centre has exploded over this time with many new or relaunched drinking establishments. Many of the new bars and pubs are centred around the Bridge Street area of the town centre. Although several bars have licences to serve alcohol until 2am, the town still only has one major nightclub which is notorious for attracting younger revellers. A second nightclub was planned for Bridge Street, with building work being completed for the end of 2002, but it has remained closed since completion due to a number of financial and licensing problems. The building has been up for sale for many months but with no buyer as yet.

There are several restaurants in the town centre with an increasingly mixed cuisine on offer. A local newspaper, The St Helens Reporter, awarded its 2005 'Restaurant of the Year' prize to The Griffin Inn, Eccleston.

Sport

St Helens Rugby League Club's (St Helens RLFC) stadium is located in Eccleston in Dunriding Lane/Knowsley Road's residential area. During the summer, the 100 year-old stadium received thousands of fans from St Helens and England's other rugby towns, although it faces an uncertain future with rumours rife that the rugby league club intends to build a new stadium on the edge of the town with better transport links and parking facilities. The club has won the Challenge Cup ten times and has played in many finals. The club was crowned World Club Champions in 2001. In 2006 the club has won all three major honours in the game, the Challenge Cup, League Leaders Shield and the Grand Final. Other honours won by the club this year include, Daniel Anderson Coach of the Year, Paul Wellens Man of Steel and Players' Player and James Graham Young Player of the Year. In December 2006 St Helens were awarded with the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Team Award at the Annual BBC Sports Personality of the Year Ceremony, this accolade recognises the best team in any sport within the United Kingdom. At the same ceremony Daniel Anderson was given the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Coach Award - this was the first time a rugby league coach had won the award.

St Helens Town FC is an English football club, currently playing in the first division of the North West Counties Football League. The club, based in St. Helens, play their home games at Knowsley Road, the home of St Helens RLFC, the town's rugby league club.

The town also has its own amateur football league, the St Helens Combination which has been running since the 1917/18 season.

Retail

The town's shopping area is centred on the parish church around which Church Square was built in the early 1970s. Church Street, the main shopping street, runs parallel to Church Square. Three indoor shopping centres meet at Church Square: the LaGrange Arcade, St Mary's Arcade and the Hardshaw Centre. Other main shopping streets include Bridge Street, Westfield Street and Duke Street. Until approximately ten years ago St Helens was criticised by residents for not attracting major chain stores; however recent growth and investment in the town has bucked this trend with many chain stores now unable to find suitable premises. St Helens has two retail parks, one on either side of the St Helens Linkway. The older of these, St Helens Retail Park, is home to discount stores and wholesale retailers, while Ravenhead Retail Park houses more mainstream retail stores, such as Currys and Next.

Notable people

.... People who were either born or brought up in St.Helens, or have had some significant connection with the town during their life, include:

• Former professional rugby league player, Alex Murphy
• Ex boxer, model and Hollywood actor Gary Stretch (Alexander, Dead Man's Shoes, World Trade Centre)
• One-time Beautiful South vocalist Jacqui Abbott
• Thomas Beecham, founded, in St.Helens, what was to become, the world's largest pharmaceutical producer, Beechams.
• Conductor Sir Thomas Beecham, the son of the aforementioned Thomas Beecham.
• Glamour model Louise Glover
• The Loungs
• Rock guitarist Nick McCabe of The Verve
• Hollywood character actor Herbert Mundin
• Hollyoaks actress Emma Rigby
• Philanthropist John Rylands
• Fitness guru Richard Simmons
• Richard Seddon went on to become Prime Minister of New Zealand
• Comedian and actor James Seddon
• Comedian and actor Stephen Johnston
• Comedian and actor, Johnny Vegas
• 1950's theatre actor Paul Walsh
• Artist Jim Manley
• Motorbike racer Geoff Duke
• Sound film pioneer George Groves
• Comedian Bernie Clifton
• Businessman and philanthropist Michael Smurfit
• Ex-professional footballer and Manchester City striker Gary Owen
• Manchester United footballer Phil Marsh
• Professional rugby league player Paul Wellens
• Real life urban legend Purple Aki
• Harold Dacre Robinson Lowe (1886-1952) had dinosaur Monoclonius lowei named after him by CM Sternberg in 1940.

Trivia

• A famous Punch cartoon had Napoleon lamenting, "Oh, no! I've been banished to St Helens!" This was a pun on St. Helena, the South Atlantic island to which Napolean was exiled.

• The local football team St Helens Town FC currently reside in the North West Counties League. However, St Helens Rugby League Club is a very successful team in Super League and was crowned World Club Champions in 2001.

• Residents of St Helens are known variously as "St.Helens People", "St Helensers" or "Sintelleners" or, at times derisively by some residents of the neighbouring city of Liverpool, as "Woolybacks", though this term generally refers to all natives of the Lancashire hinterland of that city.

External links

• St Helens Council
• St Helens CHAT - The first original and most popular interactive St Helens site which includes, local history, family history, SAINTS Rugby, St Helens Dating, 24 local forums, personal image galleries, St Helens image galleries (old and new) ex-pats forums and contacts, St Helens Shopping Online, Local News and loads of other features * St Helens - Historical information
• St Helens Connect - A useful site for St Helens genealogy, with census transcriptions, historical trade directory extracts, church records, community forums, wiki, games arcade and more.
• St Helens Celebrity News - popular local news site.
• Inward Investment
• Windle Parish Council - St Helens Parish of Windle.
• Sutton Beauty - A photographic appreciation of the Sutton district of St Helens.
• St. Helens RLFC home page

• Towns in Merseyside
• Towns and villages in St Helens
• St Helens, Merseyside