Gateshead · Town
Blaydon
The town immortalised by Tyneside's unofficial anthem — and, less famously, a hard-working stretch of the Tyne's industrial south bank.
The race that became a song
On 9 June 1862, a horse race on an island in the Tyne near Blaydon inspired local music-hall performer Geordie Ridley to write "The Blaydon Races," first performed just days earlier at Balmbra's Music Hall in Newcastle's Cloth Market. Its comic account of the journey out from Newcastle along Scotswood Road became — and remains — one of the best-loved songs in North East England, still sung today at Newcastle United matches and regional gatherings alike.
The horse races that inspired “The Blaydon Races” ended for good in 1916 — but the song outlived them by well over a century, and a modern road race has retraced the route every June since 1981.
An industrial town in its own right
Long before and after the song, Blaydon was a working town on the Tyne's south bank, home to ironworks and chemical works through the 19th and 20th centuries — part of the dense industrial corridor running from Newcastle out through Gateshead's western edge.
Blaydon today
The original horse races ended for good in 1916, but a modern road race, founded in 1981, retraces the route described in Ridley's song every June. Blaydon itself remains a residential and industrial community within the Gateshead borough.
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Quick facts
- Borough
- Gateshead
- Historic county
- County Durham
- River
- Tyne (south bank)
- Known for
- "The Blaydon Races" song