A history of the Eagle & Child, Bispham Green

There has probably been a hostelry on the site of the Eagle and Child since at least the early 18th century with a brewery and maltkiln (Maltkiln Lane) on the site of the car park.

As part of the Derby estate (the Eagle & Child is the Derby crest) it was much improved in the 1820’s with the building of the adjacent barn and the stables attached to the main pub.

The pub was operated by Threlfalls in Liverpool and the freehold of the pub and surrounding land was purchased by them from the Derby estate. It had been significantly modernized by them in the early 1950’s – possibly on acquisition of the freehold.

In 1993, the pub was sold by Whitbread following the government legislation forcing brewers to reduce the size of their tenanted estates to the Ainscough family and Gordon Bailey for £140,000. The Gill family had been operating the pub for many years and were farm tenants. In 1995 the Ainscough family acquired the whole business and established the Bispham Green Brewery Company limited.

Planning permission was sought and work began to restore the pub and convert the adjacent stables in to a restaurant area, add a large commercial kitchen and increase the size of the car park. At this point the stone midden adjacent to the pig sties was filled in and a number of ruined sheds on the car park removed. Stone flags were put back into the bar area and beams returned to the old part of the pub, stripping out the fifties formica insertions. A new staircase was also added to link in the large upstairs function room, retaining the old staircase for service use.

In 1997 following the great success of food in the pub, the kitchen was enlarged to provide more space for preparation and storage. At the same time, the wild area of grass below the bowling green was landscaped to provide a croquet lawn and site for a marquee and a sandstone patio was created  . The pond area was also dug out and landscaped and formally adopted as wildlife habitat.

Planning permission was obtained to convert the large brick barn adjacent to the pub into a micro brewery, however, due to the imposed requirement to build a sewerage treatment plant for the brewery, it was not economical to proceed. Instead in 2008, the barn opened as a farm shop selling the organic meat produced by the Ainscough farms in Parbold, Bispham, Newburgh and Croston, together with local vegetables, cheese, deli products and wine.