Things you didn't know about... Suffolk

Getting in a pickle

The headquarters of Branston pickle is in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk. A fire at the factory in 2004 threatened pickle supplies to the nation, sparking panic-buying and emergency eBay trading. Happily, Suffolk's finest chutney was quickly back in business.

Reality TV show Space Cadets was filmed in Suffolk...

Although the participants thought they were in Russia to begin with, and then outer space, they actually never left the UK.

Suffolk has finally got a university

University Campus Suffolk, which only started to take in students from September 2007, is a joint venture between the University of Essex and the University of East Anglia, with the main campus in Ipswich.

Suffolk in the picture

The Stour Valley in Suffolk is known as Constable Country after the painter John Constable, who painted many of his best-loved works in the area.

The aliens are coming!

Britain's most famous UFO sighting occurred in Rendlesham Forest in Suffolk. In December 1980, airmen from the nearby US airbase reported flashing lights; some said they saw a conical metallic object hovering above the ground. Rumours that aliens had landed in Suffolk continued for years until, in 2001, the Government published its file on the incident. Sadly, no evidence was found to support the theory.

Suffolk saw the Italians off

Suffolk was on the receiving end of the first and only air raid on Britain by Italian bombers during World War II. The town of Felixstowe suffered a hit, but reports show that Mussolini's men were no match for the RAF with several Italian planes shot down. They never tried again.

Suffolk inspired one off our greatest writers

The River Orwell, which runs through Suffolk, was the inspiration for Eric Arthur Blair's choice of pseudonym: George Orwell. The author of Animal Farm, 1984 and Down and Out in Paris and London lived in Suffolk during the 1930s, and often crossed the river on his famous tramps into the poorer parts of the countryside.

The world's first manufactured lawnmower was built in Suffolk

It was built in 1832 by Ransomes of Ipswich—and 70 years later the Suffolk-based company produced another first: the world's first petrol lawnmower. Today they remain the world's biggest manufacturer of lawn-mowing equipment.