HEDON AND DISTRICT LOCAL HISTORY SOCIETY

Based in the extensive grounds of East Ella Hall (left), White City was a much-loved part of Hull's entertainment scene from 1920 until its dramatic end by fire in 1938. Concerts, dancing, wrestling and roller-skating were all on offer. Find out more from Michele & Alan Beadle in this fascinating slice of Hull life between the wars ...  New members always welcome !   Join at any meeting: £20 a year / £5 a meeting More information : hedon.history@gmail.com

Designed by architects Runton and Barry, the National Picture Theatre was constructed for the De-Luxe Theatre Company on Beverley Road, Hull and opened in 1914.    The cinema was badly damaged during a Luftwaffe air raid on 18 March 1941, although none of the 150 people inside at the time were killed or seriously injured, and in 2007 it was Grade II listed for its historic interest as the last ordinary civilian building in England surviving in its bombed state from the Second World War.    The National Civilian WW2 Memorial Trust has been working for over 20 years to save the cinema and is currently working with Hull City Council in a bid to develop the site as a memorial to the impact of the Second World War on the city.    Town planner and trustee Hilary Byers will talk about the early years of the cinema and the fateful night of 18 March 1941. She will also explain why it has survived, concealed for many years behind a hoarding, and ho...

For our last summer visit of 2019, Hedon and District Local History Society heads to Sutton and Wawne Museum , located in Sutton's Grade II-listed former St James' Church of England School (1859).    The museum was founded in 1998 by Merrill and Peter Rhodes primarily as a family history centre but has since developed extensive collections covering the ancient villages and historic parishes of Sutton and Wawne - parishes which until the late 19th century ran all the way from Meaux to the north side of Witham, including Stoneferry, Wilmington, St Marks and The Groves. More information : via the Museum brochure - front and back - OR its excellent website .   Meet : Sutton and Wawne Museum , Church Street, Sutton-on-Hull HU7 4TL. Time : 7pm. Free parking : available in the adjoining car park ( map here ). Refreshments : tea, coffee and biscuits. Cost : £5 donation (to museum funds).   New members always welcome !   Join at any meeting: £15 a year / ...

Following his fascinating talk on the ' Rise and Fall of Hull General Cemetery ', Pete Lowden now invites you to join him for a guided tour of the cemetery on Spring Bank West.    Hear about, and view the last resting place of, some of the movers and shakers of Victorian and Edwardian Hull - from Henry Hodge, mayor and mill owner, to Zachariah Pearson, disgraced mayor and benefactor of the town; from Sir James Reckitt, industrialist and philanthropist to William Clowes, founder of Primitive Methodism and relative of Josiah Wedgwood and Charles Darwin.   Hull General Cemetery is a place of local and national importance and you will certainly enjoy your visit.   Meet : Hull General Cemetery (main gates), Spring Bank West. Time : 2.15pm for 2.30pm. Parking : free local parking on Sunny Bank (access via Brandesburton Street). Cost : £5 donation to Friends of Hull General Cemetery (FOHGC). Refreshments : not included (nearby cafes on Princes Avenue and Cha...

For its first summer visit of 2019, Hedon and District Local History Society heads to North Holderness, with a guided tour of St Michael's Church, East Garton and chance to explore the gardens and park of nearby Grimston Garth .    Both church and house are Grade 1 listed: the cobblestone St Michael's dates back to the 13th century, while Grimston Garth is a delightful Gothick house designed to an unusual triangular plan by John Carr and built in 1781-6 as a summer residence for Thomas Grimston of Kilnwick-on-the-Wolds.    The park was developed in 1782 with advice from Thomas White (designer of the park at Houghton Hall) and remains largely unaltered, with perimeter woodland providing shelter from the wind and isolated clumps of trees dotted through the landscape. On its western edge is a large Gothick castellated gatehouse, built in 1812 and possibly designed by Hull sculptor and architect John Earle, whose firm was involved in its construction.   Meet :...

For his annual President's Evening , Nicholas Hildyard is delighted to welcome to Hedon social historian Dr Stephen Caunce - best known to East Riding audiences for his acclaimed Amongst Farm Horses: the Horse Lads of East Yorkshire.    In this new talk, based entirely on original research and conveyed primarily through the words of contemporary participants and observers, Dr Caunce will evoke a largely forgotten annual event once eagerly anticipated in towns across northern England and Scotland.    Hiring fairs had a highly practical purpose in linking employers with workers, male and female, who were seeking jobs.    Yet much more went on besides, provoking opposition in some quarters - opposition which, although very clearly unrepresentative, has dominated the limited notice these fairs have since received from historians.  A delicious post-talk buffet supper will be served in the Mayor's Parlour. A prize raffle (£2/ticket) will also...

Pete Lowden 's story of Hull General Cemetery , offers a fascinating insight into Victorian Hull. In the late 1840s a group of far-sighted entrepreneurs sought to solve one of the worst problems of their era - how to dispose of the urban dead in a decent and dignified way.    On Spring Bank - then on the edge of town - they opened a cemetery as a private venture, unashamedly aiming to make a profit by providing this public service.    Notables instrumental in Hull's nineteenth-century growth as a town and port are buried there - among them sculptor Thomas Earle and shipowner Zachariah Pearson - and the last burials took place in the 1970s.    A guided tour of Hull General Cemetery and its memorials will follow on Tuesday 9 July .   Books available for purchase : Hull General Cemetery 1847-1972: a Short Introduction (£5); The War Dead of Hull General Cemetery (£8)  New members always welcome !  More information : hedon.history...

Join local resident Martin Eldred as he uncovers the story of Cavendish Square and Hull's largest Victorian church, All Saints .    Meet the wealthy clergy families who enabled the building of a new parish church for Sculcoates, unearth the scandal of the deprived curate, and find out how Sculcoates welcomed its first resident vicar in over half a century.    Discover the rising 'middling men' who exploited a building boom as Hull expanded north along the Beverley road, and learn more about the families who lived in the elegant square.     New members always welcome !   More information : hedon.history@gmail.com

Helen Good has been studying the history of Elizabethan Hull through local and national archives for many years, uncovering stories of witches and magic, inns and fairs, Shakespeare and the Spanish Armada.    Her current research is focused on the Elizabethan Star Chamber Project . Operating from 1485 to 1641, the royal prerogative Court of Star Chamber handled criminal and civil cases involving an allegation of violence.    Organised by reign, its archives touch on many aspects of local and family history - public disorder and riots, bribery and corruption, sedition and libel, robbery, illegal hunting, murder and witchcraft, forcible entry, assault, fraud and disputes (municipal, trade and land) - but inadequate indexes have so far left them unexploited.    Helen and colleagues are working on the Elizabethan records (1558-1603) - c.100,000 documents, grouped under c.35,000 references and representing c.15,000 cases - to produce freely searchable pers...