Did You Know?

Stafford is the county town of Staffordshire, in the West Midlands of England. It lies approximately 16 miles (26 km) north of Wolverhampton, 18 miles (29 km) south of Stoke-on-Trent and 24 miles (39 km) north-west of Birmingham. The population in 2001 was 63,681.

Founded by Aethelflaed, daughter of Alfred the Great, the town had its own mint from the reign of Aethelstan to that of Henry II.

The co-founder of Marks & Spencer, Thomas Spencer, is buried in St Giles Church, in Stafford. Originally a casher in the 1880s, Spencer joined forces with Michael Marks to form the now household name, at an investment cost of £300 each.

Staffordshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands of England. It adjoins Cheshire to the north west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the south east, West Midlands and Worcestershire to the south, and Shropshire to the west.

Stafford is home to the centre point of British brewing - Burton. With so much brewing going on in the town, there is inevitably going to be a lot of by-products generated as a result - with one of the more famous being yeast extract which if you hail from Burton you know is used to create the brown nectar - Marmite.

Stafford means 'ford' by a 'staithe' (landing place). The original settlement was on dry sand and gravel peninsula that provided a strategic crossing point in the marshy valley of the River Sow, a tributary of the River Trent. 

It is thought Stafford was founded in about 700 AD by a Mercian prince called Bertelin who, according to legend, established a hermitage on the peninsula named Betheney or Bethnei. 

Stafford boasts a whole plethora of famous faces to have come from the area. Staffs celebs range across sports stars, those from the world of politics, entertainment and the business world. Fellow entertainer, Neil Morrissey also hails from Staffordshire, as he was born in 1962. He is best known for his roles as Tony in TV sitcom Men Behaving Badly, Eddie Lawson in Waterloo Road and Nigel Morton in Line of Duty.

William Painter was an 1800s inventor who patented 85 inventions, including the bottle cap & bottle opener (that's why our Hook sunglasses can open bottles). His industry-disrupting innovations inspired us to go rogue and never settle.