Andrew Simpson: In Holmfirth where there is all you might want …..

Sunday, 5 February 2023

In Holmfirth where there is all you might want …..

Now that boast might be a tad over the top, but this small town in west Yorkshire offers up some cinematic history, a winery and of course a long running TV comedy.

The Picturedrome, 2023

All of which I have written about in the past but have been drawn back to by a series of pictures taken by Andy Robertson my old photographic chum. *

He was there yesterday, took some pictures and sent them over.

He started with the Picturedrome which was built in 1912, opened on March 1st 1913 as the Valley Theatre, but curiously doesn’t appear in the register of cinemas two years later. This is the Kinematograph Year Book for 1914, which lists all the picture houses, films and much else about the cinema industry and came out annually.

Happily it is there for 1928 when it is still called the Valley Theatre, owned by Valley Picture Theatre Ltd, showing one performance nightly and two shows on Saturday with prices from 3d to 1/3d.

A cinema and a balcony, 2023

The place has had a chequered history but is still there operating as a musical film venue. **

And for those that want more there is short history covering all of the Picturedrome’s reincarnations at that excellent cinema TREASURES.***

But Holmfirth was also home to Bamforth Ltd which expanded on its magic lantern business and started making films in this tiny west Yorkshire town.

Between 1898-1900 they made 14 and in the two years 1913-1915 turned out 120 before switching production to London, and also producing a range of picture postcards.

A Bamford card, circa 1914-18

And by sheer chance I came across this one from the collection of David Harrop entitled "Mother, Why Doesn’t Daddy Come Home?"

The Drill Hall, 2023

Which is a link to another of Andy’s photographs which is of the Drill Hall.

It was built for E Company of the 2nd Volunteer Battalion, Duke of Wellington's West Riding Regiment.

The foundation stone was laid on Saturday 25 April 1891, and there are memorials to the men who served in the second South African War and the Great War.****

Home to E Company, 2023

All of which just leaves me to add that the wineries were the reason we first went up to Holmfirth, but once there we did do Sid’s Café, a centre piece of that TV series “Last of The Summer Wine which ran from 1973 till 2010, and like Andy marvelled at the bus stop over the River Holme.

And I now know that Holmfirth is at the confluence of the River Holme and Ribble, is 6 miles south of Huddersfield and 14 miles west of Barnsley with a population of just over 5, 000.

Interestingly back in 1928 according my Kinematograph Year Book it had a population of 10,444, which would have provided more than enough picture going customers, but begs the question of where they all went.

Pictures; Holmfirth in 2023, from the collection of Andy Robertson and Mother, Why Doesnt Daddy Come Home? date unknown, Bamforth & Co, Holmfirth, the Patriot Series nu 1888, courtesy of David Harrop