This is a post I’ve been planning to write for a few weeks. With the events of the last few days marking the end of the second Elizabethan age, I realised that it will be more poignant.
I recently returned to the ‘retro shop’/garden centre that I had found a football magazine from 1964 in back in March. The pile of magazines and comics had gone, but I did discover a fascinating artefact of local history: the official guide to the Norwich Festival of 1951.
The Second World War was still fresh in the memories of the nation. Times were tough – austerity and food rationing had people in low spirits. The Labour government of the time planned a celebration of Britain and its achievements, to be held in the centenary year of the Great Exhibition. While the centrepiece was on the South Bank in London (it’s where we got the Royal Festival Hall from), events took place across the country, including in Norwich.
On 18th June 1951, Princess Elizabeth – later, of course, to become Elizabeth II – opened the Norwich Festival from the balcony of City Hall.
At the time of the Festival, the country was under the reign of King George VI. Elizabeth would ascend to the throne upon her father’s death a year later. This means that the Festival, and its guide book, are a wonderful insight of what Britain was like immediately before the Elizabethan age we have all lived through.
The book is full of articles about the city and adverts from local businesses. The two are worth a post each, so I’m going to focus on the adverts today. They provide a window into a Norwich of yesterday – a city that made things (mainly shoes) and a city dominated by local names rather than high street chains. But they also show names that are immediately familiar.
I’ll start with this one, advertising the local newspapers of Norwich and Norfolk. The Eastern Daily Press and the Evening News are still in publication, though the EDP’s claim that ‘nearly one of every three Norfolk homes’ will have one is fanciful in this internet age. I bet their overworked staff wish they still had 200 correspondents to call upon as well.
The Eastern Football News, due to the pink paper it was published on, was known as The Pink ‘Un, a name still used by Archant today for its football coverage.
Recognise this place?
The Bell Hotel has hardly changed, on the outside at least, for 71 years.
Now, we’re off to Chamberlins.
The building was until recently partly used as a branch of Tesco Metro, opposite the Guildhall. Plans are to turn it into a hotel.
This advert for Boots caught my eye only because the pharmacist’s logo is almost the same as it is now.
The Town House is advertised, with a photo taken from its more attractive river side. You can still enjoy a meal and a drink there today.
Bonds department store in the city was destroyed in the Blitz. By 1951, its shiny, new building was nearing completion. The architecht’s drawing featured is pretty much exactly how it turned out.
Bonds became John Lewis in 2001.
Caleys used their space in the book to show off their new chocolate factory. The building is now long gone, demolished and replaced by what is now called Chantry Place shopping centre.
The cost of living – now there’s a phrase we hear a lot these days. It was a problem in 1951, as well, but Curls thought they had the answer. Curls would go on to be Debenhams, though even that has gone now and the building remains empty for the moment.
And finally, here’s an advert from hat maker H. Rumsey Wells. The shop closed in 1974 but, if the name sounds familiar, it’s because the name of the shop lives on in the name of a pub that now stands on its site.
This is merely a few of the many adverts that give a glimpse into the Norwich of 1951. I may well dip in again some time. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this, and may we enter the reign of King Charles III with optimism. Stay well, everyone.
LEE PAYNE 