1.  The famous racehorse Brown Jack made his debut on the race-course at Ensbury Park, Bournemouth in 1927 when he came third in a 11/2 mile hurdle race.

2.  In 1937 Bournemouth had the world's largest indoor bowling green (now the Winter Gardens) and the world's largest municipal orchestra when its playing strength reached 81.

3.  Bournemouth was the scene of the first fatal flying accident involving a powered aircraft when the Hon Charles S Rolls crashed at the International Aviation Meeting held at Southbourne in 1910.

4.  The Westover Ice Rink in Bournemouth was the scene of the first Professional Ice Show in 1933.  It was also the location where later world champion boxer Freddie Mills fought his earliest bouts.

5.  Bournemouth hosted the first Schneider Trophy Air Race to be held in Great Britain in 1919.

6.  Bournemouth has its own 'Thirty-Nine Steps' - in St Peter's Churchyard.  This number, selected by Bournemouth's first vicar, represents the number of Articles of Faith in the Church of England Prayer Book.

7.  Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) built a love-nest for his mistress Lillie Langtry in Bournemouth in 1877.  It is now the Langtry Manor Hotel.

8.  The Shelley Tomb in St Peter's Churchyard contains the ashes of the heart of the famous poet Percy Bysshe Shelley who was cremated abroad in 1822.

9.  Winston Churchill fell off a rustic bridge in Alum Chine in 1892, when he was 18, while playing with his cousins. He remained unconscious for three days.

10.  Robert Louis Stevenson wrote both "Kidnapped" and "The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde" while living in Bournemouth in 1886.

11.  The first ever Paid Wireless Telegraphy Message (Marconi, 1898) was transmitted from the Isle of Wight and received in Bournemouth.

12.  Ken Baily, best known as a former England cheer-leader in his Union Jack suit, lived in Bournemouth from about 1926 until his death in 1993.  For many years he was listed in the "Guinness Book of Records" for non-stop long distance running in 1939 when he ran around the decks of the liner Queen Mary as it crossed from Southampton to New York.

13.  Well-known people born in Bournemouth include Sir Hubert Parry the composer, Freddie Mills the boxer, Virginia Wade the tennis player and Anthony Blunt the art expert and Russian spy.

14.  Harry Gordon Selfridge, the department store owner, once planned to build "the largest castle in the world" on Hengistbury Head.

15.  Footballer George Best played for AFC Bournemouth in 1983 on the five occasions that he managed to turn up.