Wildlife in York, 1932

While looking for information in association with the plans for Bootham Park, I found the document above, from 1932. It’s from a report from the British Association for the Advancement of Science, part of an appendix entitled ‘A Scientific Survey of York and District’, prepared for the York meeting. The Association met in York for its annual meeting from 31 August to 7 September 1932. (Its very first meeting had also taken place in York, in 1831.)

A J A Woodcock’s report includes the following interesting observations on the city’s wildlife in the early 1930s:

No account of the natural history of the district would be complete without a reference to the special charms of York itself. Though not at all a small city, its associations are essentially rural. Its older parts have generous gardens, even in the centre of the city, and the extent to which these are frequented by birds is quite unusual. The dawn chorus in the spring and early summer causes comment from the visitor from another town, when he hears it for the first time.

For several years a pair of kestrels has nested in the main tower of York Minster, a pair of barn owls in the turrets of the Theatre Royal, and another pair in Bootham Bar. A pair of tawny owls frequents Bootham Park, and another pair the Museum Gardens. The kingfisher, which is found along the banks of the Ouse, may be regularly seen on the river within the city boundaries. A few minutes’ walk from the houses in Clifton will enable one to put up a snipe, and curlews may often be heard calling when we walk through the streets during the quiet of night.

A pair of otters has for some years reared young on the river Ouse, and usually they may be seen during the night watches in the vicinity of the old Guildhall and Common Hall Lane — in other words, in the very heart of the city. Otters are often found along the course of the river Foss, and at several other points on the outskirts of the city. The grey squirrel frequently comes into the gardens of the houses in Clifton.

—source document, via the Biodiversity Heritage Library

I’ve read this several times and can’t quite believe that there was so much wildlife activity so close to the city centre back then. But it must be the case, this being a reliable source found in the archives.

Back then, the city’s suburbs were much smaller, of course, and owls and kestrels wouldn’t have had to fly so far to find open fields. There was also a larger area of open green space close by, not just the Bootham Park ‘gala field‘, which still exists, but what was then a cricket field to the north of it, where the city’s main hospital now stands.

Tawny owls can still be heard calling in the night, in the area around Bootham Park and the nearby football ground at Bootham Crescent. I’ve not heard anyone mention barn owls nesting in the city centre, or kestrels — though there are peregrine falcons on the Minster.

I recall reports a few years back of otters on the Ouse, and I know that kingfishers have been seen on the Foss. I think we’ve all seen grey squirrels, in and around the city centre. Not mentioned in the above, but now fairly common, are urban foxes.

If you’d like to read more about the wildlife and wider environment in the area around York at that time, you can view the document in full on this link.

Your comments and coffees welcome as always.

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Top right, part of Piccadilly, 1947 (Photo: Britain from Above)

Yesterday’s page featuring Foxton’s on Piccadilly prompted a reader to contact me with memories of a nearby building:

“Your latest on foxtons garage, sent my memory straight back to WW2 and my enforced visits to the free clinic which existed in a large, stilted wooden pavilion sited just between foxtons and the parliament street end of piccadilly. It existed to cater for medical needs, like treatment to teeth/ears/eyes etc for folk of low income unable to afford doctoring in those pre NHS days. I got my ears syringed and fitted with those awful spring steel john Lennon” type glasses earning the nickname of “four eyes” for the whole of my Nunthorpe grammar school days.

I have never found any allusion to the place while trolling through versions of york modern and wartime history, and I suppose memories of it will only exist with those of my generation.”

I’ve done my best to find more information on the clinic in Piccadilly, but haven’t found much. No photos so far, but a few mentions of it.

It maybe needs emphasising, as mentioned above, that we’re talking about healthcare before the NHS existed. It’s easy to forget that the NHS hasn’t always been there. Maybe we take it for granted if we’re of the generations born after it was in place, and until we really need it.

Anyway, a book I’ve found very helpful before included some information on the school clinic:

‘York’s first school clinic had been opened in 1908 at 24 St Saviourgate, under the Education Authority’s school medical officer, who was also the city’s medical officer of health. The clinic offered a range of medical and monitoring services, including dental, ear nose and throat, and ophthalmic clinics, for schoolchildren. Its staff of school nurses and doctors oversaw the medical inspection of children in schools. In 1920 the clinic moved to premises in Piccadilly, and thereafter to premises in Rougier Street whence it moved to Monkgate.’

— County Hospital to NHS Trust, Katherine A. Webb (Borthwick Publications, 2002)

A ‘Scheme of Education for York’, a document from City of York Education Committee, dated 1921, has a brief mention of the school clinic:

‘We have acquired and fitted up an Army hut as a Central Clinic on the Piccadilly site’

— (via Google Books)

So for a time at least the clinic was in an army hut (First World War). But on which site exactly? And does anyone else remember it?

One of the aerial views from the 1940s/50s I’ve included before in a page about York Castle/Cliffords Tower, and part of which is included above at the top of the page, has what is probably the relevant part of Piccadilly in the background, and on the cleared site to the right of Foxton’s garage (recently cleared again) there is a building that looks like it could be a First World War hut, possibly.

I went off to read more about First World War huts. Very interesting. Then thought I’d leave this information here as it is, and it might be added to at some point. Like the page about the Fever Hospital, from some years ago.

. . . . .

Your virtual coffees support this site, and recently have helped to pay the hosting fees to keep it online for so many years. Thank you.

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‘Meet Amy Johnson’ – brochure for proposed ‘Airspeed: a 1930s adventure’

Have a look at this brochure if you haven’t already seen it:

Brochure for ‘Airspeed – a 1930s adventure’ (PDF, 1.55MB)

This is what we could have in the old Airspeed (Reynard’s) building in Piccadilly. I first included the brochure on here back in 2011, and as there’s a lot more interest now than there was then, I thought I’d mention it again.

The Yorkshire Air Museum plan is being referred to as an ‘Airspeed Museum’. Which makes it sound a bit dull. Like it’s going to be glass display cases with bits of old aircraft in.

It’s far more interesting and wide-ranging than that, as the brochure shows. About conveying the spirit of the times. And with more glamour than you might have expected.

The Yorkshire Air Museum haven’t just popped up now because the building is under threat of demolition – they’ve been trying to arrange its reuse for years. Previous councils didn’t help them and this council wants to demolish the place to build a hotel.

This looks far more interesting, doesn’t it.

If you like the look of ‘Airspeed: a 1930s adventure’, email cllr.dwilliams@york.gov.uk, or tell him on Twitter.

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Advertisements in York Repertory Company programme, 1938

It’s a particularly grim weekend in early January 2014. Let’s escape briefly, into 1930s York, via the ads in these old theatre programmes I picked up in the Barbican Bookshop sale.

Betty’s had only recently opened in St Helen’s Square. And before I get complaints that there shouldn’t be an apostrophe in the Bettys name, there was one in the 1930s, as is clear in this advert. Back then, when it was just starting up, its adverts ended with the quaint and humble sentence: ‘The honour of your patronage will be appreciated.” These days they wouldn’t need to ask: there’s often a queue right out of the door and round the corner.

If you didn’t fancy that – refreshments, and cigarettes, were also available at ‘Ye Olde Parkin Shoppe’ on High Petergate.

Back in 1938 a motoring school in the ‘Creamery Buildings’ somewhere on Piccadilly could help you get out onto those ‘open roads’, when they really were open and not clogged up with loads of other traffic.

Advertisements in York Repertory Company programme, 1938

Shouty adverts told readers to stop typing their own circular letters, and to call for Marmite instead.

If you were in need of breeches you could find them on Bridge Street, then pop along Coney Street for a ‘Jamal Machineless’ perm.

Advertisement for gas water heaters, 1937. Back cover of programme for York Repertory Company

‘Constant Hot Water is an absolute necessity’ in 1937. I wonder how many homes had one of these gas water heaters. Perhaps not many, as the idea of having a hot water tap actually deliver hot water is emphasised, apparently quite exciting.

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This ‘K6′ type of kiosk was designed in the 1930s. These design classics are generally admired, but look their very best against a pale stone wall, with some green nearby. As here.

This type were apparently manufactured until 1968. Many villages seem to have retained their red phone kiosk. I’m not sure how many are left in York. I pass three fairly regularly on my way into town. All three, including this one, are looking increasingly shabby, and two are frequently vandalised. Two have Listed status: one on Duncombe Place, and this one on Marygate.

They’re very rarely used now, phone boxes, for obvious reasons. We carry our phones around with us. The kiosks remain but, Listed or not, it’s hard to see them being maintained indefinitely. They must cost more in maintenance than they make.

The photo above was taken in 2007. The phone box showed signs of graffiti having been cleaned from its panes, and had the remnants of stickers clinging to bits of its paintwork, but otherwise looked fairly smart. Not now, in November 2012. A couple of panes are broken, others are still discoloured and opaque from being cleaned so often. Graffiti continually ‘redecorates’ this kiosk.

Added decoration this year in the form of fliers for the York Mystery Plays 2012 production. This ended more than two months ago. As this Listed monument of a phone box isn’t far from the Museum Gardens performance site, I thought they might have been removed by now. I attempted to remove one myself, thinking it would just lift away easily, but it didn’t. They appeared to be quite firmly attached.

Maybe whoever stuck those cards to the panes could return and remove them. More respect please for these design classics, and particularly for this Listed one, which so beautifully enhances its corner of York.

Elsewhere on the web

The Guardian: BT sells off phone boxes as demand declines (including some entertaining comments – see the ‘impression’ by ‘ado16′)
English Heritage: listing information, Marygate phone kiosk

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See also …

Audrey’s memories of Micklegate and Railway Street, the Forsselius garages on Blossom Street and Kitch’s garage at Clifton, and her memories of York during the Second World War

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