Seaside history - Wondrous Winter Gardens by Susan Brownrigg with free school resources

 

In the late 19th and early 20th century holidaying at the seaside became extremely popular in Britain. The expansion of the railways meant that a trip to the coast was easier and there was a host of natural and built attractions to draw in visitors. Unfortunately sunny weather couldn't always be guaranteed, so towns quickly realised that indoor attractions were needed.

Winter Gardens were the solution - entertainment complexes made out of glass, often with trees and flowering plants inside.

A souvenir of The Crystal Palace owned by the author.

(Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

Winter Gardens owners took their inspiration from The Crystal Palace the stunning iron and glass building originally constructed for The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations in 1851 at Hyde Park, London. The Crystal Palace was the idea of three men - Prince Albert, Henry Cole (also known for creating the first commercial Christmas card) and Joseph Paxton. 

Paxton had been designing glass houses for twenty years when he was commissioned to create The Crystal Palace including the Lily House at Chatsworth which was built to protect the giant Victoria Regia a rare tropical water plant that had been newly discovered and its seed brought back to Britain.

The Crystal Palace was so popular it was moved south of the River Thames to Sydenham in 1854. It was sadly destroyed by a fire in 1936.

Souvenir of The Southport Pavilion Winter Gardens

 & Aquarium owned by the author.

(Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

The first Winter Garden was built in Southport, Lancashire, on land between the Promenade and Lord Street it's smart shopping street which is said to have inspired the famous Champs-Élysées in Paris.

The Winter Gardens was built by Manchester architects Maxwell and Tuke, who also designed Blackpool Tower, though they both died before it was finished.

Their Winter Gardens opened 150 years ago, in September 1874, and was advertised as 'the largest conservatory in England' and was built between two brick pavilions.

Postcard showing Southport Winter Gardens (right) owned by the author.

(Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

There were extensive gardens outside the building and a 170 foot promenade inside where visitors could stroll and admire the indoor planting. There was also a band pavilion, a reading room, a chess room and a conservatory filled with plants and flowers as well as a cascade (waterfall.)

The aquarium had over 20 tanks for fish including sharks and pools for seals and crocodiles.

An opera house was added in 1851 designed by the renowned theatre designer Frank Matcham (he also designed the famous Blackpool Tower Ballroom).

The opera house was destroyed by a fire in 1929 and was replaced by the art deco Garrick Theatre which later became a cinema and then a bingo hall and is now set to be transformed into a fancy spa hotel.

The Garrick Theatre, Southport, was built on the site

of the Southport Winter Gardens Opera House is set to be restored.

(Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

Winter Gardens soon followed at Bournemouth and Torquay on the South Coast. 

Southport and Bournemouth Winter Gardens were demolished in the 1930s but the one at Torquay was sold to Great Yarmouth who had the building taken apart and the pieces transported by barge to its new home! 

Now Grade II* listed, the Winter Gardens closed in 2008 but is due to be renovated as it was awarded a Heritage Horizon Award by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Blackpool Winter Gardens features on the cover of Gracie Fairshaw
 and the Missing Reel by Susan Brownrigg (illustration by Jenny Czerwonka)

My latest children's book - Gracie Fairshaw and the Missing Reel is partly set in Blackpool Winter Gardens. The story is set around the filming of a movie in the resort in 1935. The plot was inspired by actress Gracie Fields filming Sing as We Go in the town. In the book, my characters visit the posh Renaissance Restaurant in the Winter Gardens and go to a casting call in the Spanish Hall.

Coronation Street entrance with white faience tiles, to Blackpool Winter Gardens.

 (Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

The Blackpool Winter Gardens opened in 1878 and is also Grade II* listed. Early attractions included gardens and a roller skating rink. 

Early features included a fernery. There is also a horseshoe promenade and the floral hall which has a beautiful glass roof.

Glass roof, Floral Hall, Blackpool Winter Gardens. (Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

The building has had many changes over the years, including three versions of an opera houses (the first was also designed by Frank Matcham).

It is also home to not one, but two Wurlitzer organs!

Wurlitzer organ, Empress Ballroom.
(Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

In 1896 a Big Wheel was added to the outside of the building, in the hope it would be a rival attraction to Blackpool Tower. The 'jolly wheel' as it was known locally was closed in 1928 and taken apart. Apparantly the carriages were sold off! A similar one is still going strong in Vienna, Austria and features in the classic 1930s film The Third Man!

Author's paperweight souvenir showing Blackpool Winter Garden's
 Big Wheel. One of the Winter Gardens glass domes is visible on the left of the image.
(Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

In the 1930s when other Winter Gardens were being demolished, the one at Blackpool had a makeover. 

J.C Derham was hired to do the construction, while Andrew Mazzei, who worked as an art director for the Gaumont Film Company was responsible for the decoration.

His rooms include the Spanish Hall, the Ye Galleon bar and the Jacobethan style Baronial Hall which look like they have wooden paneling and decoration but are actually made from fibrous plaster - a material used for making film sets and props.

Ye Galleon today (Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

The Baronial Hall is now used as a wedding venue

(Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

Blackpool Council bought the Winter Gardens in 2010 in a £40 million pound deal. They have renovated a lot of the rooms inside which had fallen into disrepair. 

They have made repairs to the Empress Ballroom roof and £1.8 million was spent on restoring the glorious Spanish Hall's roof.

The Spanish Hall's decoration includes depictions of Spanish villages

 in plasterwork. Photo: Susan Brownrigg

Hopefully the Winter Garden's historic Pavilion Theatre will be next to be repaired.

Further up the coast, the surviving part of Morecambe Winter Gardens, originally the Victoria Pavilion Theare, is also currently being restored. 

It is great that these important building are being preserved for the future.

Author Susan Brownrigg in the Empress Ballroom,
Blackpool Winter Gardens during an open day (Photo: Susan Brownrigg)

Susan Brownrigg is the author of the Gracie Fairshaw mystery series set in 1930s Blackpool and Kintana and the Captain's Curse.

FREE RESOURCES: Schools can download free education resources relating to Gracie Fairshaw and the Missing Reel and Susan's other books HERE

Find out more about Susan and her books at susanbrownrigg.com or follow her on socials

Taking inspiration from the history of cinema – by Susan Brownrigg

Where do you get your ideas? For me the things I want to write about are the same things I was passionate about as a child.

I loved daytrips to Blackpool with my family when I was growing up, visiting Blackpool Tower, the Illuminations and its many other attractions. So, it felt right to set my 1930s Gracie Fairshaw mystery series there.

For the third book in the series, Gracie Fairshaw and the Missing Reel (published on World Book Day, March 7^th) I decided to set the story around the filming of a movie in the resort.

I knew that another Gracie, Gracie Fields – the Rochdale born superstar singer and actress had made a film in Blackpool in 1934. In fact, I had watched and studied Sing as We Go as part of my degree in journalism, film & broadcasting as well as writing my dissertation on the actress!

Gracie Fields in a special issue of Picturegoer Magazine about Sing as We Go

(author's photograph)

I loved that the film was shot on location, with key scenes recorded at the Pleasurebeach funfair, the open-air baths, sideshows and the Blackpool Tower circus.

Basil Dean directing Sing as we Go at the open-air baths, Blackpool.

In my book, the cast and crew are recording a fictional thriller called Room for a Traitor, when my heroine, young newspaper reporter, Gracie Fairshaw, learns that an important reel of film has gone missing.

To add authenticity to the film-making scenes, I visited Blackpool Central Library and looked at old copies of the Gazette newspaper on microfiche (as I had with the previous two Gracie books.)

I was able to see the cameras that were used and was intrigued by the fact that Gracie had had a body double/stuntwoman. I went on to learn that Lilian Tollis had been a stage actress herself as well as a dancer, sometimes using the name Zetta Morenta.

Body double/Stunt woman Zetta Morenta had a close resemblance
 to actress Gracie Fields (photo Jackie Settle)

I knew I wanted to include a similar character in my story – but I didn’t know much about stunt work. So, I did more research, reading a number of books on the subject.

I learned that in the early days of moviemaking, the stars often performed their own stunts.

In the silent film era, directors, script writers and performers were often women.

Half of all American films made before 1925 were written by women!

Dramatic serials like the Perils of Pauline were very popular with their cliffhangers, and gutsy heroines.

The female stars often performed their own stunts, with many hired because they were strong swimmers, good at driving motorcars, or were skilled acrobats.

Sometimes stuntwomen were hired, and then became leads themselves, but as the work became better paid, men started to take over – wearing wigs and dresses to look like the stars.

It was said that most stunt workers only lasted five years. Lots were killed or badly injured. For example, in 1929, sixteen men were killed, including three stunt pilots making the film Hell’s Angels!

(Sadly, stunt work is still very dangerous. Actor Rory Kinnear, whose father died in a stunt accident, continues to campaign for better training and awareness of the dangers involved.)

With the introduction of sound, cinema attendance grew and the film making became big business – women were pushed aside, and only certain poorer paid roles were generally deemed suitable for them.

Although Hollywood is often the place we associate with film making, Britain had its own studios, most were in London, but there was a northern company - Mancunian Films based in Manchester who also shot a movie in Blackpool - Holidays with Pay.

In 1927 the Cinematograph Films Act was introduced which insisted that a specific percentage of British produced movies that had to be shown domestically. Unfortunately while some brilliant movies were produced, this led to a lot of poorer quality ones too, dubbed 'Quota Quickies.'

The former Odeon cinema, Blackpool.
It opened in 1939 and had 3,088 seats!

(author's photograph)

Unemployment in the 1930s saw people visiting the cinema as an escape from their worries. Many new cinemas were built, some in exotic architectural styles.

By 1938 there were 4,907 cinemas in the UK and around that same time Blackpool alone had 17! 

Inspiration for two more characters in my book came from a real-life director Alfred Hitchcock and editor/screenwriter Alma Reville. They were married and often worked together on exciting thrillers including the first British made ‘talkie’ Blackmail.

I also enjoyed setting scenes in Blackpool’s stunning Winter Gardens. This Victorian era entertainment complex went through a transformation in the 1930s. New rooms were created that looked like a Spanish village, a pirate ship and a baronial hall! These new designs were created by Andrew Mazzei, who also worked as an art director on British films!

The Spanish Hall, Winter Gardens (photograph Susan Brownrigg)

The climax of Gracie Fairshaw and the Missing Reel takes place on the roof of the Regent Cinema in Blackpool – which still exists today, as well as showing popular classic movies, it also houses an antiques centre. I was lucky to be allowed into the projection room - a real treat for a movie lover like me!

Susan Brownrigg in the projection room, The Regent Cinema,

 Blackpool ( author's photograph)

Lights, camera, action!

A new movie being filmed in Blackpool is a real scoop for trainee reporter Gracie Fairshaw.

When she's invited to interview the star, Sally Sunshine, Gracie uncovers a plot as exciting as the one being filmed. Someone has stolen a vital film reel - and then a vicious attack is attempted on Sally!

In a world of body-doubles, stunts, costumes and makeup, not everything is what it seems.
Gracie must go behind the scenes and work out, which of the cast and crew can;t be trusted before the shoot comes to a thrilling climax at the town's cinema.

Gracie Fairshaw and the Missing Reel is published on Thursday 7th March. You can preorder a signed copy HERE

Susan Brownrigg is the author of the Gracie Fairshaw mystery series and Kintana and the Captain's Curse, a treasure hunt adventure featuring pirates and lemurs!
(UCLan Publishing)

Find out more at susanbrownrigg.com

Food for thought! Using local delicacies as inspiration - by Susan Brownrigg

Food memories can be some of our most vivid - I’m a Lancashire lass – I grew up in Wigan. We were definitely a meat, potatoes and veg family and on a good day with afters (pudding) to finish. 

Of course, up north, lunch was called dinner, and five o’clock onwards was when we had tea – our main meal.

I remember fondly fried breakfasts, readybrek and chopped up egg in a cup at the start of the day. Lunch would be a butty, but if it was a Friday during the school holidays my dad would bring home fish and chips. He was a milkman so worked very early shifts! I was a real meat eater back then – so I’d cross my fingers and ask if I could have steak pudding and chips. I didn’t ever want anything of a kid’s menu and ‘babbiesyed’ as it’s known in Wigan was grown-up food. It won’t surprise you to know I was nicknamed the gannet!

Wigan dialect and food is celebrated in Jess Riley's station art work
- babbiesyed and peywet is steak pudding with pea juice!

I also recall the newspaper wrapping, though families would also queue up with pyrex dishes to take home their chippy tea.

Another treat was pie from Edwards Bakery – and better still if I could have it in a ‘barm cake’ – the Wigan name for a bread roll. Wiganers are known as pie-eaters, though the reason why is debated. While Lancashire Hot Pot with a suet crust was another favourite.

Butter pie

My first job was as a reporter on the Ormskirk Advertiser, a small market town in West Lancashire, only a stone’s throw from where I now live. Ormskirk is famous for it’s gingerbread – this sweet treat was made by women in the town since 1732!

Sweet treats

Town’s often have their own cake or desert – Manchester Tart, Bakewell Tart, Eccles Cakes and Chorley Cakes – are just a few northern examples.

When I write my stories, I love to include descriptions of food being eaten. In my Gracie Fairshaw series, set in Blackpool, the children devour hot chips outside, with the sea air proving the perfect accompaniment along with lashings of salt and vinegar! In Trouble at the Tower, Gracie enjoys a warm mince pie with cream in the glamourous setting of Blackpool Tower’s Oriental Lounge. While in Kintana and the Captain’s Curse, my heroine has to survive on weevily ship’s hard tack (a not very edible biscuit that pirates ate) and grog and misses the traditional Malagasy recipes her Pa cooks at the pet shop home.

Cook books and food history books and online blogs are a great way to explore what your character would eat, depending on where – and when - they are.

I’ve found some fantastically useful titles over the years, including while researching what people ate in 12^th century Cambodia during the Khmer Empire, the Incas in Peru and the Congo at the beginning of the 20^th century.

Useful books on food

It’s even better if you can try the foods for yourself – though you may need to watch your waistline!

Our tastebuds can transport us to other places and times – though there are some childhood snacks I wouldn’t want to try again – 1980s blackcurrant flavoured crisps being one!

(All photos: Susan Brownrigg)

ACTIVITY

It's time to go shopping! You are looking for foods that your character would eat - it could be sweets, something savoury or a dessert! Buy a couple that look interesting - but remember to check the ingredients if you have any allergies/dietary requirements!

Back home - find some paper and a pen or pencil. When you're ready, find a quiet spot to eat your food. Don't rush! Let the flavour fill your mouth, what is the texture like? How does the food make you feel? Is it a taste you like, or not?

Where would your character eat this food? At home? In a cafe? On a picnic?

Jot down these thoughts and try to form a scene from them. 

Is your character eating alone or are they with friends, family, an enemy?

Are they savouring every mouthful or in a rush? Mood can affect how we feel about what we eat too.

Perhaps you could create your own recipe using local produce! Think about what ingredients you would use and how it would be cooked. 

 

 

Author Susan Brownrigg

Susan Brownrigg is a Lancashire lass and the author of three historical children's books for ages 8+ - Gracie Fairshaw and the Mysterious Guest & Gracie Fairshaw and the Trouble at the Tower are seaside mysteries set in Blackpool. Kintana and the Captain's Curse is a pirate adventure set in Madagascar.

Susan's books are published by Uclan Publishing. They are available from bookshops and online retailers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

How music can help historical writers to create authentic worlds

My Gracie Fairshaw mystery series is set in the 1930s so I am always looking for ways to bring historical authenticity to my scenes. One of the ways I have found bring verisimilitude to my writing is through music.

In my new book Gracie Fairshaw and the Trouble at the Tower there were plenty opportunities to be inspired by music from the past. The story takes place in the Blackpool Tower – known then as The Wonderland of the World because of the many attractions it offered.

Blackpool Tower (author's photo)

There was the Tower Ascent (the lift that took you to the top of the tower), stunning roof gardens, a menagerie, ballroom, circus and aquarium as well as fabulous places to eat including the Oriental lounge. 

The Tower Ascent, ballroom and circus still exist, and if you look carefully on your next visit you might spot architectural details from the oriental lounge where the dino golf now is!

 

Evidence of the Oriental lounge still survives (author's photo)

Music was an important part of the Tower’s entertainment offer. Although I haven’t used it in a story yet, I am really interested in the Orchestrion – that used to be in the entrance to the aquarium. 

 

The Orchestrion (ThinkTank)

Orchestrions were mechanical organs, usually made by clockmakers – the one in the Tower was made by Imhof and Mukle in Germany in 1879. It was in a 13ft high wooden cabinet. The orchestrion was originally bought for £3,000! originally worked by pin cyclinders, like in a muscial box! After 35 years the machine was converted so it used Wurlitzer paper rolls. I'm sure Violet, from my Gracie books, would love working out how it operated!

The Orchestrion was removed from the tower and is now in storage at ThinkTank, Birmingham.

Orchestrion 10" record (Decca, 1958) (lp, author's collection)

Live music was also an important attraction in the Tower.

The Roof Gardens were used for dance band concerts – in the 1930s dance band music was incredibly popular – live broadcasts from hotels and the Tower could be heard on the radio and played at home on shellac 78s.

The Tower employed their own dance band leader – Bertini. He sounds Italian but he was actually a Londoner called Bert!

Bertini and the Radio Boys (postcard, author's collection)

 

The roof gardens, Blackpool Tower
 

I am lucky to have a lot of original dance bands 78s at home as well as some vinyl and CDs. I listened to these while writing my book and it definitely helps me get into the 1930s world. Bertini records are hard to find, I have one 78 and a CD – but I did find a postcard complete with a collection of band autographs on ebay – which was thrilling.

I also have some sheet music featuring Bertini – sheet music sold really well in the 1930s giving music lovers a chance to play the most popular songs at home on the piano. The sheets included the notes and lyrics and often had a photograph on the cover.

 

Bertini, The Touch of your Lips song sheet (author's collection.)

I wanted to include a dance band in Trouble at the Tower – so I created the character Fredini. I had great fun making up song titles for his band to perform.

Of course the music most associated with Blackpool Tower is the Wurlitzer. This fantastic white organ has been an attraction in the ballroom since 1929 - with the current organ being installed in1935. I couldn't resist including it in both Gracie Fairshaw books. I absolutely adore the sound!

Reg Dixon at the Wurlitzer

What you might not know, is that the Blackpool Tower ballroom was host to a professional children’s ballet between 1902 and 1972. The ballet was extremely popular with audiences - and some of the young dancers went on to stardom. 

The Blackpool Tower Children's Ballet

The most famous dancer was Little Emmie – real name Emma Tweesdale – she started dancing with the ballet when she was just 8 years old. She was nicknamed the La Petite Pavlova (after the famous ballerina Anna Pavlova.) 

 

Madame Pauline Rivers (left) and Little Emmie (postcard, author's collection)

She and the ballet’s director – Madame Pauline Rivers – also feature on sheet music and postcards. I discovered that Madame Rivers went on to adopt Emmie.

 Song sheets featuring Little Emmie

For Trouble at the Tower, I wanted to create my own Christmas ballet. In my book the ballet has been taken over by a new director – Madame Petrova – who is a former Russian ballerina. 

Gracie Fairshaw and the Trouble at the Tower (cover design Jenny Czerwonka)

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to ballet music by the famous Russian composer – Tchaikovsky, and because trouble at the Tower is set in Christmas 1935, I also enjoyed researching which Christmas songs and carols were popular in the 1930s.

My favourite piece which features in the show is Troika by Prokofiev – also known as the Sleigh Song. The song was composed as part of a soundtrack for a Russian film - Lieutenant Kijé - in 1934.

 

A traditional sleigh ride

It makes me feel so Christmassy when I hear it! It really helped to get me in the mood for writing my festive mystery!

I hope you have been encouraged to seek out some of the music I've mentioned and will have a listen yourself!

ACTIVITY

Find some paper and a pen or pencil. Turn on the radio and tune into a station you wouldn’t normally listen to that is playing music! 

Start to write any words or images that it makes you think of. If you struggle to imagine things copy down some of the lyrics – if there are any – and see if that suggests a story to you! Or perhaps if there are no lyrics you could make up some that seem to fit the music.

Discussion points for teachers/parents 

Music often reflects the tastes of people at any given time - what music is popular now? Is it different to the music enjoyed by your family when they were children? Why do you think different generations may not like the same time of music?

Music can make us feel happy or sad, it can even make us laugh! It has been used to lift people's spirits in times of war or when times were hard - such as during the depression of the 1930s. If you were to create and bury a time capsule containing objects from now for people to find in the future - what music would you include. 

There have been many different ways to listen to pre-recorded music such as wax cyclinders, 78s, vinyl records, 78s, CDs, minidiscs, MP3s and streaming. Some formats have had a revival in recent times.

How do you think people will listen to music in the future? Will there be nostalgia for old methods?

Author Susan Brownrigg

Gracie Fairshaw and the Trouble at the Tower by Susan Brownrigg is an historical novel for 9-12 year olds set in Blackpool, 1935.

Susan's books are published by Uclan Publishing. They are available from bookshops and online retailers.