KM110

KIRKSTALL MATTERS Summer 2012 Issue 110 ÂŁ1 www.kirkstall.org.uk @kirkstallonline Kirkstall Online

Dough Bistro June Evening Menu 2012 Two Course Set-Menu £22.00 per person

Seven Course Tasting Menu £40 per person

Four Course Set-Menu £27.00 per person

[Whole table must take this menu] Complimenting drinks £30 per person

Starters Leeds asparagus – mushroom ketchup – poached free-range egg – Grassington cured ham crisp – black caviar * Cold water prawns - crayfish - chilli, lime & coriander mayonnaise – pineapple salsa - coriander oil * Braised Wakefield buffalo – creamed leek – filo basket – yoghurt & mint sauce – blue cheese – onion crisps * Sprouting fennel & potato salad – asparagus gazpacho – roast aubergine – cucumber – blue cheese mousse [v] * Swordfish sashimi – scallop sashimi - asparagus gazpacho– crab quenelle pineapple salsa [£3 supplement]

Sorbet Leeds raspberry & balsamic sorbet

Cold water prawns - crayfish - chilli, lime & coriander mayonnaise – pineapple salsa - coriander oil * Braised Wakefield buffalo – creamed leek – filo basket – yoghurt & mint sauce – blue cheese – onion crisps * Leeds raspberry & balsamic sorbet * Fillet of sea bass– smoked halibut infused vegetables - nettle nage– tiger prawns * 28 day matured Barnsley fillet beef - wild boar pate – blue cheese potato cake – cream of asparagus – Horsforth white asparagus * Lime & black pepper posset – lime syllabub topping – crushed ginger and oat biscuit * Rhubarb, ginger & lime parfait – rhubarb & chilli sorbet – poached rhubarb

Mains 28 day matured Barnsley fillet beef - wild boar pate – blue cheese potato cake – cream of asparagus – Horsforth white asparagus [£5 supplement] * Free-range chicken stuffed with chorizo and Whitby crab – broad beans with chorizo and mint– tiger prawn – paprika velouté * Roasted red pepper – fountain’s gold cheese– olive tapenade– summer coleslaw– blue cheese rosti- mushroom ketchup [v]

Latest News * We have already started receiving inquiries about Christmas and party bookings. We welcome group bookings and can fit up to 50 in our restaurant. or private parties for up to 22 or 30 in our respective rooms. *

Slow cooked goat– wrapped in filo pastry –saffron sauce – beetroot salsa – olive tapenade – goat’s cheese

*We now have a local ale & wine board, including specialist items only for Dough’s customers, not to be found anywhere else!*

*

*Award - Best restaurant at the ‘Best of Leeds Awards’*

Fillet of sea bass– smoked halibut infused vegetables - nettle nage– tiger prawns

*We are on twitter, follow us at www.twitter.com/ doughleeds*

*

Sides Tender stem Leeds broccoli with fountains gold cheese £4.00

Dough; 293-295 Spen Lane, West Park, LS16 5BD

Organic carrot and green beans with coriander £3.50

Reservations: Tel: 0113 2787255

Twice cooked hand cut chips £3.00

Leeds grown spinach with garlic, nutmeg and butter £4.00 Leeds grown new potatoes with Paganum chorizo and rosemary olive oil £4.00

Desserts Summer berry pudding poached in Cointreau – marmalade ice cream – spiced orange sauce * Basil fool – strawberry sorbet – basil & strawberry posset *

*Best of Leeds Award – Best independent restaurant 2011/12* *Winner of the Yorkshire Evening Post’s ‘Oliver Award’ for Best Chef 2009* *Featured in BBC Olive Magazine’s Best British BYO’s* *Winner of the Yorkshire Evening Post’s ‘Oliver Award’ for Best Suburban Restaurant 2010* *Winner of the Budapest Food Festival’s most innovative Chef 2010* *Winner of Leeds Menu of the Year 2010* *The Good Food Guide recommended 2011/12*

Rhubarb, ginger & lime parfait – rhubarb & chilli sorbet – poached rhubarb * and biscuits served with celery, grapes, and maple syrup [£3 2 CheeseKIRKSTALL MATTERS supplement, £8 as a course]

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

From The Editor

Issue 110 –Summer 2012

Cover: The winning poster for the 2012 Kirkstall Festival

By Serena Singh, age 11, Kirkstall St Stephens Primary School

Well, here we are, the last edition of Kirkstall Matters in its current form.

Since I took over the magazine 2 years ago I've realised what a privilege it is to be able to produce something that reaches out to everyone in our community, and how many people are involved in its production: from contributors, photographers, advertisers, printers, distributors and more. We’ve tried to bring you a wide range of articles and I hope there are lots of things in each issue that interest everyone.

As we have talked about for the last couple of issues, and at KVCA meetings, however, the amount of time it takes to produce a magazine on this scale is a daunting task!

That is why we will be moving for the final issue this year into a smaller newsletter style magazine, focussing on the activities of the association and important news about issues and developments affecting your area.

Editor Simon Dawson editor@kirkstall.org.uk KIRKSTALL MATTERS, 19 Norman Street, Leeds, LS5 3JN The views expressed in KIRKSTALL MATTERS are those of the contributors and if not attributed to individuals, they are from the editorial team. They are not necessarily the views of the KVCA.

Distribution Delivered through the doors of Kirkstall and beyond by members of the KVCA. If you can help distribute on your local street, please contact Mary on 0113 2752441 or maryrennie6@gmail.com The magazine is also kindly sold through our stockists: J News (Morris Lane) Neil’s Store (Kirkstall Road) Bargain Booze (Kirkstall Hill) Abbey Phones and Accessories (Abbey Road) Abbey House Museum (Abbey Walk) Gatehouse Cafe (Abbey Walk) Leeds Pilates Place (Victoria Road)

There are still discussion to be had about the shape and need for a printed magazine in the future which we welcome your thoughts about, but in the meantime with the time we save we will also be putting articles more regularly onto our website, Facebook and Twitter so that we can try to communicate with as many people as possible, as quickly as possible.

With this being the last magazine of this size, I’ve been able to include the remaining serialisation for Derek Hutchinson’s story into one magazine, and of course there’s some information about this year’s Kirkstall Festival!

I’d like to thank all our past editors and contributors for developing the magazine over the last 34 years, our printers (who’ve always been so helpful getting the magazine turned around quickly) and distributors (who deliver it through your doors come rain or shine), and our advertisers without whom we wouldn’t have been able to produce a magazine or such quality. But most of all I thank you, our readers, for giving us feedback that has helped us to grow or into the best community magazine in Leeds.

Event though the magazine in its current form is at an end, you can still keep in touch with us as usual. Times change, and we may change format and method of delivery, but we will continue the hard work for our community.

Simon x

Printed by Thistle Print, tel 0113 204 0600

www.kirkstall.org.uk @kirkstallonline Kirkstall Online Issue 110 - Summer 2012

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A look back at the first ever issue of Kirkstall Matters As this is the last issue of the magazine in its current form, we thought it’d be interesting to look back at how it all started...

B

ack in 1978, a small group of local residents formed the KVCA . Now, some 34 years later, it is interesting to read the motivation for what started it all. What’s even

more interesting is that the issues that were faced back then are still the same ones we face today.

The times may change but the issues stay the same, meaning its just as important today to have a community association that is vibrant and active, for the benefit of the whole community.

Have a read of these first two pages of the very first issue of Kirkstall Matters. You can read the full issue on our website at www.kirkstall.org.uk

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KVCA Update From the Chairman Well it's the end of an era for our local magazine. I along with many are so sad to see the magazine cease in it's present form but the reality is, it is just too much work for one person. Times change and we have to move on.

We will now be using online facilities which will enable us to be more up to date with news and items of interest and we think this has to be the way forward. We hope to publish and distribute 'news letters' as another way of keeping in contact with members who are not online.

Our Kirkstall Matters magazine has been a source of pride for us since it's beginning in 1978 and over the year's thanks' to the hard work of the individuals involved in it's production has become much admired by many other organisations.

I myself would like to thank and acknowledge Val Crompton, Ken Stratford and Simon Dawson for the fantastic work they did in transforming the magazine into what it is today. It is a natural process for things to change and progress and I myself see this as a way of expanding our contact with the wider community.

There is so much happening in our area at this time, people need to be informed on an up to the minute basis on what is going on and a three times a year magazine is not the way. So, this is not the end, it is the beginning. Please let us know what you think and any ideas you have which could help us in the future.

Join in the fun with the Kirkstall Valley Community Association The KVCA was founded in 1978 to benefit the inhabitants of Kirkstall Valley and the neighbourhood. We campaign and cooperate with other local organisations on developments affecting Kirkstall Valley and KVCA volunteers organise events and activities such as Kirkstall Festival, Kirkstall Online and Kirkstall In Bloom.

Membership is free and open to everyone. Simply visit www.kirkstall.org.uk and click on “join”, or you can send us the form below.

- get news and updates on what’s happening in Kirkstall - find out what events are going on in the area - help shape the association activities - find out about opportunities to get involved with exciting community projects

KVCA Officers Steve Gradys

Chairman

Vice Chair

0113 278 5987

And now for the last time in the KM magazine could I remind you, Saturday 14th July is our 32nd annual Kirkstall Festival in the grounds of Kirkstall Abbey. Those on the festival committee will once again be on day release from their secure units to welcome you to a fantastic fun day filled with no expense spared entertainment, I'm so excited I may pop along myself.

Ken Stratford

Rita Samuel

Secretary

Treasurer

0113 275 5413

Do tell your family and friends, for those of you with no friends, come along and you may make some! Remember the Parade sets off from Hesketh Road at 12 noon and makes it's way down to the Abbey grounds, come and watch, it's quite a sight. As a postscript, if anyone can recognise me from my 12 year old photograph in this magazine, there is a prize, family and friend are not eligible.

I ♥ Kirkstall and I want to join the Kirkstall Valley Community Association

John The Chair

John Liversedge

Name

………………………………………………………………………

Address …………………………………………………………………………

Postcode …………………………………………………………………………

www.kirkstall.org.uk @kirkstallonline Kirkstall Online

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Phone

…………………………………………………………………………

Email

…………………………………………………………………………

Hobbies ………………………………………………………………………… 

Would you like to help at Kirkstall Festival?



Would you like to get involved in KIRKSTALL MATTERS or KIRKSTALL ONLINE?



Could you help deliver KIRKSTALL MATTERS on your street?

Post to: KVCA Treasurer, 18 The Rise, MATTERS Leeds, LS5 3EP 5 KIRKSTALL

â– COMMUNITY NEWS

S

Kirkstall Festival is 14th July 2012! aturday July 14th is our 32nd annual Kirkstall Festival. As always our festival is held in the beautiful grounds of Kirkstall Abbey.

We do ask people to walk or get use the bus but if you do use the car then we will have a free car park on the sports fields on Vesper Lane.

As always we will have a full days entertainment aimed at the whole family, from grandparents to toddlers, there's something to please everyone.

Canoes on the river, main music stage, youth stage, birds of prey display, marvellous tea dance, mini motorbikes, mini cars, pony rides, fairground, over 100 stalls, dog show, photo forest, refreshment marquee, lots of hot and cold food from all over the world, children's games, entertainment in the Cloister, Music in the Nave, even a church service starting at 4,30pm and lots more.

Our theme this year is 'Kirkstall Going for Gold' and we hope the splash of colour in the grounds will be a sight to see.

Our festival Parade sets off from Hesketh Road at twelve noon, along Morris Lane, down Abbey Walk on to the A65 then into the Abbey grounds.

Make a point of watching the Parade or why not join in, you are most welcome. Everything begins in the grounds about 11am, there is lots to see and do.

Entry is free but we would ask you to buy a festival programme as the proceeds all go towards the costs of the festival. Come along and support us and we hope you have a memorable day with us.

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COMMUNITY NEWS ■

Enter the Woods of Wonder Submit your photos for the amazing Kirkstall Festival Photo Forest!

I

n the run up to Kirkstall Festival 2012 we're asking you to take pictures of everything and anything you love about Kirkstall and your community. These can be artistic, sentimental, fun, odd...anything goes (so long as it's legal and family friendly!)

and send the pictures to us at tpeleeds@gmail.com. We'll upload them to the blog at www.tpeleeds.blogspot.com and print them out to display in the Photo Forest.

You'll be included in the credits and retain all rights to your picture.

These images will be printed and displayed at the festival in our Photo Forest, creating The People's Exhibition of memories and experiences from the people of Leeds. We need lots and lots of photos to go into the Photo Forest. Think about what you love, go and take a picture of it, repeat for as many times as you like,

Organised by Kirsty Ware, who also did the People’s Exhibition at 2011 Light Night, the Kirkstall Festival Photo Forest will display your photos in an innovative setting in the festival grounds. Its going to be an incredible sight and we’d love your photos to be part of it - remember, your photos can be anything and everything! Email your photos to tpeleeds@gmail.com

Are You Ready For The Blue Ribbon?

Alan Crump outlines some of the fun we’ll have at this year’s festival

W

e are all looking forward to the summer and the key sporting and cultural event that will be hard to miss. It going to be nearly impossible to avoid it and there will be coverage everywhere. The opening ceremony and the sheer excitement of attending will fantastic and the whole community can get involved. Yes Kirkstall Festival is the event to look out for this summer particularly if you want to avoid the Olympics!

Kirkstall’s own community event really will get into the spirit of the Olympics by being part of the cultural Olympiad that is going to be across the whole country. We will be looking for a festival that reaches all parts of the community and seeks out a few new areas of art, music and culture for everyone to enjoy and even take part in. As regulars will know Kirkstall Festival always includes some sports on the day but this year we will extend these sports and in particular celebrate the success of disabled athletes.

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

There will also be an opportunity for everyone to participate in a version of our own sports event – a cross between It’s a Knock Out and The Generation Game. It will be aimed at local schools and help to generate funds for the sports activities of the schools who participate. If you are a parent or grandparent of a pupil at a local school then look out for further information and get involved.

There will be special events which are all for fun and which will all generate cash for local schools. Extra points (and points mean prizes) will be awarded for head teachers who participate, chairs of governors who take part and grandparents who are willing to join in the fun. There will of course be gold medals to be won and at Kirkstall Festival everyone is a winner.

So what else.. we’ll have all your favourites performers, new features and a few more artistic activities in which you can get involved. My colleagues on the committee are putting together a great day which will

have food tastes from around the globe and a fabulous selection of stalls from all your favourite local charities. Our long standing friend Albert Evans (Albert the Fair) will be bringing along his fairground attractions. As usual we will have our walking parade and everyone can join in by dressing up, or dressing down, to get into the spirit of the day. The main stage will have great music and there will be music around the park for you to enjoy.

Its your community event and the more you take part the more you’ll enjoy it. Get down there early on, lay out your picnic blanket and have a great day. If you’ve got a well behaved dog then there’s the dog show. If you fancy a Church Service then get in the nave later in the afternoon. If all you want is great music and a great day out then come along to Kirkstall Festival.

PS. Buy a programme and know that you are supporting a community event run by volunteers for the whole community.

Kirkstall Festival is 14th July 2012 KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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Tony Wilson Hawksworth Wood Community Association 6 Broadway, Leeds LS5 3PR Tel & Fax 0113 228 5550 Email: hw.ca@ntlworld.com

Electrical Installations 16 Vesper Gardens Kirkstall Leeds LS5 3NS

www.hawksworthcommunity.leedslearning.org

Local Councillor Surgeries Multi-agency Advice Surgeries 1st Wednesday each month 10am-12 noon

Tel. 0113 274 6027 Mob. 07946 608 869

Leeds City Credit Union Services

BARGAIN BOOZE J.NEWS 1 MORRIS LANE, KIRKSTALL 0113 278 6859

Newsagents

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154-160 Kirkstall Hill Kirkstall Leeds LS4 2SX Tel: 0113 278 5766 Off Burley Road

0 25 D N er Ov BRA ! gs G BI vin Sa

Sweets, Tobacco, Off-Licence, Greetings Cards, Newspapers Delivered, Major Credit Cards Accepted

FOR ALL YOUR GROCERIES, NEWS, LOTTERY, ETC.

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

COMMUNITY NEWS ■

Barbara Walker Barbara was a lovely lady, loved by many. She was well known to all - a real stalwart of Kirkstall. She had been the "lollipop lady" at St Stephen's school for 36 years until her retirement due to ill health this February, only having one day off when the school was closed because of snow. She had been involved with the guiding movement, being Brown Owl at Kirkstall for many years.

Together with Ken, her devoted husband, she was an active and committed member at St Stephen's Church, helped at the Kirkstall Community Centre and of course was involved with the Kirkstall Festival. Barbara looked after the 'found children and lost adults' tent at the festival every year since the festival began in 1980.

It was in recognition of all these devoted activities that Barbara was presented last year with an award by the City of Leeds on behalf of all the friends who had nominated her.

St Stephen's school had intended giving her a present and the Council was also going to present her with a crystal bowl for all her long year's of dedication on the Friday before Easter.

Sadly Barbara died day's before, but she did know about the presentation and how much she was loved and respected. Barbara will be sadly missed by everyone who knew her and there were many.

Our thoughts are with Ken and his family at this time.

Sue Brear Chair of Governors, St Stephen's School.

Elsie Skene Kirkstall and its Abbey have been part of the Skene family life since 1947 when Jim and Elsie moved into their house in Vesper Walk.

So it seemed only right that their enjoyment and concern for the area lead to them being founder members of the KVCA when it was formed in 1978. Elsie was the membership secretary for 10 years and Jim was treasurer.

Elsie’s love of crafts led to the running of the craft stall at the Festival with the help of members of the local craft group - which still meets at St Stephen’s church hall each Wednesday morning - and which Elsie still attended until very shortly before her death.

Elsie’s family have many memories of her running the stall at the Kirkstall Festival and each year trying to battle the extremes of weather by trying to erect a ‘home made’ gazebo with green plastic and wooden stakes. We are not sure but Elsie did say that in over twenty five years of having the stall it was never rained off! Jim could be found in his counting house (small caravan) on festival days as he was the treasurer. When the family were going through Elsie’s things they found prize tickets which she won at the festival for marmalade and first prizes for her jam and plants.

According to one of the past KVCA magazines Elsie was also involved with the KVCA badminton group and when her arthritis became too bad to play she enjoyed bowling on the Abbey bowling green.

Both Elsie and Jim enjoyed their time on the committee of the KVCA and all the activities which they took part in. Elsie looked forward each year to having the stall at the Festival and only gave up running the stall because of ill health.

The family would like to thank all who helped and befriended them. They will be sadly missed.

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■ COMMUNITY NEWS

Kirkstall Abbey Festival Service Charity comes to Kirkstall Abbey

F

or the first time at Kirkstall, we have a young women giving the address at the Festival Church Service. Revd Charity Hamilton M.A. is the minister for Highfield, Lower Wortley, and Whingate churches. She has degrees from Lancaster in English Literature and Creative Writing. Charity has worked in University chaplaincy, as a community worker and community centre manager. Charity enjoys listening to music, hanging out with friends, installation art and writing.

‘Bring me my bow of burning gold’ The Festival Service will begin a little later than last year, at 4.30pm, in the cool of the Nave of the Abbey Church. We start, as usual, by singing ‘Jerusalem’. The readings, read by Rachel Reeves MP and The Rt Hon. John Battle, will reflect the festival theme of ‘Going for Gold’. All faiths are very welcome to join us for this short service. The Leeds Central Salvation Army Band provide the music with the excellent ‘String of Beads Choir’ singing. This service, led by Abbeylands Team Vicar, Revd Lesley Ashton, will be signed (for the hard of hearing) by Mavis Rhodes.

By popular request, we will finish by singing ‘Abide with me’.

Revd Charity Hamilton (with Kirkstall Matters)

Do come at the end of a busy day at the festival to sing along and share with KVCA members in this special open air service in the historic setting of Kirkstall Abbey.

■ Val Crompton

Photos: Val Crompton 20 May 2012

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COMMUNITY NEWS ■

A Summer Serenade to help repair Kirkstall St Stephen’s Church

O

n Saturday 7th July at 7.30pm there will be a Concert in St Stephen’s Church with Joanna Gamble—mezzo soprano, Ben Kerslake—tenor and Michael Cleaver on the piano. Tickets: £7.50, including refreshments. Proceeds in aid of the Restoration Fund.

St Stephen’s was built in 1828 and has been extended twice to serve the growing population of Kirkstall. It is now the only church building in Kirkstall but the fabric is deteriorating. Rain has come through the roof—damaging roof timbers, masonry, plasterwork and internal decoration. Also work is needed to restore many of the stained glass windows. English Heritage have made an offer of £117,000 towards an estimated total now of £190,000 for the total work to be completed over two years. Help is needed from the wider community. The congregation of 100 have raised almost £15,000 in two years.

A very moving Service of Thanksgiving was led by Revd Lesley Ashton, for the Life of Barbara Walker (1937-2012) on 29th May. A collection was taken and the proceeds given to the Restoration Fund in memory of Barbara (the Lollipop Lady) who cheerfully helped in many ways over the years in the community, church, school and at the Kirkstall Festival. The church was full of family, friends and all the pupils and staff from Kirkstall St Stephen’s Primary School. The pupils all sang ‘This little light of mine’ and lit a candle to remember Barbara, her care for them and her contribution to the life of the school.

If you have ideas or can help support fund-raising events at St Stephen’s or send a donation—please contact the Treasurer, John Rex, 52 Moor Grange View, Leeds LS16 5BJ, tel. 0113 275 9589. Cheques should be made payable to: St Stephen’s Development Fund. (If you are a tax payer, please ask for a Gift Aid form so that the church receives an additional 20%.)

■ Val Crompton

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â– COMMUNITY NEWS

Procession at Kirkstall Abbey

by Shaeron Caton-Rose

S

outh Square Gallery presents a new offsite project by artist Shaeron Caton-Rose at Kirkstall Abbey, one of the best preserved 12th century Cistercian monasteries in the country.

Kirkstall Abbey is part of Leeds Museums and Galleries.

Within the grounds of Kirkstall Abbey, contemporary artist Shaeron Caton-Rose places a series of enigmatic and reflective artworks which have been inspired by the spiritual and geographical history of the site. Over the summer, visitors will experience Kirkstall Abbey in a new light as their journey through the site is punctuated by surprising encounters with four very different artworks.

Running the full length of the abbey church, Procession is a dramatic white line of pebbles echoing a historical route into Leeds which passed directly through the building. Throughout the summer months the continual footsteps of visitors will slowly disperse the pebbles until the route disappears once again. Sensitively set in the chapels of the abbey church, Advice to Laity is a display of six devore textile veils of image and text. Created in collaboration 12

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

with a local contemporary faith community based in Hyde Park (Leeds), this piece explores the relevance of a monastic lifestyle in Leeds today. In the Chapterhouse the words Work Prayer or Prayer Work circle endlessly on the stoneflag floor, the ambiguous order and emphasis of these words suggests an ever-shifting balance of the role they play in our lives. Reflective in material, the large words on the ground mirror the architectural space above and emphasise a tension between earth and heaven, or the tangible and the spiritual.

Finally, on the Ginkgo tree in the infirmary, Votive invites visitors of all faiths and beliefs to tie a strip of cloth to a branch as an act of offering a prayer or wish. Over time, the trees will become embellished with white and silver cloth, moving and glistening in the wind.

About the artist Shaeron Caton-Rose was born in Guildford, Surrey and studied BA in Printmaking at Sheffield Hallam

University followed by an MA in Fine Art at Humberside University. She moved to Bradford in 1996 and has continued to develop her practice as an installation artist, showing successfully across Yorkshire and latterly in London. She works in a wide variety of media, with an emphasis on textile processes, video and sound. In her work she seeks to confront preconceptions and belief systems we have inherited from folk and religious sources, but also to celebrate the spiritual and encourage query. She now lives in Knaresborough, where she is currently artist in residence at Henshaws Art & Craft Centre for the visually impaired and people of difference.

Special events 22 August 8-9pm – Labyrinth (walking of a temporary candle lit labyrinth in the cloisters, free) School information packs are available from the reception You can visit the artworks now at Kirkstall Abbey until 3rd September 2012

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COMMUNITY NEWS ■

...Kirkstall Kid Kirkstall ex-pat Ryan Lock writes about his time away, and how it makes him think of home It shouldn’t be the case, but leaving behind the land you built your life upon, making all those carefree childhood memories and dreaming of becoming that something – is an epiphany we just don’t realise until it’s gone.

Growing up in Kirkstall really was special. The significance of the Leeds’ suburb can be somewhat undermined –majority, I believe being by the ‘locals’.

As a child, I always dreamed of becoming a pilot – a dream that became a reality, and as I write this from my home here in Orlando, Florida, I feel slightly overwhelmed at the concept of nostalgia; reminiscing of those cold snowy days sledging down the steep gradient hills connecting Burley and Kirkstall Road – to the “hot” summer days playing frisbee in the grounds of the Abbey.

I am a proud Loiner, more specifically a ‘Kirkstall Kid’ and always love coming home to see my family, friends and community. It was sad to leave it all behind, but life takes us in many directions – in the end I believe it all comes full circle.

I moved to Orlando in December 2008 where I pursued flight training under Delta Air Lines. Three and a half years later I am now a commercially licensed pilot and a Certificated Flight Instructor.

It can be as simple as following @KirkstallOnline on Twitter.

Anything. Something.

It really is important to have a strong community relationship – I have vowed to become involved in the Kirkstall community even from a far.

Being thankful to older generations that have worked so hard in the community to prolong Kirkstall is something we, the young, should respect. It’s not uncool to be involved in the community… it’s an honour.

All those memories you made in the suburb should be treasured and for our future generations, we should help them make just as many (and more) special ones in the place we call home!

Thank you to the editor for giving me space in this issue and thanks to all the residents for contributing to Kirkstall.

Be involved.

RYAN www.ryanlock.com Twitter.com/RyanLock

If I had a pound, actually… make that a dollar, for every time I have been asked which I prefer –Leeds or Florida, then I’d be a rich kid.

How do you answer that? Both places are individually unique for many different reasons. I do have an answer however, it’s simply… “there’s no place like home!” –there truly isn’t; I have realized this even more so living out here in the states.

So, how did I come to write an article here in Kirkstall Matters, I hear you ask…?

In case you’ve been living in the dark ages for the past 5 years, then you’ll know about social networking. Yes, I get my fix even with a 4200 mile separation. @KirkstallOnline is the official Twitter account for Kirkstall Matters. I am a tweeter; they’re tweeters, are you?

Social Networking has revolutionized (or should that be revolutionized?) the world, even to the point of me writing this article. The recent craze is ‘Twitter’. I followed the Kirkstall Matters team (@KirkstallOnline) early last year and expressed my gratitude for their dedication to the community and informative tweets about Kirkstall. The editor, who is also the administrator of their Twitter account, asked if I’d like to be featured in this issue, and, well… here I am.

So, now you know about me, what’s the point of this article, huh?

Well, being of the younger generation, I wanted to reach out to community members of my age and encourage you all to have a dream, follow it, go where life takes you, but never forget where life put you.

Keep Kirkstall alive, your community needs you; we’re going to be the ones that will take Kirkstall into the future and mold it for future generations.

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Leeds City Council Department of Education

Kirkstall St Stephen’s Church of England Aided Primary School Headteacher : Mr Steven Viles Looking for a friendly and happy primary school which will provide for the needs of your child?  A caring, Christian environment welcoming children from all sectors of our community  Good Ofsted Report July 2010  Statutory Inspection of Anglican Schools July 2010 judged us as an ‘Outstanding school at meeting the needs of our learners’.  Holders of the Basic Skills Agency Quality Mark for high standards of provision in Literacy and Numeracy  Activemark for PE and sport  Significant investment in ICT throughout the school including laptops for the children  Excellent links with the community  Before and after school childcare available  Many extra curricular opportunities including football, netball, basketball, dance, athletics, cookery, drama, recorders  Highly supportive Parent Teacher Association  Investors in People award July 2010 Contact the school if you would like to look for yourself

Morris Lane, Kirkstall, Leeds LS5 3JD

Tel: 0113 2144630

www.kirkstall-st-stephens.leeds.sch.uk

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KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Kirkstall St Stephen’s Pre-School Kirkstall St Stephen’s C of E Primary School, Morris Lane Leeds LS5 3JD

Tel: 0113 214 4630

From 2½ to school age FREE from 3 years old.

Monday- Friday 9am to 12 noon A warm, safe and stimulating environment

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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Dear Editor

This page is the opportunity for you to voice your concerns, fears, comments, thoughts and deepest darkest secrets.

Drop us a line in writing to 19 Norman Street, Leeds, LS5 3JN or email us at editor@kirkstall.org.uk

lights. and this is the pertinent bit it was OUR IDEA to ask them if they would like to place "sponsored by" signs on some of the motifs.

There was no attempt at "BRIBERY" on behalf of Tesco before their planning application was submitted far from it.

Rather LOCAL RESIDENTS using our inititive to continue something we had achieved through hard work Keith Collridge

The Festive Lights Whilst i am all in favour of people using Kirkstall Matters to voice their opinions i must take S Smith to task over his comments in the current issue.

Under his paragraph headed "Bribery" he his totally misinformed. The Festive Lights @ Kirkstall have for the past 3years been in place because of the hard work carried out by the Gilbert @ Sandford Resident Association obtaining funding from the inner north west area comm. when in 2011 the council cut the grants to pay for festive lights, we as an group had to decide whether to not bother or to go out and get commercial sponsorship.

This we did and approached numerous businesses in Kirkstall including Morrisons and Tescos. We were delighted when Tescos offered to fund the cost of the

Chair, Gilbert & Sandford Residents Association

The Woodman Inn Having received the latest edition of Kirkstall Matters I was very interested to read the correspondence between Mrs Rawnsley, and Mike Harwood. This raised two questions for me.

First - Mrs Rawnsley’s query about the Childs/Child family. I am researching Hargraves who lived in Kirkstall, descendants of a John Hargraves who was born about 1821 in Settle. John’s second wife was Martha Beanland who was born in Holbeck …… the daughter of William Beanland and possibly Sarah Childs/ Child. I still have to confirm that these two

are Martha’s parents, and any further information would be appreciated.

Second – Mike Harwood’s map and comments on the streets and, particularly, the old pub. The Cockills are another branch of my family and for some time now I have been trying to find out about the Woodman Inn in Kirkstall, where John Cockill died in 1863.

At the 1851 census he was a Beer Seller, living at Providence Place. 1861 he was an Innkeeper, no address for him but further down the page the address is Padgett’s Row, which I have not managed to find on Mike’s map. At the 1871 census the Innkeeper at the Woodman Inn, Commercial Street (next to Rawson’s Building) is Benjamin Rawson and his family. John’s Cockills daughter is living at Watson’s buildings with her second husband John Lodge, her sons William and John from her first marriage to Joseph Fox, and daughter Ellen Lodge.

So have I at last found where the Woodman Inn was?

Yorky A Kirstall Stray

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KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

COMMUNITY NEWS ■

Kirkstall in Bloom Would you like to get involved?

W

e’re a new local group looking for volunteers to help us beautify areas of Kirkstall. You don’t have to have green fingers to join, just bags of enthusiasm and an interest in improving Kirkstall. If you are able to give as little as one hour a month, then we would love to hear from you! We have successfully received funding for two local projects and welcome your help.

To join Kirkstall in Bloom or to find out more, email kirkstallinbloom@gmail.com or visit “Kirkstall In Bloom” on Facebook

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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The Bookshop Kirkstall 10 Commercial Road Leeds LS5 3AQ UK

Alison James Opticians 372 Kirkstall Road Leeds LS4 2HQ Tel: 0113 2752201

Tel 0113 2780937 www.amazon.co.uk/shops/bookshopkirkstall www.abebooks.com/bookseller/kirkstall book.shop@btinternet.com

We buy and sell good secondhand and antiquarian books

At Alison James Opticians, we take eye care seriously.

Just like you, we believe your eyes deserve the very best care and attention you can give them. We’ll help you keep them in tip-top condition with relaxed stress-free examinations, accurate prescribing, precise lens manufacture and of course, a wide range of frames.

Monday to Saturday 10.00am - 4.00pm or by appointment

Kirkstall Leisure Centre Looking for somewhere to hold a meeting or event?

We now have a Meeting Room Available every day one off or long term bookings.

Seats up to 25 people. Children’s Parties, local groups and businesses welcome.

Contact Reception for further details: Kirkstall Leisure Centre, Kirkstall Lane, Leeds LS5 3BE Tel 0113 214 4555/6

Kirkstall – your local leisure centre

Birthday Parties at Abbey House Museum If you are looking for a birthday celebration with a difference, why not book a birthday party at the museum?

Our parties give children a chance to be creative and explore the museum and its objects in a fun way.

Party Planning Birthday Parties take place on Sunday mornings from 10am -11.30am The party is suitable for children aged between 7 - 14 years. We can take up to 10 children per party. We provide a party leader and the materials.

The Birthday Party costs £30.

Pre-booking is essential tel. 0113 230 5492

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KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Have you tried Canada’s Favourite Confection?

12 Kirkstall Hill, Kirkstall, Leeds, LS5 3BD Telephone: 0113 278 3661/2 Fax: 0113 275 4599

Nanaimo Bars are back at Kirkstall Abbey Deli Market!

Pick up your favourite flavours & sample new ones at the Fayre by Alley stall.

Unique Canadian sweet treats made in Yorkshire Alleyne Oman Phone: 07749 130 628 Email: fayrebyalley@yahoo.co.uk Web: www.fayrebyalley.co.uk

Bespoke orders taken & delivery available

Rachel Reeves M.P. Surgeries

Kirkstall Ward Councillor Surgeries Help & advice from your local Councillors is available on the first Saturday of the month at Kirkstall Leisure Centre from 10.30am (except August). Local street surgeries are also regularly run in the local area.

Rachel holds regular surgeries throughout the constituency.

Cllr John Illingworth tel. 0113 267 3735 John.illingworth@leeds.gov.uk

For details, and to book an

Cllr Lucinda Yeadon

appointment, please call

tel. 0113 217 7330 Lucinda.yeadon@leeds.gov.uk

0113 263 0411 or email rreevesmp@gmail.com

Cllr Bernard Atha

www.rachelreeves.net Issue 110 - Summer 2012

tel. 0113 267 2485 Bernard.atha@leeds.gov.uk

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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Carole Anne BA (Hons) Oasis Adv Dip Therapeutic Counselling Counsellor Low self-esteem

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Spiritual Counselling Please visit my website at: www.lovingcounsel.co.uk

Explore Yorkshire's past with the Yorkshire Archaeological Society

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Library, archives, lectures, excursions & publications on all aspects of Yorkshire's history and archaeology Special interest sections include: Family History, Roman Antiquities, Pre-History, Industrial History, Medieval History

Find us at Claremont, 23 Clarendon Road, Leeds, LS2 9NZ

For more information see www.yas.org.uk 20

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

@ St Stephens Church Hall (top of Norman Street) Every Tuesday @ 7.30pm Class is great for all ages and abilities Dance, laugh and have fun Just ÂŁ4 per class For more info call, text or email Nicola on 07782198534 r8nic@yahoo.co.uk Issue 110 - Summer 2012

COMMUNITY NEWS ■

Canadian Fayre Going Down a Treat at Kirkstall Abbey Deli Market

T

he Nanaimo Bar has been called ‘Canada’s Favourite Confection’. Fayre by Alley is a new and growing business which has introduced this Canadian dessert to cafés and markets in Leeds, West Yorkshire.

A Nanaimo Bar (pronounced ‘nuh-nay-moh’) is a three layer dessert square named after the city on the west coast of Canada where it originated. The Bar has a crunchy biscuit, cocoa and coconut base, a soft sweet middle and a solid chocolate top. It is different from a brownie, cupcake or a millionaire’s square in its rich and multi-textured taste. The Nanaimo Bar has earned its spot beside the cup of coffee, pot of tea, glass of red wine or pint of real ale.

Fayre by Alley has brought the traditional Canadian recipe to the UK and has created a growing range of interesting flavours. They have fun and quirky names such as Canadian Winter (a minty version), Ginger Snap! (ginger nut biscuit in the base) and Wee Beastie (shortbread biscuit base and a whisky-enhanced middle).

These sweet treats are regularly selling out in cafés and markets across Leeds.

Alley is Alleyne Oman, a Canadian who has been living in the UK for over ten years. She moved from London to Leeds last year and rather than pursuing a job in the financial services industry where she previously worked, she decided to start a home-based business by making and selling Nanaimo Bars. After a sellout debut at the first Kirkstall Abbey Deli Market in May 2011 with a little camping table, her company Fayre by Alley has been expanding due to a growing fan base of customers and ‘foodies’ who are in search of new taste experiences.

Kirkstall Lane (formerly Red’s) and will offer great takeaway coffee, breakfasts, ‘elevenses’ and lunches, mini hampers for cricket and rugby matches and catering for offices, schools and events. As well, Alley’s met many Yorkshirebased food producers through farmers’ markets and aims to feature their fayre, too. And the Nanaimo Bar will have a permanent home, with several flavours always on offer.

A big step from that little camping table at the first Kirkstall Abbey Deli Market a year ago! For more details visit www.fayrebyalley.co.uk and www.kirkstalldelimarket.org.uk

Alley enjoys the Kirkstall area so much that she’s moving into the area A popular comment heard when people are having a Nanaimo Bar for the first time is ‘I’ve never tasted anything like it’. A recent customer commented ‘the Canadian Sunrise flavour reminds me of a jaffa cake but better!’ And ‘never would have believed that a chocolate dessert would go so well with a porter’ was heard by a real ale enthusiast at the Headingley Ale Festival in December 2011.

Alley enjoys the Kirkstall area so much that she’s moving into the area! The Fayre by Alley Takeaway Deli Fayre is located at 137

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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Stanley Allen 10% off with this voucher

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Stanley Allen 119 Kirkstall Hill, Leeds, LS4 2TH Telephone: 01132 786343

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KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Brand new and exciting mediterranean bistro

Bookings welcome: 0113 274 0041 41-43 Commercial Road Kirkstall, Leeds LS5 3AW E: info@gallery-fortyone.com W: www.gallery-fortyone.com

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Come and dine in beautiful surroundings, choose from a wide range of delicious traditional mediterranean dishes Hors d’oeuvres Pasta & Risotto Pizzas Salads Cheese Platters Desserts Bottled wine & beer selection

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KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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■ LIFESTYLE & PEOPLE

The Cracker Factory In the last issue, we published the first of four articles about Derek Hutchinson's childhood in Kirkstall during in the 1950s. These are extracts from 'The Cracker Factory' a book he is writing about his life with Hilary Dyter. Here are two more extracts evoking that lost community on Commercial Road and the boy whose wild living continually disrupted the neighbourhood. The last episode ended with Derek moving from Sunderland to Kirkstall at the age of three with his brother John, Jack his father, a master welder and a bare fist fighter, and his increasingly alcoholic mother, Betty.

A

t first, the Hutchinson family lived in a flat at Ellers Nurseries on the Leeds Bradford Road. But not for long. “The old man, who owned the place, used to wake us up on a night, shooting rats on the canal. Then John bit his dog. I think that might have been why we moved.

Mind, John used to bite me too and I bit him.”

free coke. Kirkstall Congregational Church was right next door, which was very handy, not that we ever went to church, though Mum was forever telling people she was High Church of Scotland. They had these regular deliveries and, after the coal lorry had turned the corner, Mum would send us through a hole in the wall with our buckets.”

They moved to 50 Commercial Road, just down the road from Kirkstall Abbey. Derek thinks the house may have been built in the eighteenth century, in any case it was grand and spacious. It belonged to Henry Jenkinson who owned the printing works on Bridge Lane, where Betty first found work. It had once been a house of substance, with walls a couple of feet thick, stone steps leading up to a double front door and large windows each with a pair of panelled, wooden shutters that folded out like concertinas. It stood on an artificial terrace with a six foot drop to a long, overgrown garden that sloped steeply down to the River Aire. By 1950, though, it was largely derelict. A year after they arrived, Betty became pregnant again with her last child, a third son, Maurice.

Water was heated in a copper boiler. “We had baths in front of the fire until someone stole the copper in broad daylight, when I was about seven. Mum were in the pub so he must have thought it were a sure thing she wouldn't be back for a while.”

The family of five lived in two barely habitable rooms. A stone flagged cellar served as both kitchen and living room. A window allowed glimpses of the main road, but the one at the back was set close to the ceiling. Derek remembers the room as dark and damp, and freezing in the winter, when there was no fire in the range.

Their furniture was basic: a sink, a food cupboard, a sofa, an armchair and a table with only four chairs (though this wasn't a problem, as they rarely sat down for a meal together). Betty cooked on a Yorkshire range. “We always had plenty of 24

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

The sole bedroom was a few steps up on the ground floor. It was warmer and lighter there, with bare wooden floorboards.

“There were two beds. When Maurice were little, Mum slept in one with him and Dad shared the other with John and me. Our clothes just went wherever except, when it was cold, when we piled everything on top of the beds.”

Along the back, a flagged yard gave access to a chemical toilet at the far end. “Going to the loo was like walking to the end of our street.” Once a month, Jack would dig a hole at the bottom of the garden for sewage disposal. The toilet bucket had hoops for poles to be inserted. “Me and our John carried one side and Dad had the other. I don't know if you can imagine going down a steep flight of stairs with that. Dad went first and his arms would be above his head trying to keep it level - but it's just not possible. One day we dropped it and we were all covered in shite. But it didn't half make the raspberries grow.”

Betty told the boys that monsters lived in the rest of the house. “This was supposed

to deter us from ever going there but of course it had the opposite effect on me I'd go monster hunting. There were one of those sweeping staircases that splits at the top and carries on up in two directions, like you see in the Hollywood films. You had to be careful where you walked because there were no floorboards, only joists. There were cellars running right underneath so I went down there as well with candles.

Maurice came with me a couple of times but he were only little and it frightened him. I found plenty of hiding places, for when I needed to lay low for a while.”

Jack did his best with the part of the house they inhabited. “It were always freshly painted - either khaki green or battleship grey. Down Kirkstall Road there was the Army and Navy Salvage Yard. Keelings, they called man who ran it. Dad would give us half a crown for some tins of paint.

Instead of spending it, our John would stand with his hands linked by the back wall and I'd take a running jump and push up over. Then I'd pass the tins down to him. It were a twelve foot drop. We didn't just get one, we had to make a profit! Half of Commercial Road were painted in the same colours.”

Derek's childhood was tough by modern standards but, in the post war period, plenty of people were living in similar conditions. However, Derek can't remember anyone in the area who didn't have a job, including most of the women.

As a master welder, Jack was never out of work. In the immediate neighbourhood, St Ann's Mill employed around 700 people, Thomas Wade Printers about 450, Jenkinson's about 600 and then there was the Brewery and Abbey Mills. As in all mill towns, there were well-established nursery Issue 110 - Summer 2012

LIFESTYLE & PEOPLE■ schools accepting children as young as two and a half, so that mothers could be available for work. “Mum mostly worked in printing jobs or at the Brewery. She took me to a nursery in Armley but she had to take us away because I kept escaping. One day, they found me in the back of a truck and I think it was the last straw.”

For all the sparseness of the family's living conditions, improvement seemed possible – until Betty developed a drinking problem. “Mum worked in the Brewery for four of five years. You could have as many drinks as you wanted during the day. They said the idea were to put people off but it didn't work with her.” In Sunderland, Jack had gone to the pub every Friday and Saturday night, but he never drank in the house and never deviated from this pattern. Betty was different though and her drinking grew into a daily habit. “She said she worked hard and deserved a drink but by the time Maurice were six, she were juiced up every night of the week. Before Dad came home from work, she'd go over to the back of The George with a jug and they'd fill it up for her. She'd drink some there and then and finish it off in secret, after he'd gone to bed. Most evenings she'd carry on at the old man. Every night she'd be shouting at him, then she'd get out of bed and barge across the room, then back again and so it would go on. I never once heard him shout back, never once saw him hit her. Some nights, she'd drag us out of bed and go round knocking on people's doors, saying he was hitting her. One Christmas Eve, they came back from the pub and she fell over in front of us and cut her eye on the fender. She called the police round and accused Dad of hurting her. Before they came, she said to us, “Don't forget to tell the police that you saw your Dad hitting me.” I refused, so she gave me a good hiding.”

When Jack wasn't around, Betty directed her anger at Derek. “If there were any carry on, it were always me that got the blame.

She used to give me a good hiding with the belt, or anything she could get her hands on, then lock me in the coal house for a couple of hours. It was about nine foot square with a broken window. I could have got out but where else would I go?

The coal sacks kept me warm. Under the sink there were two pillars and I used to get under there and go to sleep. This happened so often, I got so used to sitting there on me own in the dark that it didn't bother me. She didn't do it to the others and I don't think me Dad would have stood for it, if he'd known. Once I asked her for a fried egg and she went on that Issue 110 - Summer 2012

much, I said it didn't matter but she'd already cooked it so she held me down and forced it down my throat. Afterwards, I hid under the table and drank a whole bottle of cough mixture as a treat. You were never sure what mood she were in. It were safer to stay out of house.” Worse than the punishment was the hunger.

Derek was the smallest of the three brothers. He remembers being the only child at Kirkstall County Primary to be given a daily ration of malt. He blames the shortage of food on Betty who drank all her own wages and as much as she could of Jack's. Her nickname for him was 'Skinny Get', John was 'Black Haired Get' and Maurice was 'Baby.'

With regards to food, Sunderland was Derek's paradise lost. There was so much food, they fed the surplus to the cats.

“Ganny [Grandma] did all the cooking for everyone. There were cow heel, pig's trotters, neck of mutton and my favourite pot pie. You make it with steak and kidney, steamed in a pot lined with suet pastry and cooked in a pan with the lid on. Our street led down to the ferry, where it was a ha'penny to get across. We used to go over and sit on the dock fishing just for fun and we'd feed the fish to the cats because, even though there was rationing, food wasn't short. We'd go night fishing on the pier with Dad and Uncle Billy, Uncle Lance and the others. Or we'd go down the beck with the pram for sea coal and whillicks.

These were tiny snails that Gramma would boil in a great big tub, then we'd take them with us to a match at Roker Park and dig them out with pins'.

Though Betty could also provide memorable meals, when the ingredients were available. Derek remembers that Jack was always well fed. As the main wage earner, and with a job that demanded strength and concentration, it was important that he stayed fit and well.

Derek has fond memories of the occasional home-made pies and bread with raspberry jam. “Most weeks, Mum would make bread. Everyone did then. The only time I did as I were told was when she told me to go get some raspberries. This meant she was going to make jam to go with the bread and it was lovely. If any of the other kids got wind of this, they'd be hanging round the kitchen too, the four Mosers were always there. Somehow they just knew. They were good mates of mine.”

But bread with raspberry jam was the exception. “Mum would make a meal before Dad came home. He'd get mutton and we got the fat with mashed tatties. It

were that horrible to chew, we just swallowed it.” Things improved years later, when the family moved to a house in Burley Road. Derek remembers roast dinners there every Sunday and Jack using the left-overs to make what he called 'p'nack'. “He'd mash it all together in a frying pan and add a big dollop of piccalilli. If you have some of that after nine pints of beer, you'll eat it like a wolf.”

In the meantime, the brothers staked out a territory extending for roughly a mile in every direction and foraged like hunter gatherers. “We never begged, we had our pride and when you had parents like mine, it wasn't stealing. If you took anything home that was ripped off, it was the only time Mum was nice. If it was food she'd cook it. If not, she'd sell it for beer.”

Derek became an expert scavenger. “Every day of the holidays, we were free to do as we pleased. We were outside whatever the weather. We had the run of the garden at the back of the house. It were all overgrown but there were fruit trees, currant bushes and a strawberries. It just grew itself and that's what we ate all day and every day.” In the spring, there was rhubarb (Derek calls it 'tusker') rustled from fields above the Abbey. “Sometimes we ate it raw with sugar but it were better in a pie. On Sunday, a bloke used to come with milk churns from Skipton and he'd stop and play darts and dominoes with Dad. In among the milk churns, he'd rabbits that he'd get from the farmers along the way and we'd always take a couple for lunch.”

The main course for Christmas dinner was always one of Hettie Hunter's free range chickens. “She were the steward for Kirkstall Recreational Club next door and she kept hens half way down her garden.

You'd hear her shouting to her husband, “Jackie! Jackie! One of the hens is missing!”

And we'd be sitting in our kitchen plucking it. It were always me that had to go into the hen hut because I were the only one small enough to get in.”

In those days, there were many more shops along Commercial Road, than there are today. Derek and his friends would steal bottles of Tizer and PLJ, drink the contents and take the bottles back to collect the return money on them. “We used to play with the Dixon brothers. Their parents had the café at number three. It were called the 'Taxi Man's Cafe', because their Dad was the Kirkstall taxi. They didn't exactly give us food, we weren't charity cases, but we used to come away with cakes and all sorts. If you were fast KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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■ LIFESTYLE & PEOPLE enough, you could get fruit from Garner's Fish and Fruit or from Dobby's further up the street.”

Jack's favourite food was duck or goose eggs. Where the River Aire branches, originally to drive the waterwheels at Jenkins Mill and St Anne's, is a fast flowing weir, thirty foot wide with a drop of over fifteen feet. A two inch, red line was originally painted on the ledge to show where it was safe to cross but, over the years, this had mostly vanished under moss and water weed. “But, we knew the secret. You'd to walk sideways so you could see both sides of the red line.” The first time they successfully got across, they discovered what they thought was a secret island inhabited only by ducks. “This were where we collected our duck eggs. Being the smallest, it were my job to crawl into the bushes to find them.” On days when nothing much else was happening, Duck Island (as they called it) would catch fire, and firemen, running along the bank, inevitably found three willing lads waiting by the weir, to show them how to get across safely. Goose eggs were supplied by the allotments near Dobby Row. “It's difficult getting goose eggs, we had to use sticks. It's never something to do on your own. You had to have a distraction party because the plots were overlooked and the only way out were the path up to the main road.”

It occurred to me that Derek hadn't mentioned any toys. He had to stop and think. “No, there weren't any but it didn't matter because we made our own. But we had a radio. It were our prize possession.

We listened to Radio Luxembourg, all the early jive and rock and roll. And we had our pile of Beano and Dandy. Dad would buy them when he got his wages every week.” It's not difficult to imagine Derek finding inspiration in Dennis the Menace and the Bash Street Kids. “We were proper river lads like in 'Tom Sawyer'. We'd go rat catching with big sticks and stones, anything we could get our hands on. We hung ropes from trees to swing across the river. We built rafts. A while back, I took my grandchildren down there to show them what we got up to and they were amazed that our Mum and Dad let us go down there on our own.”

After one of my visit to the archives, I asked Derek about flooding. I've read that the River Aire was notorious for extensive flooding in this part of the valley. In the year he was born, the whole of Bridge Road, the playing fields and the railway station were all under water. I thought of

26

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

the three boys immersed in their adventures and wondered at the dangers they faced. But of course, Derek was well aware of the flooding. “As far as where Morrisons is now could be two foot under water. We were up to our waists sometimes. The river regularly flooded, right over the railway lines and all over our gardens would be flooded right up to the steps.

“It wasn't clean water like it is now. It were black and muddy. There were always lots of rats but we never saw any fish. The water used to come down from the hill in big blobs of foam. We used to throw bricks at them. It ran right through the middle of Kirkstall Forge where they made axles.

There were a big Lasko Stamp, a thirty two tonner that stamped big axles. On the other side of the river, they had seven hammers and a main machine house, with lathes and capstans. Everything, all the coolant for cutting steel got washed into the river.”

Derek gave me a detailed description of how they made bows and arrows from sticks and ferns. “You get a decent stick that's reasonably even, usually elderberry, and you shape it down leaving some of the bark on for the handle. Then you tie string to one end, bend it tight, and tie it to the other and you've got your bow. We mostly used ferns for the arrows but we'd tie a piece of brick to the end to make them go further and hurt more.”

Jack taught them how to make something called a 'French arrow' using a half split cane. “These were two foot long and you had to get proper cane from the penny shop. You split it both ends, two inches away from a knuckle in the wood so it won't split all the way down. The flight would be cardboard or anything you could find. You find a big sharp rock to stick in the cleft in the other end and tie it up right strong. Then you wrap some decent string once, round the knuckle at the rock end, stretch it down the length of the arrow and wrap it round your finger. You pull it as far back as you can over your shoulder and launch it, letting go of the string. They go for hundreds of yards when you get it right.” Frustrated by my inability to grasp the finer points of construction, he drew me a diagram. It was all about making the best of what they could find. They made pea shooters out of reeds using green elderberries for the pea. “They don't half hurt if you get one on the back of the neck!” They used with one of Betty's best knives to whittle catapults. “Down by the mill, there was a pile of broken bearings,

those big ones that carry all the spindles.

We'd take the small bearings out for ammunition. I got a rat with one once instant death!”

Under the Recreational Club, there was a raised platform on pillars. “It were like a cave. That's where we learned to stone throw by putting bottles up against the back wall and throwing bricks at them.”

Another of Derek's favourite games was to climb onto the flange part of the metal bridge, over the railway line at the bottom of Bridge Road, and wait for a coal train to come along. Then he'd jump fifteen feet into one of the wagons and get a free ride all the way to the power station. “You had to keep your head down because all the trains were steam and they could blind you, so you couldn't see where to jump. It were always a safe landing. It were soft coal but a bit mucky. The trick were to get the timing right. I always did this on my own. Maurice were too small and John were scared he'd miss. Mum caught us at it once. Bye! She didn't half leather us. She walloped us all the way up the street. A man was passing in a car and he leaned out the window and shouted at her to stop. Not that she took any notice.”

They kept pigeons and rabbits but there was an unwritten rule that these were not for eating. Pigeon fancying was first started, in the North East, by miners. There is an obvious therapeutic contrast between a working life spent deep underground and the process of cosseting birds into peak condition for racing. The Hutchinson family developed their own version of the art. One of the first things Jack did, when they moved to Kirkstall, was to build some pigeon ducketts in the middle of the garden. “He'd five or six birds he'd tamed as racers but that weren't what they were for. When there were a race on overhead, he'd let them out and they'd bring back at least one more bird every time. The trick is to keep the new birds in the ducketts for a couple of weeks, otherwise they'll fly straight back home. If anyone tries to sell you a homing pigeon in the pub, you need to remember this. There's a few bob been made that way - if you get my drift.”

Derek learned how to use Jack's carpentry tools and made his own ducketts and a rabbit hutch with wood mostly raided from the bonfires that were being built in the neighbourhood for bonfire night. Wire clothes hangers were twisted into the special hooks that allowed the pigeons in but stopped them from getting out. And he also kept newts and tadpoles in an old dustbin filled with water.

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

LIFESTYLE & PEOPLE■ Derek caught his fledgling pigeons on the roof of St Anne's Mill. 'We were all very good climbers. Any roof in Kirkstall were fair territory and St Anne's were so old, nobody dared to follow. The roof were all zigzags with glass to one side. We'd find the nests with the young birds and I'd train them to be homing pigeons. You have to hold it carefully with one hand and lift its beak and feed it with corn. Once, we took Dad over to the mill to show him how we did it. He was seriously impressed. But he didn't tell us not to do it because he knew it wouldn't make any difference if he did” Maurice went everywhere with them. He would have been about three and a half, when he was up on the roof of St Anne's, watching as Derek and John jumped across the coping stones. “Before we could stop him, he tried to do it and missed. He fell straight through the glass and landed on a skip of shoddy. I don't like to think what would have happened if he'd have hit the side of the basket. Our John had to lower me onto one of the roof supports and I jumped the last twenty feet. Maurice were fine, though we were both covered from head to toe in shoddy but the biggest problem were getting out of there without Old Jim seeing us. His job were to guard the place and he were always on the look out for us. Not that he ever caught us but he had this bulldog. I didn't know then that bulldogs can't run. I found a window at the back and we climbed through and ran like the wind. I got the blame as usual.

Maurice would have been about five or six when I got sent to approved school and I worried about him because I were the one that looked after him.”

Jack earned extra money by making wrought iron gates for private customers.

For this he borrowed space in the workshop at Horsfield's Engineering, 116 Commercial Road. Sometimes, he would take Derek with him. “He knew all the blokes there and, in those days, there weren't anything like Health and Safety and they'd let me have a go. I knew how to weld before I left primary school.”

In the Hutchinson tradition, Jack also taught all three boys how to box properly.

“All of us were brought up to look after ourselves, to defend ourselves at all times.

When it came to fighting none of the other kids were a match for us because we'd been taught how to do it properly and they hadn't. Dad had us in the garden with gloves on, from being five years old. Both my parents stood up for themselves only he stood up for other people, like I do.

John were a lot heavier than me because he used to get more toast than me so he got big and I didn't. Later he did some professional boxing, as a heavy weight. I were a light middle weight. I've never boxed professionally but I've always been 'The Man', the one people come to if a problem needs sorting.”

The wall of the ruined tower of Kirkstall Abbey is 200 feet high. This was Derek's most ambitious climb. “We hardly ever played there as there weren't much to do and it were more in the public eye than our patch. One day though, I were there with a couple of mates, Barry and Tony, and we saw all these pigeons up there, so I thought I'd have a go at finding a nest. I climbed up holding onto the lightning conductor. When I got to the top, I could see all the river and over as far as the tusker fields, where Leeds Rhino grounds are now. Then I heard all these sirens coming closer. Someone must have rung for the police and fire brigade. I got down faster than anyone has ever moved and ran for it. I look at it now and I can't believe it but I were only a skinny little rat.

I could climb owt.” He was six years old.

On rare occasions, Derek had the chance to see Jack in action. “I once saw him knock a bloke over a bridge. We were sitting outside the Star and Garter with our Guy Fawkes getting our pennies and this bloke came out and gave us a lot of aggro, telling us to get off home. Well, the Guy weren't very good and I suppose he thought we were begging. We'd just stuffed a jacket with some newspaper, stuffed more in a paper bag for his head and scribbled a face on. It weren't worth the effort to make a better one because everyone were popped up anyway. Mum came out and gave him some lip, so he started on her. Then Dad came out. He didn't say a word just punched him once and he went straight over the side of the bridge and landed head first in the mud.

We all fell about laughing but Dad had to jump down and get him out or he'd have drowned. Another time, Maurice and me were leaning out of the bedroom window and we saw Harry Leeming coming down through the churchyard thinking to steal some of our pigeons. He hadn't seen Dad were fast asleep on the wall of the terrace.

We yelled and Dad woke up so suddenly, that he fell straight over the wall. But he chased Harry right round the church and gave him a good licking.”

When Derek had mastered basic carpentry skills, his father taught him how to weld.

Inevitably, living in a small, close knit community, the Hutchinson boys began to

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

get a reputation. “I were always in trouble with the police, with people telling lies about what we'd done and not done and it were always me that got the blame. Well alright, some of it weren't lies. Bobby Thompson thought he knew all that went on in the Kirkstall village area but he were right fat so he couldn't catch me if he saw me doing owt and, if he did, he'd just give me a crack round the head and take me home to tell me Mum. Mind you, it were different then, we only did the sort of things that kids have always done, not like the violence we have today. We weren't knocking old ladies over the head and pinching their money to buy drugs. We didn't have many friends because most of them couldn't stand the pace and anyway most people wouldn't allow their children to play with us. It were just the lads who were the same as us - those that had nowt.

“There were air raid shelters at the back of Tommy Wades. To get into them there were an air vent at the top with a cowling and you had to get under the cowling and drop down. We found a load of gas masks in one and there were a big stone table.

That's where we had our gang meet, where we'd share out the apples after we'd been out kipping. We'd take candles from the mantelpiece in the kitchen. Our gang were me and our John, the two Barrys, Tony, the four Moser brothers and two other brothers, Dennis and John. We'd have the occasional guests, but they had to bring their own candles and, from time to time, we'd have young lady members.”

Derek's career as a 'twocker' began at an early age and with one of the most desirable cars of all time. While motor vehicles were becoming more common, few people could afford to buy one, relying on the tram or their legs to get around. It was still not unusual to see horses and carts. In the summer, Betty worked at Wades the printers. “She were always as good as gold without the beer. If we wanted anything, like a few pence, we'd go round and knock on the door. One of the women would pop their head out, “Oh, do you want yer Mam?” Thomas Wade kept his Mark VII Jaguar out in the yard.

One day, I saw some fruit pastels on one of the front seats. That's what attracted us at first. We were sitting inside eating them, when I noticed a round starter button so I started it up and ran it straight into a wall.

There weren't a right lot of damage and he never said anything.”

When Derek was seven, he had his first serious accident. “Barry and me used to get up Kirkstall Hill the quick way, by

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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■ LIFESTYLE & PEOPLE hanging onto the backs of wagons. This day, there were a low loader with a trailer on the back. We were sitting on the tow bar and as it turned the corner half way up, the turning nuts tore off one of my finger nails and I fell under the wheels and smashed me legs. You could see through to the bone in places. I were in pots up to me waist with a metal bar across me shins.

I've still got the scars today. I couldn't do anything for meself so Mum had to give up work and look after me. She'd push me round in a spinal carriage. Maurice would have been about two so he came with us.

It must have been the year of the Coronation because someone came round from school with my commemoration mug. One day, she said she was taking us to Kirkstall Abbey but we only got as far as the Vespers. As a rule we never got past the George. Then every day was the same, the Vespers or the Star and Garter or the Far George or the West End or the Abbey or the Sovereign. She really started to hit the booze. That were the time when someone pinched our copper.” To this day, he not only remember the names of all eight pubs in the area but can list the different beers sold by each one.

Derek had his first contact with the law courts when he was eight years old. It involved guns. On the other side of the Recreational Club was a large patch of land. In the winter, this was taken over by a fairground. “They had an air rifle stand.

One night, I were there with John and a few mates with the idea of getting some rifles to play around with. John pushed me through a back window and I passed him seven rifles through a little hole in the back door. John gave me one and kept six for himself. He told me to hide them in the derelict part of the house because he were afraid of going there himself. We took them out in the cornfield on the hill a few times, taking pot shots at the garage over the road. One day, the police caught us at it. One of them said to me, 'What are you doing with that gun?' I threw it at him and ran but he knew who we were, everyone knew us. I got twelve months at the Attendance Centre because John lied, saying I had six guns and he only had one.

Mum knew the real score but she never said anything and I didn't put them right because you don't grass on your brother.

Every Saturday, I had to go to 'The Scrubs', a police run place up York Road, where you had to scrub the floor as a punishment.”

School was the only place where Derek was never in trouble. “From the very first day, I loved every minute. The teachers 28

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

were always pleased with me and I were expected to go to the grammar school.

When I went back after the accident, I began to write stories. I'd fill a whole exercise book in a lesson mostly about how I'd rob Lady Docker of all her jewels.

I'd been making up stories to pass the time, when I were in the spinal carriage outside the pub with our Maurice.” But grammar school didn't appeal to Derek.

None of his family or friends had ever passed the eleven plus. “John had already gone to Kirkstall Road Secondary and I wanted to go there too. I remember looking at the exam paper and thinking it were just so easy. I wrote a load of nonsense on it so I wouldn't pass. The teachers were upset and gave me a load of grief. They said I hadn't tried at all which were true enough.”

When Derek was in his first year of secondary school, he was convicted at Leeds Magistrates Court of breaking and entering. That's the official version. In reality, he was caught red-handed doing what less adventurous boys only dream of.

“We'd been on a school trip to the Abbey Museum and there were all these swords and stuff like that. That night, my mate Kenny said to me, “Let's go and have another look at that place.” One of the roof rests were open so that's how we got in. Inside, it were pitch black at first but then we could see all these knights in armour. Well, we were fencing up with a couple of the swords when suddenly the alarm went off and the caretaker came down. I didn't see him at first because he were behind me. I just saw Kenny turn round and jump straight through the window and I were stood there thinking, “What's wrong with him?” Police came and took me and that, basically, were the start of my life of crime. It wasn't really a crime because we'd no intention to steal owt. It were just a bit of excitement you know.

“Kenny were two or three years older than me but they remanded me in custody not him. I were put in Wortley Remand Home until the trial came up. I thought it were great. We played sport - a bit of rugby and football. There were school work and they had a woodwork shop. There were a mixture of lads up to fifteen years old. The older lads used to diss the lads who couldn't hack it but they were alright with me because I were as wise as them. We had three meals a day. We were warm at night and they gave us proper clothes short trousers, corduroy gear and proper shoes. I were used to Wellington boots with the toes cut out. There were no carry on at night, no drunkenness. I didn't miss

my family. When I went to court, I thought I'd be going back home and I weren't right happy. In court, they said to Kenny's Mum, ''Are you prepared to make sure that he won't do this again?' And she's going, “Oh yes, your Honour. I will your Honour.” Then they asked my Mum the same thing but she'd called in the Jubilee Bar on the way and she says, 'I'm afraid I can't look after him. He won't do as he's told'. So the judge gave me three years but I didn't mind. I just wanted to get back to Wortley for some tea. If I'd been born into a different family it might all have been different but as it were, when I look back at my childhood, it were about making the best of a bad job.”

Sentenced to three years, Derek rebelled against every harsh word, disregarded every punishment meted out to him and was always the first to come forward in defence of a friend. As a result, he ended up doing four.

Derek continued to live on the edge of danger until the age of 12 when, following a particularly daring escapade, his mother declared that he was beyond parental control and he was sent to approved school. Here, and later in the borstal system, he gained a reputation for being a formidable fighter. In 1974, he was selected for experimental psychosurgery which resulted in permanent brain damage.

Unable to win legal redress as a result of the Statute of Limitations, he has spent the last twenty years as a local, national and international campaigner against abuses in the mental health system.

Recently, he has worked tirelessly to restore the cemetery at High Royds Hospital where over 2,000 past inmates ('the lads and lassies' as Derek calls them) were buried in unmarked graves.

Today, he and his wife Carol live just up the hill from his childhood home and spends most weekends ferrying his grandsons to rugby matches.

Our thanks go out to Derek and to Hilary for letting us tell his story.

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

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KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Can you give a little time to make a big difference?

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Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Kirkstall Abbey by Jo Jones

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

31

■ LOCAL HISTORY

From Picture House to Bingo Hall

T

he Abbey Picture House, Kirkstall, in Leeds, opened, according to Preedy in Leeds Cinemas (and also according to the note accompanying the photo on the Leodis Web site; but see below) on 22 September 1913; and closed, to be turned into a Bingo Hall, on 8 October 1960. It was advertised as having 520 seats, five exits, and fifteen ventilators.

There was, as originally advertised, an orchestral balcony with music provided by a piano and violin under the direction of Mr Will Nettleton. (See Leodis web site; and see Illustration (1). It was one of the smaller cinemas; at the other extreme, the Majestic which opened in City Square in 1922, had 2,500 seats.

The original investors and owners were John Briggs, Miriam Ransley and Martha Dealey. In the first two decades of the twentieth century Leeds, and that included Kirkstall, witnessed two major changes.

First, it was the dawning of the age of the cinema (‘the pictures’ as they were more commonly known then; or ‘the movies’ as the Americans would have us call them); though perhaps, as the cinema has been reinvigorated and the Leeds International Film Festival approaches its twenty-sixth anniversary, one should now refer it as the first age of the cinema. In Leeds, the first purpose built cinema, also known as the Picture House (later becoming the Rialto) opened in Briggate in April 1911 (Leeds Cinemas: p 10) Some 56 cinemas opened in Leeds between 1910 and the end of 1919; excluding those listed by Preedy as ‘out of town’. Kelly’s Directory for 1923 lists 52 ‘Cinematograph Houses’ in Leeds. In 1931 the annual licence was renewed by the Watch Committee for 68 cinemas in Leeds. Besides the Abbey Picture House, there were at least 8 in Headingley-cumBurley: 4 in Kirkstall Road, 2 in Burley and 2 in Headingley.

This was the passive entertainment in the pre-telly age. Maybe not always entirely passive on the back row: ‘I spent many happy evenings in this cinema, I had my first “date” with my late wife Eunice there in 1950, in later years before it closed we used to call it our cinema because on some occasions there would be no other customers but us. I feel very sad when I pass it now. I still live in the area.’ (Comment by Eric Lee, downloaded from Leodis, 6/2/2012) And no doubt the ritual of the national and

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universally popular Saturday morning matinee was sometimes a noisy and not entirely passive affair: ‘I spent many an enjoyable Saturday morning watching the matinees with brothers, sisters and cousins, then riding my horse back to my grandparents’ house on Victoria Terrace. Colin Darby.’

(Downloaded from Leodis, as above.)

And the following from Kirkstall Oral History Group (From Spanish Wine, Page 54): ‘The Abbey Picture House was owned by Mr Sutcliff. William Pullan tried to keep the children quiet at the old 2d rush on Saturdays. He also sold sweets in the interval. Jam jars were accepted as entrance fees to the cinema.

After work you could go home, have your tea, and then go out to the pictures. There were a lot more picture houses in those days, one on nearly every corner, and the films changed twice a week.

The local cinemas were the Abbey Picture House, the Haddon Hall, the Burley Picture House (the “Bug Hutch”), the Lyceum and the Atlas.

Serials always ended each week with a cliff -hanger and you had to go next week to see what happened.

A favourite actress was Pearl White who was often tied to a railway line with a train approaching, or hanging over a cliff edge waiting to be rescued by the hero who

usually arrived on a white horse in the nick of time.

There were lots of Westerns with Cowboys and Indians. Cartoons which we watched were Felix the Cat; Mickey Mouse; Popeye.’

The Saturday experience was undoubtedly repeated throughout the city and the whole country. The following, from Kirkstall Matters, so captures the flavour, as I too remember it, that I must quote it in full. It relates to the Atlas (which, in 1935, became the Embassy) and had over 800 seats, in Kirkstall Road: SATURDAY AT THE PENNY RUSH by RON SMITH 'Whatever we had ever done on special days like election day as described in my last article, whatever games we had played during weekdays, or whatever innocent, harmless mischief we had indulged in, there is no doubt whatsoever that the highlight of every week was the Saturday afternoon at the cinema, or as we called it “the pictures”. Otherwise known as the 'Penny Rush’ because a penny, was the Issue 110 - Summer 2012

LOCAL HISTORY ■ cost of entrance. The pictures themselves were silent, all conversations between actors and actresses being printed on the screen. The only concession to sound was a piano, complete with a pianist sitting towards the side of the screen, who had to have a most diverse and prolific selection of tunes because he had to try to play something which would convey in music whatever was being enacted on the screen.

As can well be imagined, such scenes would often be changing and sometimes during the course of a few minutes.

Perhaps a cowboy would be lovingly gazing into the eyes of some attractive young lady and then the next moment he would be mounting a horse which would then gallop off at break neck speed. It is easy to imagine the vastly different tempo of music needed and how quickly the pianist had to act to effect such changes.

The particular pianist at the cinema I attended seemed to be there all through the year and had brought the job to a fine art. Such artistry was completely lost on the young audience and he could just as well have stayed at home. The cinema which I frequented was the 'ATLAS' and was situated down Kirkstall Road, less than 5 minutes walk from my home.

There must have been many hundreds of youngsters living in close proximity to the ATLAS, consequently it was always packed to bursting point, with a uniformed usher dashing hither and thither up and down the aisles trying to keep some semblance of order. It was just as well that the films were silent because there is no way that even our young and sensitive ears would have been able to pick up most of the dialogue had there been sound. That is why the pianist might well have stayed at home. We kids provided all the necessary accompaniment to the films. When a film had a scene of the cowboy and his woman embracing and kissing it would be given short shrift. In those days, and at our age, we boys had no time for girls, let alone watching the older ones being fondled and kissed. It was all just too “sloppy” and the cry would have gone up, rising to a crescendo “Tek um off”. This would never happen today with our sophisticated youngsters, or if it did the words would have an entirely different connotation All this would be immediately forgotten when the cowboy mounted his horse and galloped away for then all the lads would be shouting themselves hoarse, standing up and waving both arms urging their hero to push his steaming horse to run faster and faster in order to catch up with the baddies who always seemed to be just

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

ahead. These westerns which usually dealt with Cowboys and Indians were part of the staple film diet and arguably the first favourite amongst those youngsters. Next in popularity came the comedies, mostly of the custard pie type and which would have us rolling in the aisles. Such films were responsible for developing a small army of comedians to such an extent that some of their names are known to quite a few of us some 60 to 70 years on. If ever their old films appear on T.V., these names draw really big audiences. Some who come to mind are Charles Chaplin, Chester Conklin, Harold Lloyd, Laurel and Hardy, Ben Turpin and, he of the unsmiling face, Buster Keaton. The third type of silent film which had a big following was known as a serial.

These were full of drama and held their young audiences absolutely spellbound even though the story dragged on Saturday after Saturday. Such serials cunningly managed to finish every episode with either the hero or heroine in terrifying danger such as being trapped in a cave as water came rushing in. When the surging water nearly reached their chins the picture would end abruptly and on the screen would be flashed rhetorical questions such as “Will our heroes survive?” “Is any hope left?” “Do not miss next week's thrilling instalment”, As it turned out it was more difficult for the average lad of 10 to survive the following week as he pondered the fate of his heroes than it was for the heroes themselves as they had the writer, producer and director firmly on their side!!

It was different for us for the simple reason that it was often difficult to separate fiction from reality. The characters in at least some of these serials came to life for us so that we really thought that the water,was endangering their lives and we hoped that on the following Saturday, by some miracle, they would come out of their immediate danger safe and sound.

Somehow they always did, only to become entrapped in some new threat and danger by the time that week's episode ended.

What wonderful, enthralling Saturday afternoons those were, life without them was unimaginable to us - but time would prove how wrong we were.... How much money did it cost for those wonderful Saturday afternoons? The Penny Rush says it all. Just think, two hours of rapturous entertainment which engulfed every fibre of our being for only a third of a new penny!’ (Kirkstall Matters 1994) By 1960 the telly was arriving and cinemas, like the Abbey, being turned commonly into Bingo Halls; until Bingo too gave way to the television age: ‘As a projectionist of

37 years experience I think the closing of cinemas is due, not to bad projection, but to the fact that so many people are paying out so much on instalments for television sets, cars and household devices. (Quoted in Yorkshire Evening Post. Saturday, 8 October 1960.)

The second major change, at the same time, was that Kirkstall was changing; from being part of the largely agricultural fiefdoms of the Brudenells (the Earls of Cardigan – the seventh Earl, being he of the ‘Valley of Death’, and the Balaclava folly) and the Grahams; and becoming a residential suburb of Leeds; with its rows of through and back-to-back, red brick terraces; a suburb of owner-occupiers (or at least, tenant-occupiers). The ambience of the Normans (and the Abbey Picture House is in Abbey Road, immediately next to the block of streets known as the Normans - which also includes De Lacy Mount) before these changes occurred is caught by the following reminiscence: ‘It was one of my duties as a small boy to “Take my father’s dinner”. I left school ten minutes early, ran home, collected the small wicker basket with the dinner inside, was given a ha’penny to pay the tram fare from the Abbey to the Forge and set off. I walked down Station Parade, on “t’top road” and across a field now occupied by the Normans to the Abbey gate where I caught a tram. It took me to the Forge gate, where an obelisk marked – it still does - the midway point between London and Edinburgh. It was an unimaginable and undreamed of two hundred miles each way.’ (From: Kirkstall As I knewIt: 18961914, H Sydney Pickering, published 1982, Kirkstall Valley Community Association.-copy in Leeds Central Local Studies Library.)

By a series of conveyances culminating in one of 27 June 1901(the memorial to be seen at WRRD) the land between Morris Lane and Abbey Road (NE-SW) and between Abbey Field and Tordoff Terrace (NW-SE) was bought by a consortium of builders and investors: Arthur Eddison of Leeds (Builder), William Exley of Halifax (Dyer), George Darley (who was too dead by 1907 to enjoy his entrepreneurial fruits) and William Bower of Leeds (Builder).

Subsequently the land was shared between them and actual development begun. It is here that the history of the Abbey Picture House really begins; and the Misses Ransley and Dealey (both milliners by trade) enter upon the Kirkstall stage.

In a conveyance of 2nd September 1913 William Bower and William Exley (vol 38, p KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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■ LOCAL HISTORY 404, no 164 at WRRD) conveyed to Miriam Ransley, Martha Dealey and John Briggs, greengrocer, a plot of land situate in Abbey Road, Kirkstall, containing 518 ½ sq yards, bounded on the north-east by a new street 12 yards wide called Vesper Grove, on the north-west by other property of the said William Bower and William Exley, on the south-east now or late of George Reason and on the southwest by Abbey Road (see Illustrations 4 & 5). No doubt this was part of land allocated to Bower and Exley out of the purchase of 1901. It is the plot on which the Abbey Picture House stands. On 1 January 1914 (WRRD vol 1; p 282, deed no 94) Miriam, Martha and John mortgaged the property to a John Cecil Atkinson, of 6 Butt’s Court, Leeds, a solicitor. No doubt this was to make long term provision towards the cost of buying the land and having the cinema built – presumably financed initially by short term loans. Until well after the Second World War solicitors played an important role in arranging private mortgages (as opposed to the saving with and borrowing from banks or building societies which has become the ubiquitous and almost universal practice today) between clients with capital to invest and clients in need of loans; the solicitor, as here, not infrequently investing his own money in this way. Much of the nineteenth century development of Leeds must have been financed in this way.

There is a curiosity here. Preedy gives the opening date of the Picture House as the 22 September 1913 (see above). The conveyance transferring the land to Ransley, Dealey and Briggs is dated 2nd September 1913; and yet speaks of a picture house yet to be built; for example in requiring the purchasers ‘so soon as they erect the buildings intended to be placed by them on the said plot of land to build a wall along the line marked ABC ….’

It must be that, a not uncommon practice then and now, the parties had entered into a preliminary contract so that the building work could proceed before the actual conveyance; without the wording of the conveyance being redrafted to reflect this.

A rather nice note is a covenant (undertaking) in the conveyance by the three buyers against the use of any building on the land ‘for any noisy, noisome, or offensive trade but this shall not prevent the user of any building thereon as a Picture House’.

That the cinema did open for the first time on 22 September 1913 is pretty well confirmed by the minutes and resolutions of the Leeds Watch Committee The Watch 34

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Committee was a committee of and delegated by the City Council (the Corporation), concerned primarily with the management of the police force; but also, amongst other functions, with the consideration of applications for licences for cinematograph and musical performances, ‘During the 1890s and 1900s, most film exhibition took place in temporary venues such as fairgrounds, music halls and hastily converted shops (so-called ‘penny gaffs’).

The film then in use was made from the highly flammable cellulose nitrate base.

Combined with limelight illumination, this created a significant safety hazard, resulting in a number of fatal fires.

The 1909 Act specified a strict building code which required, amongst other things, that the projector be enclosed within a fire resisting enclosure. All commercial cinemas (defined as any business which admitted members of the public to see films in exchange for payment) had to comply with these regulations. In order to enforce this each cinema had to be inspected and licensed by the local authority. The Act was amended in the wake of the 1929 Glen Cinema Disaster in order to give local authorities more powers to regulate the number of emergency exits and insist on other safety measures.’

cinematograph entertainments be indicated by means of illuminated signs so arranged as to be easily visible to the audience’.

That the first two decades of the twentieth century witnessed the blossoming of the cinema in Leeds (and elsewhere) is testified to by the passing of the Cinematograph Act 1909, the introduction of a regime of general regulations made by the government acting under the Act and the additional local regulations such as those for Leeds formally approved by the Council on 3 December 1913; by the founding of the Cinematograph Exhibitors’ Association of Great Britain and Ireland; and by the large number of applications to the Watch Committee for licences in this period.

Wikipedia –‘Cinematograph Act 1909’, downloaded 14-02-21-2012 – links omitted.

To return to the Abbey Picture House: On 22 April 1913 the Watch Committee resolved: ‘That the plan of Mr John Briggs for a proposed Picture Hall in Abbey Road and Vesper Grove, Kirkstall, be approved so far as this committee are concerned [approval under the City’s building regulations would also be required and the formal confirmation of the Watch Committee’s decision by the full Council] provided the exits be improved on the lines now suggested and that upon the building being completed to the satisfaction of the Committee, the Council be recommended to grant licences for cinematograph and instrumental music for the same.’

Typically, the following Resolution of the Watch Committee of 22 October 1912:

On 27 June 1913 an amended seating plan put forward by Briggs was not approved.

‘Resolved: That the application of the Leeds Arcade Company Ltd for music and cinematograph licences for the Savoy Café, Queen’s Arcade, Briggate, be acceded to subject to the plans being amended to the satisfaction of the Chairman and Deputy Chairman and to the following conditions;-

And on 19 September 1913 it was reported to the Committee that the Abbey Picture House, Kirkstall, referred to in the Minutes of 22 April last, had been satisfactorily completed. And so, as stated by Preedy, it would seem that the cinema did open on the 22 September 1913. All these applications were made by Briggs, making him the licensee, and supporting the thought that Miriam and Martha were simply sleeping partners (see below).

 That performances be continuous and no queues formed

 That the staircase leading from the entrance be widened as now directed, that the door in the operating room leading onto the landing be blocked up and the fire escape staircase continued to such room.

 That the yard leading from the fire escape be kept clear and the photo frames and gates be removed

 That fire appliances be provided.’  And on 22 November 1912 there was a resolution of general application that:

 ‘All exit doors of premises licensed for

One of the local, general regulations provided that there were to be no Sunday performances, none before twelve noon and none after eleven o’clock at night without the special permission of the Watch Committee. On the 21 November 1913 Mr Briggs was refused permission for a Sunday performance ‘to employ vocalists to give selections at a benefit performance in aid of Kirkstall District Nursing Fund.’ He was more fortunate the following year when he applied for permission to hold a Sunday performance of ‘a sacred concert’ at the Picture House and on 23 December Issue 110 - Summer 2012

LOCAL HISTORY ■ a statement of receipts and expenditure for the concert was submitted to the Committee. There must later have been a general relaxation of the rule in order to allow the Saturday morning performances for kids which became almost universal.

Fred, the architect.

The Abbey Picture House was designed by Fred Mitchell. Fred was born in 1863 and trained in Leeds. He began independent practice in 1887, in Leeds, in partnership with C D Swale. (See Directory of British Architects 1834-1914 published by the Royal Institute of British Architects; and see Who’s Who in Architecture- 1914, also published by the RIBA ). He practised at 9 Upper Fountaine Street, Leeds (See the above and Kelly’s Directory of Leeds, 1914).

‘He devoted himself to commercial and domestic architecture but his other works included extensions to Leeds Infirmary, St Chad’s Home at Far Headingley and the Canon Jackson Memorial Wing at Cookridge Hospital in 1894. He was also responsible for the design of many housing schemes in Leeds…………(RIBA Journal vol 91 I January 1984, p 87)

Victorian style architecture, particularly in areas like Beeston The Hyde Park Picture House, Hyde Park was originally built in 1908 as a hotel and in 1914 it was converted into a picture house. The cinema has gas lighting, the original organ and piano. It is a grade II listed building and one of the few surviving picture palaces in the UK. The picture house is regarded by many to be one of the finest examples of Edwardian architecture in Leeds.’

But, as noted here, the Hyde Park was originally designed as a hotel, not a cinema. And no doubt hotel visitors in Edwardian England were more demanding of the aesthetics of their surroundings than we kids crowding in on a Saturday to see Lassie Come Home or the latest episode in the annihilation of American Indians by the white cowboys and the cavalry. In fairness, I should say that today the Abbey Picture House still looks from the outside much as it must have looked as a working cinema; and I must say that to me it has now acquired a certain mellow charm.

Of a little more interest in the present context, he designed both the Abbey Picture House and two other cinemas in Leeds: The Regent Picture House in Torre Road, Burmantofts, with seating for 1,076, which opened on 1s May 1916; and closed in 1971 when, like The Abbey, it became a Bingo Hall; later a tile and wallpaper emporium. (See Illustration (2)). The other one was the Palace Picture Theatre in Westfield Road, Burley with 308 seats, the licence to open being granted on 10 March 1913, and which closed in 1916.

(See Illustration (3) from Leeds Cinemas Remembered, p 30).

The last two illustrations copied here are of the cinemas after, perhaps long after, they had closed and been put to other uses.

They are not seen at their best. But it is perhaps fair to say that many of the cinemas of this period in Leeds – at least those away from the city centre – were little more than large brick boxes (at least the conveyances to John, Miriam and Martha did insist on the use of ‘best pressed bricks’) with some sort of façade of indeterminate style ‘stuck’ on the front.

Of course, there were exceptions: Wikipedia (Architecture of Leeds; downloaded, 7/02-2012) suggests: ‘For the first decade of the 20th century many areas of Leeds saw a continuation of Issue 110 - Summer 2012

sister Mary, as a milliner’s assistant. Brother John, aged, 24, is shown as a draper; and there is another brother, A W [?] Ransley, aged 8. Miriam’s father, like the rest of his family, was born in Rothwell, Leeds., his own father being a farmer.

An entry at the West Riding Register of Deeds shows that Miriam’s mother, Sarah, made a will on the 23 March 1893 and died on 2 March 1906. Her property included numbers 1 Carr Place, Claypit Lane where the family lived and number 2; also her share in the estate of her late father (Miriam’s grandfather), John Lacy; and also the shares in this estate of her brothers, Hampshire and William which she had purchased from them; obviously she was not a pauper.

It seems that Miriam acquired the Carr Street properties whether directly under her mother’s will (the note at WRRD does not give details) or indirectly from the immediate beneficiaries. A conveyance of 1908 recorded at WRRD (vol 38: p 538: no.

232) shows Miriam (of the Bon Marche, Cleckheaton) conveying the two houses in Carr Place to an Ernest Osborn of Leeds, engraver. It is likely that this provided (in whole or part) the funds for her and Martha to invest in the Abbey Picture House. It also illustrates how a good deal of the nineteenth century, flourishing development of Leeds was the small-scale work (small plot by small plot, each enough for a few houses perhaps) of independent tradesmen, craftsmen and skilled workers– greengrocers like John Briggs; milliners, drapers and machinists like Miriam’s family, who had joined the unavoidable migration from rural to city life; some of them prospering generally in a minor way; others forming the underbelly of the city’s poverty..

And Miss Dealey (Martha)

Miss Ransley (Miriam) At the time of the 1881 census Miriam is 18, at home with her parents, John and Sarah; at 1 Carr Place, in North-West Leeds; Parish of St Matthew. He is a machinist, she is a milliner. They have with them four children including Miriam. They are not destitute, having with them a domestic servant, Sarah Malham from Selby, aged 23. Miriam is shown, like her

Martha first appears (to me) in the census of 1871 in Headingley. And here is a connection with Kirkstall. The census return for 1871 shows her, aged six, with her parents, John and Mary, two brothers and a sister. They are in Burley (part of the township of Headingley-cum-Burley which included Kirkstall). Her father is a plate shearer in an ironworks. The whole family, apart from the father, were born in Leeds.

By the time of the 1881 census, they are still living in Burley. Our Martha (Martha Ann), now aged 16, has become a dressmaker. Her brother John, aged 18, is a millwright’s apprentice. She has three sisters and three other brothers.

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

35

■ LOCAL HISTORY And in 1891 the family is still at Metcalfe Terrace in Burley. Martha, now aged 26, is still with them and unmarried and still employed as a dressmaker. But things will soon change.

A lifelong partnership begins By the 1901 census much has changed.

Martha (now aged 34) and Miriam (aged 35) are now living together at Cheapside in Cleckheaton, in a modest three mainroomed property. They now both describe themselves as milliners; and (at least by the census of 1911) they are in partnership working for themselves. [Note: Cheapside is shown on today’s A to Z, leading off Northgate].

In 1911 they are still together, still both single, still living in Cleckheaton, at 41 Whitcliffe Road. Miriam is described as the head of the household, Martha as her partner; and they are both in trade in partnership as milliners. They seem to have done reasonably well; and without children to be a drain on their income.

The conveyance of the Picture House Land in 1913 (above) gives the address of Miriam, Martha and John Briggs as 320 Burley Hill. So does the conveyance when they all three bought the adjoining plot of land in 1919 (below). But they had in fact by then arrived in Kirkstall. The 1917 Kelly’s Directory for Leeds shows them both living at 26 Vesper Road, less than a mile from the Abbey Picture House.

The Burley Hill address, John Briggs’ own address, was no doubt used in the conveyances as, in effect, the business address of the partnership; and suggests that perhaps John Briggs was the driving force in the venture, having perhaps persuaded Miriam and Martha to invest their money in the venture; and that they were in effect, at least until 1923, sleeping partners. I have not found anything to suggest that Miriam and Martha were ever actively involved in the practical, day to day, management of the picture house.

Neither have I seen any evidence that they owned 26 Vesper Road (or number 54 to which they later moved) or any other landed property; though they must have been able to raise the capital, either from savings or perhaps by a mortgage loan, to buy out John Briggs’ share in the Picture House (see below). Maybe the Picture House was for the two of them an investment, an investment rather than an active business venture, which was to maintain them in their old age – what today would be called their pension pot.

36

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Kelly’s Directory of Leeds for 1936 again shows Miriam and Martha both living at 26 Vesper Road. Kelly’s Directory for 1938 shows them now at 54 Vesper Road; and this is where they were living when Miriam died, aged, 77, on 26 August 1941; still a spinster. Martha died in 1954, aged 89, also still a spinster. Number 54, today, appears as a very solid, stone-built, semidetached house. The two spinsters must have been fairly comfortable.

But before Miriam died, they had sold the Picture House. This is what happened.

The Second Plot And Afterwards.

In 1919 (by a conveyance of 15 December 1919 recorded at the WRRD – vol 98; p 367; deed no 121) the three of them had acquired, again from Bower & Exley, the patch of vacant land next to the Picture House. The ‘second plot’ I will call it. This was the piece of land between Vesper Grove, Norman Street and Abbey Road, containing 947 square yards. The two plots together are shown in Illustrations (4) and (5) copied from the Ordnance survey map for 1906 (originally at a scale of 1/2500). It will be seen that in 1906 the two plots together formed a remaining, triangle of land between the houses on the Vesper Grove, Norman Street and Tordoff’s Terrace; and adjoining Abbey Road..

I found no evidence that they borrowed money on mortgage to purchase this second plot; and as it was not at the time built on, would have been relatively cheap.

The mortgage-loan from Atkinson was repaid on 1 October 1919 (WRRD vol 69: p 578: deed no 221); that is before the purchase of this second plot. All this suggests that the cinema had been proving reasonably successful. There is no real evidence as to what if anything in particular they wanted it for. No doubt it was sensible in any case to control this remaining bit of space next to the Picture House. The conveyance contained, like the earlier conveyance of the Picture House land itself, a covenant against any noisy, noisome or offensive trade but not so as to prevent use of the land as a Picture House.

Presumably they did not want it as a car park (and there must have been even fewer arriving, like Colin Darby, by horse and needing a place for it to graze during the performance.)

It is speculation, but quite likely that they had thoughts of enlarging the cinema at some time in the future. And certainly this is what Arthur Sutcliffe had thoughts of doing after he acquired the Picture House

in 1936 (see below).

In 1923, by a conveyance of 4 October (WRRD: vol 80; p 983; deed no. 348) John Briggs transferred his third-share in the Picture House and the additional, second plot to Miriam and Martha. By this time he was living just down the road at 18 De Lacy Mount, which had been built about 1907. I have not discovered exactly when he moved to 18 De Lacy Mount.

It seems likely that at this point a split occurred between ownership of the land and buildings on the one hand and ownership of the cinema business on the other. Miriam and Martha were now sole owners of the land and buildings. It is likely that at this point John Briggs became the sole owner of the cinema business. He certainly continued as manager at that stage. It is of course possible and very common for one person to own the land and a different person to own the business being pursued on that land; the latter paying what might be called a ground rent to the landowner for the use of the land.

At present, I have little information on John Briggs. He was, it seems a greengrocer by trade; and was, in 1913 and until he moved to De Lacy Mount, living at 350 Burley Hill. He was initially the manager of the Picture House; as well as part owner.

Although he had transferred his interest to Miriam and Martha John Briggs continued as manager of the Abbey Picture House, presumably under some financial arrangement with Martha and Miriam. The Watch Committee Minutes show that on 6 January 1932 he was the applicant for the annual renewal of the licence for music and cinematograph. He is described there as ‘proprietor’ It could be that he was being employed and paid by Miriam and Martha to run the cinema business (but then he would hardly have been the proper person to apply for the licence). It is more likely, as I have suggested, that John now had ownership of the cinema business; but was paying rent to Miriam and Martha for use of the land and building of which now (since 1923) they were the sole owners.

It seems that, in 1932, Arthur Sutcliffe took over the cinema business from Briggs. On 2 September of that year the Watch Committee Minutes record a resolution that the licence of the Abbey Picture House (Music and Cinematograph) be transferred from Mr John Briggs to Mr Arthur Sutcliffe of 9 Haddon Road. Sutcliffe had been from 1913, when it opened, the manager of the Picture House, Burley, Issue 110 - Summer 2012

LOCAL HISTORY ■ owned by the Burley Picture House Company Ltd. It is likely that Sutcliffe controlled this company and was, in effect, the real owner of the Burley Picture House.

Kelly’s Directory for Leeds for 1929 does describe him as cinema proprietor.

And in 1936 (by which time Miriam was about 72 and Martha about 71) (see WRRD 1939; vol 59; p 869; deed no 324) they sold the Picture House (together with the adjoining, the second, plot) to Arthur Sutcliffe. He thus acquired ownership of the land and building as well as the cinema business.

The planning agreement – 1939 We do know that Arthur in 1939 had intentions (fruitless in the end) to enlarge the cinema extending it into the second plot.

An agreement between Arthur Sutcliffe and the Leeds Corporation is preserved at the West Yorkshire Archives at Leeds (LLD1/1/A11212); and see Minutes of Watch Committee for 21 April 1939). This was made within the framework of the ‘Leeds (Bramley, Farnley and Wortley) Planning Scheme, and related to proposed ‘Alterations and Additions to the Abbey Cinema, Abbey Road, Kirkstall.’ This scheme had in turn been prepared under s 10 of the Town and Country Planning Act of 1932.

At last, town planning was coming to Kirkstall!!

This Act was one of the earliest attempts, going back really to the Housing, Town Planning, etc Act of 1909, prior to the Second World War, to control planning in the social interest, to curb the centuriesold, largely unfettered right of landowners to use their land as they wished, subject only to the health and sanitary laws developed in the nineteenth century and the common law against trespass and nuisance.

Section 54 of the 1909 gave local authorities the power, turned into an obligation under the later legislation, to prepare schemes: ‘as respects any land which is in course of development or appears likely to be used for building purposes, with the general object of securing proper sanitary conditions, amenity, and convenience in connection with the laying out and use of land, and of any neighbouring lands.’

The agreement with Arthur Sutcliffe was concluded on 10 June 1939. In the Agreement his plan to make ‘alterations

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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■ LOCAL HISTORY and additions’ to the Abbey Cinema (as it was now being called) was approved by the City Corporation, subject to certain conditions. These were that no signs or advertisements would be affixed to any part of the cinema or in its vicinity except the name of the cinema in a position and lettering approved by the City Engineer; and that any posters to be displayed in connection with films to be shown would be placed on the panel provided for the purpose as shown in the plans submitted with Sutcliffe’s application.

There is a plan attached to the Agreement showing the area covered by the agreement. As far as I can tell, it shows that the proposal was to extend the cinema into the second plot. And as far as I can tell the result would have been that the extended cinema would have occupied some two-thirds of the original and second plot together. But it never happened.

The bit of the second plot adjoining the cinema which can be seen in the picture (Illustration (1) copied here from Leodis and taken, it says there, in August 1937 suggests that this plot was then still wasteland. Sutcliffe got his consent to expand on 10 June 1939; the Second World War started (according to the conventional dating) with the invasion of Poland by the German Government on 1 September 1939. This second plot next to the original cinema is still without any building.

In 1944 (a conveyance dated 12 July 1944: vol 59; p 358; deed no 163 at WRRD) Arthur Sutcliffe sold the Picture House with the two plots of land (and also other land on the corner of Abbey Road and Kirkstall Lane) to Abbey Entertainments Ltd, whose registered office was at the Abbey Picture House. On 7 July 1944 the licence had been transferred by the Watch Committee from Arthur Sutcliffe to Leslie Preston, one of the directors of Abbey Entertainments (see below) On 1st May 1964, Abbey Entertainments sold the land on the corner of Abbey Road and Kirkstall Lane to the City Corporation, presumably to enable the creation of Kirkstall Leisure Centre as is still there, of course. And in 1967 (5 October) the WRRD shows that Abbey Entertainments sold the Picture House with the two plots of land to Kenneth Gummersall, Chartered Accountant, of 20 Moor Grange View and Leslie Preston, Company Director, of 402 Street Lane, Leeds. From the above it seems likely that Preston (and perhaps Gummersall) were the real owners of 38

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Abbey Entertainments; and that the sale in 1967 was just a rearrangement of their business affairs.

‘intend to modernise and landscape it and then use it for their industrial machinery business.

The Abbey Picture House (as noted in the Watch Committee Minutes for 20 October) closed as a cinema on 8 October 1960; and after it had closed, probably soon after, the building was converted into a Bingo Hall.

It seems likely that Bingo was introduced to the Abbey Picture House early in the 1960s and was abandoned around 198384.

‘By the late 1950s it was clear that, no matter how many laws were passed, gambling had continued to expand, largely as part of commercial leisure provision.

The continued commercial growth of bingo, whether in the black economy, the quasi-commercial regular charitable games, or as part of the organised entertainments at holiday camps, is indicative of the need being met by those providing the opportunity for the masses to indulge in a gamble on bingo….

Under the Betting and Gaming Bill [becoming the Act of 1960] as first published it was possible to 'play houseyhousey as an activity of a club if all the money staked is returned to the players.'

As the Betting and Gaming Bill also allowed there to be a charge for the right to take part in the game there was an obvious loophole soon noticed by the anti -gambling movement, seaside corporations and leisure entrepreneurs….

January 1961 and the first commercial bingo club opened on 3 January. The floodgates were opened, and by 1963, there were 14,324,081 individual members of commercial bingo clubs….’

From Playing Bingo.com http:// playingbingo.co.uk/bingo-historyfolklore/01-pb-bingo-history3.shtml#axzz1m0ZiGxfF Downloaded, 10 February 2012 As noted at the start of this piece, the Abbey Picture House closed in October 1960. So far I have not found any reliable information on the dates of its existence as a Bingo Hall. The Leeds Telephone Directories for 1961through 1966 at least list it as ‘Abbey Cinema, Abbey Road; with the telephone number 54232.

In the alphabetical listing in the Leeds Telephone Directory for 1969 it is listed as ‘Abbey Bingo and Social Club, Abbey Road; 59863.’ This is the first mention I have found of its life as a Bingo Hall. Its disappearance from the Directories after 1983 suggests, more convincingly, that it ceased life as a Bingo Hall in 1983-84.

There is a note in Kirkstall Matters (1984-5, No 24) that the Abbey Picture House had been bought by Mr & Mrs Lyons who

When I cam to live in Kirkstall in 1991 the Abbey Picture House was empty and neglected. Within the last few years the building has been acquired by the charity, Mind. Hopefully it will now be renovated and brought into beneficial use as part of their activities.

The Watch Committee A note on the Watch Committee. The remit of the Watch Committee, as a delegate of the local authority, was to deal with not just the management of the local police force, but also a range of other matters, for example: hackney carriage licensing; music licensing; the location of petrol pumps; the fire brigade and its ladders; permissions for flower and flag days; pawnbrokers’ licences; and so on; and of course the granting of cinematograph and music licences. The serious risk of fire and its prevention must have been a serious and constant concern of the Watch Committee.

Between 1929 and 1945 at least 9 outbreaks of fire at cinemas were reported to the Watch Committee in Leeds; including one at the Abbey Picture House on 2 February 1945.

A further, brief, excursion into their Minute Books in this period will give an idea of the sort of increasingly regulated regime to which Cinemas were subject in this period, early in the twentieth century – and I refer to regulation without any pejorative intent; far from it - and a flavour of some of the matters which would concern the daily management of such a cinema.

Thus, on 4 May 1923, the Committee resolved ‘that no objection be raised by the Committee to the application of the licensee of the Coliseum, Cookridge Street, for permission for an elocutionist to recite a prologue to the film entitled “Where is my Wandering Boy Tonight” during the week commencing the 7th inst, on the understanding that the elocutionist does not appear in character costume.’ At this time the cinema had still not become a creature, entirely distinct from the theatre and the music hall. And Watch Committees were perhaps never terribly happy about music halls.

I cannot resist here a note on ‘Where is my

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

LOCAL HISTORY ■ Wandering Boy Tonight; leaving any reader to imagine the Prologue: ‘This mawkish tale of mother love was loaded with -- as film critics of the 1920s liked to say -"hokum." It was supposedly inspired by the old song of the same title. Cullen Landis plays Garry Beecher, your classic small town boy who is seduced by the promises of New York. So he heads for the big city, leaving his mother (Virginia True Boardman) and sweetheart, Lorna Owens (Patsy Ruth Miller), at home to pine for him. Of course, he forgets all about them and becomes involved with Veronica Tyler, a cynical chorus girl (Kathleen Key). But he can't keep up with her extravagant tastes and when he begins stealing, she turns him in. He goes to prison as a result, but redeems himself during an uprising among the prisoners by snatching the warden from a train which is about to have a headon collision. The grateful warden gives Garry a pardon, and he returns to his small town home, his mother and his girl.’

lighting be installed at the Headingley Police Station and resident officer’s quarters at an estimated cost of £36.10s [that is £36 10 shillings – or £36. 50p in today’s coinage]. Modernism, lit and powered by electricity, it might be said, is coming to Kirkstall

Downloaded from Answers.com on 20 February 2012. <http://www.answers.com/ main/entertainment.jsp>

On 5 April 1929 an Inspector was appointed under the Explosives Acts with authority at all reasonable times to enter any premises being used for any purpose to which the 1922 Celluloid and Cinematograph Act applies and to take for analysis samples of any materials which he suspects to contain celluloid.

‘And on the same date, 4 May 1923: ‘A report was submitted with respect to the operating box at the Grand Assembly Rooms, New Briggate, on the 26th ultimo.

Resolved that the Building surveyor report with respect to the method of construction of operating boxes in premises licensed for cinematograph entertainment’.

On 21 September `1923 a variation in the standard conditions to be attached to licences granted under the 1909 Act was agreed (subject to the approval of the Council): ‘Subject as hereinafter provided no music be permitted other than instrumental music. Provided that the singing by one or more persons of songs descriptive of or appropriate to accompany the exhibition of any film exhibited and occasional singing of appropriate music by members of the orchestra may be permitted on condition that no comic song shall be sung and that no vocalist shall sing elsewhere than from the stage or orchestra and that no vocalist shall appear in comic or character costume.’

And also on 8 August: ‘Resolved that permission be granted for the installation of wireless receiving apparatus at Malvern Picture House, Beeston Road.’

On 28 November 1924: ‘Resolved re application by the Lyric Picture House, Tong Road, for two Indians to appear in native costume with an interpreter in conjunction with exhibition of the film “The Covered Wagon” be refused.’

On 19 February 1926 – the only specific mention in the January 1925 to December 1929 Minutes, – the Abbey Picture House was granted permission to hold a meeting of the Independent Labour Party on 28 February.

And a final illustration, on 22 July 1927 a communication from the Home Office was reported, requiring the Town Clerk to submit draft regulations to be inserted into all cinematograph licenses prohibiting films – other than photographs of current events – which have not been passed for ‘Universal Exhibition’ from being exhibited at entertainments provided primarily for children.

---------------------------------------------

It was not compulsory to register your title deeds but the majority of people did register them when a transaction lead to a change in ownership. Between 1704 and 1970 some 7 million deeds were registered and indexed. Freehold and Leasehold deeds were registered but it was not possible to register Copyhold land or leases for less than 21 years. As well as title deeds probate documents were also registered to indicate the transfer of title.

‘Leeds Cinemas.’ Leeds Cinemas Robert E Preedy (2005, Temple Publishing Ltd, Stroud) ‘Leeds Cinemas Remembered.’ Leeds Cinemas Remembered, Robert E Preedy, (1980).

‘Leeds’ Watch Committee’. The Minutes of Leeds Watch Committee 1912 to 1967, held at West Yorkshire Archives in Leeds: LLC5/1/20 to LLC5/1/30.

‘Spanish Wine’: Spanish Wine Kirkstall Vintage: Memories of Kirkstall; published by the Kirkstall Oral History Group; being a book of ‘reminiscences and photographs about growing up, living and working in Kirkstall from the 1920s to the 1950s.’

‘Kirkstall Matters’ Kirkstall Matters – the magazine of KVCA – The Kirkstall Village (later ‘Valley’) Community association. The first issue appeared in the autumn of 1978.

Note: I have so far found little information relating to the Abbey Picture House after it ceased to be used as a cinema. If anyone reading this has any information or reminiscences relating to the Picture House at any stage of its life, I should be very happy to hear from them.

References ‘Leodis’. This is a photographic archive of Leeds organised by Leeds Library and Information Service < http:// www.leodis.org/>

Mike Harwood 19 May 2012. (24delacymount @tiscali.co.uk)

‘WRRD’. West Riding Registry of Deeds

On 22 October 1923 our cinema, the Abbey Picture House, gets a brief mention: ‘Application acceded to for Abbey Picture House for 11 November for religious meeting under the auspices of the Kirkstall United Free Churches.’ No danger of music hall antics here!

‘The West Riding Registry of Deeds was established by Act of Parliament in 1704 and operated until September 1970. One of only five Deeds Registries in the country it was created to allow land holders to register the title to their property. The Registry operated across the whole of the West Riding of Yorkshire and contains summaries or memorials of the registered title deeds.

On 8 August 1924: ‘Resolved that electric

These memorials do not contain all the

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

details of the original but will give the date, the names and addresses of the parties and a brief description of the property. They do not tend to give details of the covenants and frequently do not include a plan.

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

39

KIRKSTALL ABBEY TENNIS CLUB Playing at Kirkstall Abbey Free coaching for juniors and adults Tournaments & social events Membership:

Adults Family Juniors

£25 £50 £5

Concessions for Priority Leeds Card Holders New members welcome For more information contact Jason Sears on 07814 549170 or sears-j@sky.com

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KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

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Strong performances before Christmas have but Burley in a good position to stay up. Since then the luck just hasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t gone their way with oppositions managing to

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

scrape narrow victories in last minutes of play; otherwise the club could be a lot higher in the league.The team are still focused on playing their style of running rugby. With 6 matches to go Burley are aiming for a finish in the top 8. the club is always welcoming to new players. So if you fancy playing rugby

please come down at participate. Training is Tuesday and Thursday nights 6:30pm to 9pm.

If you are interested in joining Burley RUFC or would like to attend a training session, please contact either Henry Bisson on 07812 174762, or James Griffin on 07983 418003.

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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TOOLS SERVICED AND SHARPENED; MOWER SPARES



KEYS CUT WHILE YOU WAIT - PLEASE ASK

VACUUM BAGS, BELTS AND FILTERS; COOKER AND FRYER FILTERS VISIT US FOR WATCH BATTERIES & STRAPS WE HAVE AN EXTENSIVE RANGE OF DIY SUPPLIES WE STOCK A WIDE RANGE OF HARDWARE, PLUMBING AND ELECTRICAL ITEMS FOR GARDENING EQUIPMENT, PLANTS SHRUBS, BEDDING PLANTS, COMPOST, CHECK US OUT PET PRODUCTS, A WIDE RANGE OF HOUSEHOLD GOODS AND PEST CONTROL PRODUCTS COMPREHENSIVE KEY CUTTING CENTRE, OUR SERVICE COVERS: KEYS AND LOCKS FOR HOME - WINDOW - PADLOCK - PATIO - GARAGE - CAR - TRANSPONDERS MOTOR CYCLE - PETROLCAP - OFFICE – FACTORY - FILING CABINETS - CASH BOXES AND MANY MORE

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

MARK JOHNSON QUALITY RE-UPHOLSTERY & REPAIRS * SUITES RECOVERED * * FIRESIDE CHAIRS * * ANTIQUE RESTORATION * * REPLACEMENT FOAM CUSHIONS * * COMPLETE REPAIR SERVICE * * WORK FOR NURSING HOMES A SPECIALITY * OVER 18 YEARS EXPERIENCE

PHONE FOR FREE ESTIMATE 0113 275 3126 24 EDEN CRESCENT, LEEDS, LS4 2TW

If you are looking for a job, make sure your CV doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t let you down!

Call us on 07894 881763 for a free consultation.

ABBEY

GUESTHOUSE

At Abbey Guesthouse in Kirkstall we offer luxury four star bed and breakfast guesthouse accommodation at value prices.

Our generous guesthouse accommodation in Leeds is completely no smoking throughout and includes a private car park for our visitors.

The six spacious rooms are individually designed and all have a luxury ensuite bathroom, Freeview television, wireless internet connection, radio alarm, hair dryer and complimentary beverage tray with tea and coffee making facilities.

44 Vesper Road, Kirkstall, Leeds, LS5 3NX www.abbeyguesthouseleeds.co.uk Tel:+44(0)113 278 5580 Email: info@abbeyguesthouseleeds.co.uk

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

43

Community Notices ABBEY HOUSE MUSEUM Opening times: Monday closed all day. Tues to Friday 10am - 5pm, Saturday 12noon—5pm, Sunday 10am - 5pm Admission charges: Adults £3.80, Children £1.70 (16 and under).

Concessions £2.80 (senior citizens and students). Family ticket £6.50 (2 adults and up to 3 children) The Gate House: Licensed restaurant / café (accessible without museum entry).

Every Weekend Saturday Shoppers Each Saturday afternoon from 24pm, we have different fun activities for families, from trails to craft activities.

Arty Smarties Craft Activities for children every Sunday afternoon 2-4p highlights at Abbey House and Kirkstall Abbey Rock and Roll Eggs Easter craft activities Tuesday 3 April, 10-12 & 2-4pm Wednesday Wardrobe- Make an Easter outfit Wednesday 4 April, 10-12 & 2-4pm Easter Murder Mystery Thursday 5 April, 10-12 & 2-4pm Bunny Fun with Mr Bunny Friday 6 April, 10-12 & 2-4pm Titanic Craft Day Tuesday 10 April, 10-12 & 2-4pm Sink the Titanic science experiments Wednesday 11 April, 10-12 & 24pm Nautical Murder Mystery Thursday 12 April, 10-12 & 2-4pm Titanic Craft Day Friday 13 April, 10-12 & 2-4pm

ABBEY - VISITORS’ CENTRE Admission free. Open 11am - 3pm Tues-Sun Closed Mondays except Bank Holiday Mondays Tel. 0113 2305492 Mini dragons– messy fun for under 5’s Tuesday 3 & 10 April 10-11.30am How to heal your dragon – time to practice your potions Wednesday 4 & 11 April, 2-4pm

44

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

Gory Tour – spooky stories and ghostly goings on!

Thursday 5 & 12 April 2-3pm Follow the feet & meet the dragon – don’t forget your camera Friday 6 & 13 April 10-11.30am Hunt the dragons counting trail Saturday 7 & Sunday 8 April 10am – 1pm Saturday 14 & Sunday 15 April 10am – 3.30pm KIRKSTALL LEISURE CENTRE Kirkstall Lane. Open 8:30am to 10:30pm. Bookings Tel. 214 4555 Special activities for children during school holidays ABBEY LIGHT RAILWAY Trains from Bridge Road run at frequent intervals along to Kirkstall Abbey (and vice-versa) on Sundays from 1 pm to dusk (weather permitting) CARDIGAN CENTRE 145-149 Cardigan Road Resource Centre 9am to 8pm MonFri. Tel. 275 9282 Youth Point; ‘Active for Life’ Healthy Living Project; Older Active People Scheme; Handy Person Scheme HAWKSWORTH CENTRE Broadway, Leeds LS5 3BQ T. 0113 258 4507 / 0845 0457275 hawksworth@parklanecoll.ac.uk www.parklane.ac.uk HAWKSWORTH WOOD YMCA Lea Farm Mount Tel. 216 2970. Free ‘Connexions’ Access Point - Mon day-Thursday 3pm - 4pm and Fridays 6-8pm.

Lunch Club (age 50+) Fridays 11.30am - 1.30pm Parent &Toddler group, Thursdays 9.30 - 11.30am.

Park Lane College Courses, Tues Thurs (Term time) Activity groups in Sports, Drama, Dance, Martial Arts etc.

STEP St Andrew's Church, Butcher Hill, Leeds, LS16 5BG, Tel 2757988, www.stepleeds.org.uk STEP supports people over 60 and runs the following groups: Monday - 1.00 - 3.00, Come and have afternoon tea & cakes with us and a game of bingo Tuesday - 10.00 - 11.30, Come and join our gentle exercise class followed by a cuppa and a chat Thursday - 10.00 - 11.30, Come and have a cuppa and a toasted teacake with us Thursday - 11.30 - 1.00, Come and

To post a notice on this page, please email editor@kirkstall.org.uk have a game of bingo followed by brunch OUR LADY OF KIRKSTALL PARISH is made up of 3 churches: The Holy Name of Jesus, 52 Otley Old Road, LS16 6HW; St Mary's, Broadgate Lane, LS18 4A; The Assumption of Our Lady, Spen Lane, LS16 5EL. The contact number for all 3 is 267 8257.

Holy Name Saturday Vigil 6.30pm Sunday Mass times are: Holy Name 9.00am, 11.15am Assumption 9.45am St Mary's 8.15am, 11am ST MARY’S CHURCH & HALL Hawkswood Ave, LS5 3LU Sunday Service 11am Mon 5.30pm Karate 8pm Zumba Tues 7.30pm Bingo Weds 6.30pm Beavers & Cubs 8pm Zumba Thurs 5.30pm Karate Fri 7.30pm Scouts Hall Hire tel. 258 2923 ST STEPHEN’S CHURCH Morris Lane, LS5 3HE 2nd/4th Sunday, 8am: Holy Communion There will be no 8.00 a.m. Service on the 1st, 3rd or 5th Sunday in the month.

1st/3rd/4th Sunday, 11am: Parish Communion 2nd Sunday, 11am:: Parade Service & Parish Communion 5th Sunday, 11am: Joint Team Communion (If there is a fifth Sunday in a month, a Joint Team Communion Service will be held in one of the four Abbeylands’ Team Churches*.

Please note the time of this Joint Service may vary ) 1st Sunday, 1pm: Holy Baptism 1st Sunday, 4pm: Evensong 2nd/3rd/4th/5th Sunday, 4pm: Said Evening Prayer *The Abbeylands Team Churches are St. Andrew’s, on Butcher Hill: St. Mary’s, in Hawksworth Wood: St. Margaret’s in Horsforth and St. Stephen’s in Kirkstall.

Contact: Revd Rosemarie Hayes, Tel. 258 2481, email: rosemariehayes@live.co.uk ST ANDREW’S CHURCH & HALL Butcher Hill, LS16 5BG Sunday Service 9.30am Wednesdays 10am Holy Communion Hall Hire tel. 226 7441

WEST PARK UNITED REFORMED CHURCH Spen Lane, LS16 5BB Sunday Services with crèche 10.30am Monthly prayer meeting House group fortnightly Coffee morning with toasted tea cakes 1st Saturday in the month 10.30am Contact: Church Secretary 2785373 LEEDS HUMANISTS Meet monthly at the Swarthmore Centre. Contact Bob Tee, 14 Foxholes Crescent, Calverley, LS28 5NT - Tel 0113 257 7009 mandr.tee@ntlworld.com www.wyhumanists.org.uk ACTIVE LIFE Kirkstall Leisure Centre offers Active Life sessions for the over 45s every Tuesday and Thursday.

To book and for further information contact Allyson Bertram on 0113 395 0196 or allyson.bertram@leeds.gov.uk AVIATOR ALLSTAR CHEELEADERS Contact Tim on 07800 859 916 frontdesk@aviatorallstars.com SCOUTS The 5th North Leeds (St Stephen's) meets at the St Stephens Church Hall, Norman Street, Leeds 5. Beaver Scouts meet on Tuesdays at 5.30pm & Cubs meet on Fridays at 5.45pm, For details of the Scout Troop, please contact Laurie on (0113) 2259234 Mob: 07798 730917: e-mail lawrence.wilson3@ntlworld.com The 43rd North Leeds (Phoenix St Mary's) meets at the St Mary's Church Hall, Hawkswood Crescent, Leeds 5. Beaver Scouts and Cubs meet on Wednesday evenings at 6.30pm, Scouts meet on Friday at 7.00pm. Details from Richard on (0113) 2673325: email richardfrank@phoenix43.fsnet.co.uk LADIES ROUNDERS Last summer, we set up a rounders team in Cookridge. The games will be on a Tuesday night at 7pm on Cookridge sports fields (near the fire station on Otley Old Road.)

If you're interested in playing this year, drop me an email kerrysmith_82@hotmail.com (Please put ROUNDERS in subject line!)

Don't worry if you haven't played since school... It's friendly and informal and best of all it's free!!

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Local Services

Libraries

LCC Switchboard

0113 222 4444

Burley Library, Cardigan Road, tel. 214 4528

LCC NW Area Management

0113 395 0964

WNW Homes Enquiries

0800 915 1113

LCC Planning and Development

0113 222 4409

LCC Social Services Enquiries

0113 398 4702

LCC Parks & Countryside

0113 395 7400

Bramley Library, Hough Lane, tel. 214 6040

Parkswatch

0113 232 9973

Education Enquiries

0113 247 5590

Education - Admissions

0113 247 5729

Anti-Social Behaviour reporting

0113 398 4701

Neighbourhood Policing Team

0113 205 3025

Police (emergency)

999

Mon 10am-7pm Tues 10am-6pm Wed 10am-7pm Thurs 10am-6pm Fri 10am-6pm Sat 10am-3pm Sun 12pm-3pm facilities: CD ROM Multimedia, Council Papers, Theatre Bookings, Disabled access, Photocopier, Study Area, Fax, Internet Access

Police (non-emergency)

101

Crimestoppers

0800 555 111

CASAC Checkpoint

0845 838 8851

Community Mediation Service

0113 242 4110

Leeds Victim Support

0113 395 1260

CAB Advice Line

08701 202 450

Streetscene

0113 222 4406

Highways Abandoned vehicles

0113 222 4406

Graffiti removal

0113 222 4406

Pest Control

0113 222 4406

West Yorkshire Archive Services

Dog Wardens

0113 222 4406

WYAS, Leeds, Sheepscar Leeds LS7 3AP

Refuse collection

0113 222 4406

Bulky waste collection

0113 222 4406

Needle & Drug waste

0113 222 4406

Some archives are held offsite and our search room can get very busy. Appointments recommended.

Noise Nuisance (8am-6pm)

0113 222 4406

Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays

Noise Nuisance (8pm-2am/3am)

0113 242 5841

9.30am to 5pm

Environmental Action Team

0113 222 4407

Mon 2pm-7pm Wed 10am-6pm Fri 2pm-7pm Sat 10am-1pm facilities: Asian Language Books, CD Rom Multimedia, Meeting Room, Disabled Access, Fax, Internet Access

Headingley Library, North Lane, tel. 214 4525 Mon-Fri 9am-7pm Sat 10am-4pm Sun 12pm-4pm facilities: Asian Language Books, UK Yellow Pages, CD ROM Multimedia, Computer Catalogue, Council Papers, Meeting Room, Theatre Bookings, Videos, Disabled Access, Photocopier, Study Area, CDâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s, Fax, Planning Applications, Sale of Book Tokens, Internet Access

Tel: 0113 214 5814 Fax: 0113 214 5815 leeds@wyjs.org.uk

Please note we do not produce archives between 12 noon and 2pm

Stay Up To Date www.kirkstall.org.uk @kirkstallonline Kirkstall Online Issue 110 - Summer 2012

KIRKSTALL MATTERS

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Issue 110 - Summer 2012

Issue 110 - Summer 2012

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Nursery Places Available Now

OUTSTANDING OFSTED REPORTS in 2007 and 2010

“All groups of pupils make OUTSTANDING PROGRESS because they receive consistently effective teaching and the exciting practical activities help them develop very positive attitudes to learning.” (2010) OFSTED

“At nursery I play with my friends and I read books. I like stories they’re my favourite” - Aleena

“I can mix my own colours and paint my picture all by myself. Look red, yellow, orange” Joe

“When I go to school I can work with Droovie, he’s my friend, he helps me count” - Laila

OUTSTANDING SCHOOL OFSTED 2007 and OFSTED 2010 48

KIRKSTALL MATTERS ls and more information call the Headteacher, June Turner, on (0113) 214 Issue 4562110 - Summer 2012

Or visit our website: http://www.beecroft.leeds.sch.uk