 Hanley became a parliamentary borough in its own right, and shortly afterwards also became a county borough.The Hanley constituency in the 1885-1918 period included Burslem as well as Hanley itself, and was one of the most populous urban constituencies in the country, with more than 100,000 inhabitants by the time of the First World War.Its main economic base was pottery, though both towns included substantial numbers of coal miners as well as pottery workers.