The New Class of Visitor

Construction of entertainment establishments on the Marine Parade was about to pick up at a very fast rate. This started with the Goode’s Hotel (see Figure 17) being built in 1902 after their dance establishment was destroyed by fire, the Marine Arcades housing small shops which sold holiday gifts being built in 1902 with the second arcade opening in 1904.

Figure 17: Caesar's Palace Amusement Arcade (originally the Goode's Hotel)

In 1903 George Gilbert who previously ran a circus in a small wooden building on St. Georges Road, acquired part of the site which used to belong to the Bath House, and on it he built a new Circus. The architect on behalf of Mr Gilbert, a Mr Ralph Scott Cockrill, thought that sound insulation would be an important factor, and so he designed the walls out of two foot thick concrete with a double roof construction. The Hippodrome Circus would hold 2,500 people, with a special menagerie provision at the rear and even had a mechanism for the sinking of the ring to allow it to be filled with water.

In 1899 the Corporation purchased the Wellington pier from the Wellington Pier Company for £1,250 which they demolished and proceeded in the construction of a new pier. By 1903 it was completed and opened. The new pavilion at the end of the pier was of steel frame construction with a semi-oriental like finish. It could house up to 1,000 people, which compared with the Britannia pier was a fairly small number. In 1904 the corporation improved the Wellington Pier site by erecting the “Winter Gardens” (see Figure 18), which they had purchased from Torquay Corporation for just £1,300, (which was just one tenth of the original cost). The building was placed on a base of tile-faced concrete, and was constructed with cast-iron main supports and ornamental curved wrought-iron roof trusses and purlins carrying the glass roof. It was capable of holding up to 2,000 people, and was used for dancing and giving concerts.

Figure 18: The Winter Gardens

By 1906 the old horse drawn tramcars had been replaced by the new electric ones, and it took just 15 minutes to travel from Vauxhall Railway Station to the Wellington Pier, which allowed visitors to be transported to the place where they were staying much more efficiently.

Mr Nightingales empire had now expanded quite rapidly and he now owned either privately or within a company, the Britannia Pier, The Aquarium, The Queens Hotel, The Theatre Royal, The Royal Assembly Rooms, The Revolving Tower and the Victoria Building Companies, Victoria Hotel, as the previous tenant had failed to pay the rent due.

In 1908 Great Yarmouth's Marine Parade was proud to posses the countries first purpose built picture house. It was called “The Gem” (see Figure 19) and was constructed in a whimsical baroque style, with hundreds of light bulbs lighting the facade.

Figure 19: Ripley's Believe It or Not! (Originally 'The Gem' cinema)

In 1911 a second establishment called “The Empire Picture Playhouse” (see Figure 20) was erected, and this was clad in a vitreous terra-cotta material in a 'free' renaissance style. Within this period the Britannia pier pavilion was destroyed by fire causing £1,600 worth of damage. A new pavilion was built and reopened in 1910, only to suffer the same fate when it was also destroyed by fire in 1914 and had to be rebuilt once again.

Figure 20: Bourbon Street (Originally the 'Empire' cinema)

When war broke out in 1914 the Holiday industry ground to a halt, and in 1915 Great Yarmouth was subjected to one of the first air raids in the country. With its front-line position a Royal Naval Air Service Seaplane base and airfield was established on the Denes, which was an area still largely undeveloped, and only used by the fishing industry.

The first world war had acted as an instrument for breaking down the old social order, and this gave the working class a new found freedom. As a result 'Holiday makers' flocked to the town in ever increasing numbers. Four years of regimental style living had changed their outlook, and instead of the organised entertainments they had wanted before this period, a new unstructured recreation was required. The Corporation realising this started a programme of public works to counteract the unemployment situation within the town, caused by the great economic depression. The first project undertaken in 1922 was the building of a swimming pool, and the second, a new racecourse on the North Denes which replaced the original military one, which had disappeared soon after the barracks closed. During 1926 and 1927 the waterways and boating lakes were opened, and in 1937 the Marina Open Air theatre added to the list of attractions. Now that the beach had built up, the sea at high tide was no longer a threat to the flooding of the Marine Parade, and during the interwar period, gardens tennis courts and bowling greens were laid out between the two piers.

In 1919 after a small fun fair with a scenic railway was destroyed by fire, another was built in its place, South of the Wellington pier and Victoria Building Company developments. This increased the amount of people passing the Wellington pier and so to tempt more people to enter, the Corporation built a grand entrance (see Figure 21) to the pier which matched the semi-oriental style of the pavilion, in 1927.

Figure 21: Entrance to the Wellington Pier

In 1938 the end house in Britannia terrace, used as a private house was converted into the present Majestic Amusement Arcade.

By the time war broke out in 1939 the 'Golden Mile', was full, with buildings lining its West side and with Gardens, Piers and Sports facilities lining the East.

Like the First World War the Second one also brought the Holiday Industry to a halt, and due to the destruction of the quayside, the fishing industry also. Again Great Yarmouth was in the front line, with the town being subjected to heavy bombing raids between 1940 and 1945, particularly in 1941, when nearly 8,000 bombs were dropped in 167 air raids. These raids completely destroyed many parts of the ancient town, and was not helped by the closely packed nature of the rows which increased the spread of fire.

When the war in Europe had ended in 1944, a massive rebuilding programme was put into action, with the port being the main focus, so that the town could resume its normal operations. However, within ten years the fishing industry had totally collapsed because of overfishing, and of the town's two traditional functions, only the holiday industry remained.