Modern Travel | Rise Of The Seaside | 3

Who decided that the sea — cold, dangerous and full of smugglers — was somewhere you went for fun?

What kind of doctor prescribes plunging into the Channel naked in the dead of winter, and then drinking it?

And how did the towns Britain built to enjoy itself end up among the most deprived places in the country?

The holiday — the whole idea that ordinary people are owed one — starts with a Brighton doctor, a shed on wheels and an Act of Parliament, and Peter Frankopan and Afua Hirsch follow it from there to the boarded-up promenades of the present.

Dr Richard Russell published a book in the 1750s arguing that seawater cured everything from scrofula to melancholy, and that you ought to drink it by the pint, with milk or port to take the edge off. The elites followed him to a fishing village called Brighthelmstone, the Prince Regent built a pleasure palace there, and once the railways arrived the whole thing belonged to everybody. Then cheap flights took it away again. What the Victorians left behind is a coastline of magnificent architecture standing in some of the poorest wards in England — and, lately, the first signs of something coming back.

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[0:00] From the Grand Tour to the stick of rock — the moment travel stopped belonging to the rich

[8:52] Before the deckchairs: smugglers, pirates and a coastline you kept well away from

[9:51] Dr Richard Russell, the eighteenth-century wellness influencer who told Britain to drink the sea

[13:17] Peter jumps into the Antarctic in his swimming trunks, shamed into it by a woman in her eighties

[17:57] The steam train, the Bank Holidays Act, and the week the mills shut down

[20:53] The bathing machine: a shed, a horse, and a strong local person to dunk you

[29:54] Clacton, Jaywick, and what happened to the towns Britain built to enjoy itself

[35:09] Margate, Dreamland, and whether hipsters can fix a structural problem

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Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas:

Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com

Join Legacy+ for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more.

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Stay connected with Legacy:

Instagram: @originallegacypodcast

TikTok: @legacy_productions

Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com

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