Glastonbury 2014: Things you never knew about the iconic Somerset music festival

Michael Eavis founded the first festival in 1970 and just 1500 people attended

People enjoythe hot weather at Glastonbury Festival (PA)

The gates opened yesterday and festival-goers continue to arrive in their thousands ahead of the first big day of music on Friday.

Glastonbury Festival is renowned around the world as a fantastic celebration of music and the arts, with many performances now considered among the greatest ever.

But what don't we know about Michael Eavis' Somerset extravaganza?

Around 3 million gallons of water are used during the festival

This staggering amount of water is used from the taps provided during the five days of the festival. Since the provided taps have used drinking water, the amount consumed has rocketed, but rum and gin consumption is probably still higher.

Free milk used to be given out

At the first ever festival in 1970, when the musical spectacular was known as Glastonbury Fayre, the £1 ticket included free milk. The debut of the festival started the day after the death of Jimi Hendrix.

There is an entire section dedicated to holistic therapies

Glastonbury is renowned for its weird and wacky areas, and this is one of them. It seems to be that music is almost becoming secondary with the masses of other entertainments and activities available, so if you fancy some alternative healing, head over to this section.

The Kinks were supposed to headline the first ever festival

Hard-core Glastonbury fans may know this, but after failing to show up in 1970 T. Rex filled in for The Kinks. Most didn’t seem to be too disappointed with this, with Marc Dolan’s performance going down in festival history.

During the festival, the same amount of electricity as the city of bath will be used

Whether it’s extravagant light shows or providing mobile phone charging points, Glastonbury uses a massive amount of electricity over the 5 days. It has been worked out that around the same amount of electricity will be used as a city the size of Bath uses in a 5 day period.

People didn’t want ‘popular’ bands

In the 1980s there was uproar among festival goers that popular bands like The Smiths shouldn’t be playing on the pyramid stage. After Morrissey’s performance in 1984, fans of the festival said that the pyramid stage isn’t about cool, mainstream acts. How things have changed.

People sit in the sunshine as the Glastonbury Festival

The first ever festival was attended by 1500 people. Now it is up to 200,000

Year on year the number of people attending Glastonbury have spiralled, reaching new heights every year. 2014 is expected to see around 200,000 people cross its gates.

The Killers left their guitarist at a service station en route to headline

On the way to Glastonbury Festival in 2005 The Killers left their guitarist Dave Keuning at a motor service station. The act wasn’t intentional and as soon as they realised they raced back to pick the stranded musician up and Keuning almost missed their set on the Pyramid Stage.

You’re not allowed to wee in the bushes

Anyone that has ever been to Glastonbury will know this, but it’s still funny that people have to patrol the bushes for rogue wee-ers.