Pub with longest name in UK reopens next to pub with shortest

It might not trip off the tongue after a pint or two but punters in Stalybridge, Greater Manchester, can now choose to drink in the pub with the country’s longest name – and then pop two doors down to the pub with the shortest.

The Old Thirteenth Cheshire Astley Volunteer Rifleman Corps Inn has reopened after closing three years ago. Referred to by locals as the Rifleman for short, it received a Guinness World Record for the public house with the longest name in the UK and a blue plaque from Tameside council in 1995.

When Nigel Baxter decided to set up a pub in the town to run with his wife, Sarah Farrer-Baxter, they were offered the use of the 55-letter name by the Rifleman’s previous owners and jumped at the chance.

Farrer-Baxter told the Guardian: “It’s a massive honour to take on the name, so it’s not lost forever.”

She said their enthusiasm was dampened a little when they commissioned a new sign for the pub and realised they would be charged by the letter. “The invoice did come as a bit of a shock. It was worth it, though – that’s what you get for having the longest name.”

It had appeared in the record books under slightly varying names in previous years but was edged out by the Ferret and Firkin in a Balloon Up the Creek, and the London, Chatham and Dover Railway Tavern, both in London.

Farrer-Baxter said: “The Rifleman is such an important part of this town’s history so everyone was gutted when it closed down. Now the name can live on, which I think is something all the locals can be proud of.

“It might seem like quite a small thing but the Rifleman really puts Stalybridge on the map.”

The pub is just two doors down from the Q Inn, opened in Stalybridge in the late 1980s, according to Paul Armstrong, who manages it with his wife.

He said: “Lots of people who come in talk about us having the shortest name. It’s really good that the Rifleman has reopened just 50 yards away. It’s a nice gimmick.”

Farrer-Baxter added: “The fact we’re so close to the Q Inn is such an amazing coincidence. They had also closed and reopened so that we’ve ended up next door but one is bizarre.”

She said she planned to contact Guinness World Records to have the entry updated with the pub’s new address.