August 2011

A rare survival on a city centre site

These rather dilapidated buildings would have been bulldozed if the plans for the ‘big wheel‘ had gone ahead, and have won only a temporary reprieve. There are plans to landscape the area and remove them, possibly as early as autumn 2011.

The earlier planning application called them ‘hutments’ (a term used for military-related encampments). They date from the Second World War, and look like other buildings from that period. In themselves they’re not architecturally impressive. What’s unusual about them is their location and their original purpose. What’s worrying is that they may be demolished when only a few people have any idea of their history. Most people don’t know we’ve got a former Second World War RCAF hostel behind the art gallery.

These ‘hutments’ have managed to survive in a quiet corner in our city centre for almost 70 years. They’ve had a variety of uses since their hurried construction, but were originally a service hostel or ‘leave club’ for the Royal Canadian Air Force.

Canadian bomber crews served at several local airfields, most now crumbling away into the landscape, including East Moor (near Sutton on the Forest) and Tholthorpe.

A letter sent to the Yorkshire Air Museum, with accompanying photographs, records that this service hostel/leave club was used by members of the RCAF when returning from leave, or if they’d missed the last bus or train, or were changing postings, or had a few days spare before they were due on base.

The buildings are seen by most as an eyesore, to be cleared as soon as possible. To others they’re an authentic link to our wartime history and should be preserved, at least in part. A report submitted among the supporting documents with the planning application called them a ‘a rare and interesting survival within an urban context’. Because of this, there’s a ‘recording exercise’ taking place before they’re demolished. This is intended as some kind of compensation to the future generations, or indeed members of the present generations, who might have been interested in this heritage asset we’re about to clear out of the way, so they can see photos of it when it’s gone, rather than looking around it while it’s here.

They’re not beautiful, they’re functional. Or they were, before a lack of maintenance left them in this dilapidated state. In themselves they have no architectural merit. But it would appear that they are the only surviving purpose-built service hostel/leave club dating from World War Two still in existence in a city centre location. If you know of others, please let me know.

References on urban exploration forums and a recent letter to the local paper show there’s some confusion regarding what the buildings were used for, and who used them. Not surprising really. Their history hasn’t been advertised. Which is why I’ve included so much about them on this website.

This area is destined to be cleared, to become part of the ‘Cultural Quarter’. The current structures are clearly a bit too gritty, grubby and authentic to be ‘cultural’. So instead this is to be another garden area (which could equally well be sited on that other underused area just north of the abbey remains).

Here’s a bit of real history, right in our backyard, and it’s seen as having little value. Close by are St Mary’s Tower, damaged during an earlier conflict, and the grounds where besiegers and besieged fought.

So, in this small corner of York are the visible remains of the two major conflicts that have affected this city in recent centuries. One has no marker since the plaque on St Mary’s Tower fell off. The other is represented by this surviving structure that York Museums Trust want to clear away without most of us having the chance to see it, never mind understand it.

Location

More

History of the hutments – notes on the wartime and post-war use of these buildings

And also – Marygate Centre – notes/dates re the use of the buildings for adult education, post-war

If you’re looking for views of the interior, a search for ‘hutments York’ in Google will show that several urban explorers/’guerilla historians’ have been undertaking recording exercises of their own. Thanks to them for capturing artistic and authentic images of a forgotten place. As for me, I just got some rather poor images of the exterior, on a few cold days in winter.

Though I can offer a few classy black and white images of the interior, taken many decades ago.

. . . . . .

Update: the buildings were demolished in 2011-12.

The post ‘A rare survival': WW2 service hostel appeared first on York Stories.

August 2011

Note: These buildings were demolished in 2011-12.

These buildings are hidden away behind York Art Gallery. Most people who have seen them think that they’re just a load of scruffy asbestos-ridden sheds. But they’re more interesting than that.

I went searching for accurate facts after noticing a lot of contradictory information on the web and elsewhere. The info below was compiled from dusty old volumes of council minutes, and various other sources (full list at foot of page).

• These ‘hutments’ (as such military-related encampments are called) were constructed at some point between May 1942 (after the ‘Baedeker raid‘) and 1944 (when they’re referred to in council minutes – see above)
• They were constructed as a service hostel or leave club by the RCAF (Royal Canadian Air Force).
• Soon after the war the buildings were adapted for educational use by the local authority. From 1946 until the end of January 1949 they were used as an Emergency Teacher Training College (in connection with the raising of the school leaving age)
• In 1949 they became the Marygate Centre of Further Education, with an emphasis on providing courses for women and girls, and continued as the Marygate Centre until the 1970s
• During the same period (late 1940s to 1970s) one of the former dormitories was allocated for use by the York School of Art, based in the adjacent Art Gallery building
• From 1981 the nearby Yorkshire Museum used the buildings for storage and workroom space.
• The buildings are ‘of prefab concrete frame construction with clay brick infill panels and asbestos sheet roofing’. This is similar to buildings of the period in use at Eden Camp and the Yorkshire Air Museum. However the current planning application states that demolition is ‘required for health and safety reasons’.
• During 2011 they have been emptied in preparation for demolition. Despite the fact that so few people understand the significance of what’s about to be demolished – even the journalists from our local Press.

It’s probably not feasible to keep the entire ‘hutments’ complex, but part of the structure should be retained on site.

Photos & more info

Photos (interior and exterior) of the buildings in the 1940s, as the RCAF service hostel

More detail on the years of educational use

Plan and links: York School of Art

General background and opinion on the proposed demolition

For more info and interior photos of the buildings in recent months, search for hutments York on Google.

Location

Sources

York City Council minutes; Annual Reports of the Yorkshire Philosophical Society; 17 Feb report prepared for CoYC meeting (PDF); documents submitted with the ‘big wheel’ planning application, eg this one and this one (PDF files); The history of the Yorkshire Museum and its geological collections, B J Pyrah (York, 1988); letter from Mr MacPherson of Ontario (held by the Yorkshire Air Museum) … and recent web-based photo galleries by urban explorers and ‘guerilla historians’ – thank you chaps, for showing us what we couldn’t get to see for ourselves.

. . . . . .

This page was last updated on 19 November 2013.

The post A history of the ‘hutments’ appeared first on York Stories.

August 2011

Behind the art gallery are dilapidated buildings seen as an eyesore, with no obvious ‘history’. They are soon to be demolished.

Originally used by the Canadian Air Force, as a service hostel/leave club, these buildings were taken over for use by the York Education Committee. For many years they were known as the Marygate Centre, a base for adult education.

The York City Council minutes show that the buildings were adapted for educational use soon after the war, first used for the ’emergency training’ of teachers.

1946

The Ministry of Education wanted to acquire the ‘Canadian YMCA Hostel’ in 1946, though the Canadian YMCA apparently also had plans for the future of the buildings. By June 1946 it had been agreed that the former hostel buildings were to be used in connection with the emergency training of teachers: ‘so that the necessary teachers will be available in the country for the raising of the school leaving age’.

1947

By 1947 the council minutes record the progress on providing living accommodation for a Matron, in the ‘Emergency Training Hostel, Marygate’, and the Art Gallery Committee ‘have agreed that the site of the Marygate Hostel should be appropriated for education purposes for a period of not less than ten nor more than fifteen years, the site to be reappropriated at the end of the period.’ (This agreement must have been extended, as it takes the date to circa 1962, and the buildings were used for education for some years after that.)

1948 – proposals for long-term use

The minutes suggest that the city council were keen to use the buildings for further education, rather than emergency teacher training, and the Report of the Further and Adult Education sub-committee in July 1948 proposes plans for the use of the ‘Marygate Hostel’ in the future:

‘a) Additional accommodation for the School of Art.

b) Accommodation for the Day Continuation School for Girls.

c) Provision of a basic Catering Course.

d) Daytime classes for women in Housecraft and allied activities.

e) Evening and weekend Adult Education courses.’

October 1948 saw approval of the use of the buildings as outlined, and noted that ‘one of the present dormitories’ should ‘be adapted as supplementary accommodation for the School of Arts and Crafts‘ (aka York School of Art).

The buildings are also to be used ‘for day classes for women and girls in Homecraft and related subjects’.

1949

In January 1949 there’s a suggestion that Miss P M Everitt – Head of the Day Continuation School for Girls – should be offered ‘the residential accommodation in the Tutor’s flat in the Hostel’.

By 1949 the buildings are known as the ‘Marygate Centre of Further Education’, with an emphasis on ‘courses primarily for women and girls’. Council minutes record efforts to improve the Grounds, following the ‘suggestions of the Parks Superintendent’ – who gives initial estimated cost, and an ‘annual maintenance cost of £80′. This was later reduced to a simplified scheme with an annual maintenance cost of £20. (Conjuring visions of an initial scheme inspired by the Chelsea Flower Show, later reduced to a couple of pots of begonias.)

1950s, and after

Things got lively in the 1950s, with a proposal in June 1952 to ‘run a class in Folk Dancing (American Square)’.

So I’ll leave you with that cheerful scene of dancing classes, 10 years after the ‘Baedeker raid‘ of 1942.

Except to say that Elizabeth, who emailed me, remembers dressmaking classes here in the 1970s, and having to queue for them, as they were so popular.

Comment

Interesting, isn’t it, that these buildings were originally constructed to shelter men who were trained to kill, to fly heavy bombers overseas to enemy targets, men who were in the thick of it during the conflict of the Second World War – and that by the late 1940s, through to the 1970s, they were to be occupied mainly by women and girls learning ‘Housecraft and allied activities’ – ‘activities’ fundamentally peaceful and domestic. Quite a contrast.

Postscript/links

The was demolished in 2011-12.

See also:

A history of the ‘hutments’

Sources

York City Council minutes.

The post Marygate Centre appeared first on York Stories.

June 2011

The former service hostel buildings behind York Art Gallery were used after the war as the Marygate Centre, for further education and evening classes. A section was used by York School of Art (their website includes some fab photos from the 50s-60s, including the long-forgotten sight of cars parked in Exhibition Square).

The art school already occupied one side of the art gallery, and later expanded to use part of these buildings behind it. Many thanks to John C, a former student, for the illustration. The areas used by York Art School are marked in orange.

The post York School of Art appeared first on York Stories.

April 2011

These photographs show the hutments behind the Art Gallery around the time of their construction, during the Second World War.

This exterior view shows the hutments complex, with the Minster towers on the right of the photo. The large building is the Art Gallery, and St Mary’s Tower is just visible on the extreme left.

They were used originally as a service hostel or leave club for members of the Royal Canadian Air Force stationed at local airfields.

The photos were sent to the Yorkshire Air Museum in 1998 by Oscar MacPherson, of Ontario. The accompanying letter explains that the photographer was a Mr Speed, the official government photographer for the area.

The photos below are interior views of the hutments in their original form as a service hostel, when the place was new and the floors were shiny. The buildings were demolished in 2011.

I’ve been reading through the city council minutes for more background on these buildings. It seems they were briefly the subject of some wrangling, post-war. Minutes dated 3 May 1946 note that the Ministry of Education wants to acquire the ‘Canadian YMCA Hostel’, but also note a ‘contrary proposal’ put forward by the Canadian YMCA ‘to continue the use of these premises for purposes other than the war-time purpose for which they were requisitioned.’ What this purpose was isn’t recorded. The buildings were however quickly adapted to educational use, and served this purpose for decades after the war.

See a history of the hutments for more information on these buildings and their use since the 1940s.

With thanks to the Yorkshire Air Museum.

The post RCAF service hostel – 1940s appeared first on York Stories.