Gateshead

BOOK GATESHEAD HOTELS

Rather interesting Gateshead facts

Click for places to stay in Gateshead | Today's best rates | Send in your views of Gateshead | Read visitor reports

Did you know that Daniel Defoe may have begun "Robinson Crusoe" in Gateshead? He lived in Hillgate it is thought between 1706 and 1710, and Alexander Selkirk the model for his famous castaway was rescued in 1709 .

Did you know that a house in Gateshead became the first home in the world to be lit by an electric light bulb? Joseph Wilson Swan , a chemist and inventor who lived in Gateshead, demonstrated his new device in his house in that town in 1878, receiving a patent for the incandescent bulb that same year – beating Edison by a year.

If you like this, Share it

Famous Gateshead people:

Paul Gascoigne
Steve Cram

More famous Britons here

Brit Quote:
A man who trusts nobody is apt to be the kind of man nobody trusts - Harold Macmillan
More Quotes

On this day:
Six Month Frost Begins - 1076, First Known Performance of Othello - 1604, The Tempest First Performed - 1611, Premium Bonds go on Sale - 1956, Channel 4 transmits for 1st time - 1982, BSE identified in UK - 1986
More dates from British history

click here to view all the British counties

County Pages