Howden Milton Rooms performance of Red Riding Hood

As regular readers of the blog will know I contribute a piece every month to a local magazine called Howden Matters.

Some two months ago the editor published a photograph which had been sent in for which he had no identification.  Since then I have been contacted by several people who knew both the event and the names.

It was in fact a performance of a pantomime organised by a lady called VI Phillips who ran a dancing school in Howden and who put on regular shows in the town's Milton Rooms.

Howden's Milton  Assembly Rooms were built as a schoolroom in 1857 behind the  Congregational chapel in St Helen's Square. The rooms were used for a multitude of purposes. At various times they  were an auxiliary classroom for the Council school, a sale room, a lecture theatre and of course a venue for Vi Philips' dance shows. I remember  going in there when my mother was teaching dancing to senior girls from the Hailgate school in the 1950s but am not sure when it was demolished. Any more memories or pictures of the Milton Rooms  would be welcome.

 

 Thora,  who played Red Riding Hood, wrote that

'The photograph would have been taken in 1936/37 in the Milton Rooms.   What a pity the place was pulled down. It was a large hall with stage and several changing rooms behind'

Back row: Mrs Jeeves, Mrs Smith, Vi Phillips, Methodist minister, Mrs Jackson, Percy Jeeves,  Edwin Turner, unknown, Bob Dennis, Robert Dennis.

Middle row:  Josephine Wilson, Ethel Tasker, Mildred Long, Bill Seddon [the fox], Betty Waterhouse, Rene Talbot, Ida Jackson, Jack Watson, Thora Turner, Margaret Talbot, Mrs Talbot, Marie Turner, Eunice Lumley.

Front row [left]: Kathleen Dennis, Roy ?, Betty Naylor, Elsi Proctor, Enid Nutbrown, Barbara Smith, Gwen Jeeves [ the fairy].

Front row [right]: Pat Naylor, Marjorie Gamwell, June Phillips, unknown, unknown.