The Yorkshire Film Archive collects, preserves, and shows film made in, or about Yorkshire. Our collections are non-fiction, dating from the 1890s to the present day, and providing a rich and visually compelling record of all aspects of lives, cultures, landscape, industries, major events and everyday activities, many of which are available to watch, free of charge, on our website.
This film is part of Free
Fire Brigade York
York celebrates the opening of one place of leisure, and witnesses the devastation done to another.
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Overview
The opening of one of York’s most favoured parks, West Bank, in 1938 is conjoined onto one of York’s most well-known fires, that of the Rialto Cinema in 1935. The Rialto was owned by the father of the great composer John Barry, Jack Xavier Prendergast, and was established as a major music venue, booking the likes of Louis Armstrong. The film shows the efforts of York Fire Services to limit the terrible damage done to the Cinema, still advertising Bing Crosby in ‘She Loves Me Not’.
This is one of a number of fascinating films taken in York in the 1930s by butcher, and amateur filmmaker, Henry Foster of Acomb. The opening of West Bank Park, once belonging to famous botanist and Quaker missionary James Backhouse, took place on July 23rd 1938. The Park is currently being revitalised with a Heritage Centre. The Rialto, burnt down in April, rose from the ashes with a new Art Deco replacement opening on 25th November 1935 with Gold Diggers, starring Dick Powell. In the 1950s John Barry worked and played there, as a projectionist and with his John Barry 7; while in the 1960s many bands played there, including the Rolling Stones and the Beatles. But this was after Prendergast sold it to Mecca in 1961.
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