The origin of Knottingley Band is obscure. In 1980 the Band celebrated its conjectured centenary year, the date being taken from an old letterhead of 1880. (1) However, a subsequent documentary source has been located which indicates that the genesis of the Band may lie much further in the past.

The records of the long defunct Knottingley Brewery Co. reveal that in April 1861 the proprietor, John Carter, made a donation to Knottingley Town Band. (2) There is clear evidence therefore that a band was in existence early in the second half of the nineteenth century and as the name ‘Knottingley Town’ or ‘Knottingley Brass Band’ was commonly used prior to the adoption of the title ‘Knottingley Silver Prize Band’ early the following century, it would suggest that the year 1880 merely marked the reorganisation of the Band which was already well established by that date.

The roots of brass band history are lost in time but immediate influences date from the late eighteenth century when the growing popularity of fairs and markets increasingly became the haunts of musicians. A simultaneous development was the growth of church bands as small groups of parishioners banded together to provide musical accompaniments for divine worship. The musical nucleus was forged into a cohesive whole by the advent of the Industrial Revolution which by the early nineteenth century as an antidote to the harsh drabness of working class life, engendered the genesis of small bands which were to develop as an important element of popular working class culture in many small towns and villages. Numerous brass and reed bands were formed at that period, with many having but a short existence. Others, however, such as Kippax village band, established in 1814, proved more durable and thrived in the burgeoning atmosphere of national security and patriotic pride which characterised the Victorian era.

Nominally subscription bands were primarily of working class membership and dependant upon the financial support of working class communities. Such bands were also of economic necessity, open to the patronage of the local gentry. Thus, the involvement and by extension, influence of the middle classes was a clearly discernible element in the development of local ensembles.

The middle class squire-archy and aspirant capitalist manufacturers, mindful of the excesses and social consequences of the French Revolution of 1789 and fearful of the latent power of the growing industrial proletariat in England, regarded music as a force of good; a device by which the masses might be gentled and pacified. To this purpose they actively supported the formation of community bands and in so doing became the arbiters of musical taste subliminally defining a basic repertoire of selections from operas, marches, waltzes and polkas.

Simultaneous technical and commercial revolutions accompanied and influenced developing social trends. From the mid nineteenth century the process of mass production assisted the manufacture of cheaper instruments while the invention of the piston valve and its application to musical instruments made such instruments relatively easier to play and was therefore fundamental to the increase in the number of bands formed as the century progressed. (3)

Such bands were frequently associated with local inns which in addition to affording the facility for practice in convivial surroundings also provided adequate space for the storage of instruments. The bands were supported and encouraged by brewers and publicans keen to promote entertainment and stimulate the sale of ale. Money for the purchase of instruments and music stands was commonly raised by public subscription and by loans from wealthy patrons who also often owned the premises which served as a bandroom. (4) Thus, there is a distinct possibility that the beginnings of Knottingley Town Band were subject to such an arrangement and this is further reinforced by the known link with the Carter family and with St. Botolph’s Church with which that family were so prominently associated throughout the nineteenth century.

Of the formative years of the Band there is little specific evidence and it is only following the establishment of the Pontefract Advertiser late in 1863 that snippets of news began to appear concerning the activities of the Band. A newspaper report of November 1874, for instance, states that Knottingley Brass Band played for dancing in Knottingley Town Hall until 11.00pm. (5) More seditiously, perhaps, is a report the year following that the Band led George Knapton and his supporters from Knottingley railway station to the Town Hall following Knapton’s release from prison where he had spent a month in detention for illegally voting in an election for the town guardians. Knapton was met at the station by an open conveyance and was triumphantly led through the streets by the Band. At the Town Hall, Knapton was presented with a purse containing £20 by Sidney Woolf Esq., earthenware manufacturer of Ferrybridge Pottery, one of the successful electoral candidates in whose interest Knapton had broken the law. (6)

The month before, the Band had played at the opening match of Knottingley Town Cricket Club following its relocation to Banks Garth, the occasion being marked by a match between the married and single men of the town. (7) The event was but the first in which the Band appeared at the Banks Garth cricket field and marked the beginning of a mutually supportive bond between the Band and the Club throughout subsequent decades.

As early as the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the Band was already engaged on a well established routine, elements of which are still discernible today. For example, in 1875 the Band paraded the streets of Knottingley on Christmas morning, playing carols, and annual event designed to provide festive cheer and simultaneously take advantage of the season of goodwill to replenish the coffers of the Band. (8)

A further annual engagement was the ‘send off’ provided by the Band on the occasion of the annual Sunday School trip for the teachers and pupils of St. Botolph’s Church. On occasion, the Band actually accompanied the trippers on their out of town excursions, as in August 1885 when a convoy of eight wagonettes travelled to Womersley park headed by the Band which played as they left Knottingley and as they entered Womersley, and then repeated the performance on the return journey. (9)

In the winter of 1885-86 the Band appeared in a series of entertainments given in the National Schoolroom, promoted by the Vicar of St. Botolph’s, Rev. F.E. Egerton. (10) Again, in 1885, the Band made what was described as, “their annual church parade” on Whit Sunday morning and shortly after noon the following day accompanied the Sunday School pupils under the direction of Mr. Starr, walking in procession through the town and singing hymns at the residences of principal members of the St. Botolph’s congregation. By 4.00pm, the rounds being completed, both Band and scholars sat down to “a well provided tea” in the schoolroom. The procession then reformed and marched to Grange Field, the Hill Top residence of Mrs Hannah Martha Carter, widow of the erstwhile brewery owner, where games took place as the Ban played selections of music to “the great delight of all present.”

Finally, after the singing of a favourite hymn and a round of cheers by the pupils for Mrs Carter, the Vicar, the Sunday School teachers (plus one for themselves), the Band struck up with the National Anthem to mark the end of a very busy day. (11) Undaunted, the following year the Band again accompanied the St. Botolph’s Sunday School trip, this time on a visit to Nostell Priory. (12)

Regardless of any patronage which may have been bestowed by the Carter family or other benefactors, the Band has, from its earliest days down to the present time, been largely self-supporting, relying upon the skill and enthusiasm of its members to elicit the patronage of the local population. That support from this source has generally been forthcoming is largely due to the esteem in which the Band has been held by the public because of its readiness to support any occasion, civic or social within the town and district, particularly events held for charitable purposes. Nowhere is this more clearly evident than in the case of fundraising for the district medical charities which served the local population.

During the last quarter of the nineteenth century the custom had developed of holding an annual parade with the Town Band leading representatives of the various friendly societies through the main thoroughfares of the town as collectors sought random contributions from bystanders in support of organisations such as Pontefract Dispensary, Leeds Infirmary and Askern Spa Medicinal Baths. Thus, in 1881, the Town Band led members of twenty lodges of the Oddfellows Friendly Society in a march round the town as a preliminary to a service held in the Ropewalk Wesleyan Chapel. Frequent heavy showers resulted in the temporary abandonment of the parade but following the service, the group reformed and visited the areas unattended earlier that day. (13)

A variation of the fund raising activity of the Band is also evident from an earlier engagement at which, on Monday and Tuesday, 23-24 August 1880, the Knottingley Town Band played for dancing at Ferrybridge feast and gala which was held in support of the medical establishments. (14)

The Oddfellows, Buffalos and kindred organisations within the town formed the Knottingley Charitable Institutions Committee which by 1884 had extended the number of charitable events held within the town throughout the year including a gala event to coincide with Feast Week activities on and around August Bank Holiday each year. The earliest recorded gala concert was held at Grange Field, adjacent to the residence of Mrs Hannah Martha Carter, in 1884. Within a few years the event had been transformed, becoming an annual Hospital Sunday parade and demonstration with which the Town Band was to be associated for over half a century. (15) However, throughout the decade of the 1880s there appears to have been a hiatus concerning the Town Band’s involvement with the annual parade and demonstration, the rival Bagley’s Glassworks Band being regular participants in the event. (16)

The ‘Glasshouse’ band was formed by the employees of Messrs Bagley Wild & Co., whose glass bottle factory had introduced the industry to Knottingley in May 1871. (17) The precise date of the establishment of the Glassworks Band is not known but the indications are that it was formed in the early 1880s for a report in the Pontefract & Castleford Express, dated August 1883, states that: -

“The Brass Band of Bagley, Wild & Co., under conductor, Mr. John Shaw, paraded the town on Saturday and Monday and played well indeed considering the short time Mr. Jerry Johnson of Castleford, the teacher, has had them under his tuition.” (18)

Although entitled a ‘brass band’ reference to it as a ‘Brass and reed band’ is found in a report of a concert performance which took place on Knottingley Flatts in June 1884, under “their able bandmaster, Mr John Shaw”, when the efforts of the band were stated to be “highly appreciated”, (19) as they no doubt were when the band participated in a service at Christ Church, Knottingley, the same month. (20)

The move to establish a glassworks band may have precipitated the reorganisation of the Town Band in 1882. Certainly, there exists at least one source which connects certain personalities with both organisations. Recalling days of yore in newspaper correspondence in 1977, Mrs Hodgson Walker referred to her father, John Hartley Shaw, as the former bandmaster of the Town Band at the same time when Sam and Jack Marshall were tutors. Other familial members of “the first Knottingley Brass Band” to be mentioned were the Hargraves, Drapers, Rowbottoms and the Pollards. Extant documentary evidence links individuals from the above named families with subsequent membership of the Town Band and it would appear, therefore, that for reasons which are unclear, a ‘breakaway’ occurred in 1882, with John Shaw and perhaps others, leaving the Town Band to form the band of Bagley, Wild & Co., thus necessitating the reorganisation of the Town Band and prompting the subsequent but erroneous impression that the Band was established at that date. (21)

The existence of two bands within the town, each frequently referred to in the local press as ‘Knottingley Brass Band’, makes definition of their individual activities almost impossible during the ensuing decades. Indeed, the common nomenclature serves to suggest that the Town Band and the Works Band and their common link with John Shaw, were one and the same. Such is not the case, however, for aprt from the historical evidence that the Town Band was in existence some twenty years before the formation of the Works Band (indeed, a decade before the existence of the glassworks with which the latter was associated) there is clear proof that they were separate entities.

The advent of the Glassworks Band appears to have cast something of a shadow over the older ensemble and throughout the 1880s the ‘Glassblowers’ seem to have predominated in events within the town, particularly with regard to appearances at the Infirmary Sunday gatherings. In 1884, Bagley’s Band led the parade through the town with Brotherton Band in the middle and Pontefract Borough Band bringing up the rear, the parade being followed by a concert of sacred music at Grange Field, Hill Top. (22) Again, in 1886, the Glassworks Band, conducted by Mr. John Shaw, gave a concert at Howards Field which included selections of “new music” from ‘The Bohemian Girl’, ‘Art & Nature’, Weber’s ‘Mass’ and the fantasias ‘La Pariselle’, ‘La Val d’Amour’ and ‘Salutation’. (23)

For a decade and a half from 1884, the Glassworks Band participated in the events of Dispensary Sunday, usually in conjunction with brass bands from neighbouring towns such as Pontefract, Castleford, Featherstone and Brotherton and in 1890 with the military band of the Lancashire & Yorkshire Regiment. (24) In addition, in 1895, the Glassworks Band under the direction of Mr. I. Johnson, marched through the town to mark the coming of age of Mr. Ernest B. Bagley, son of William Bagley, one of the founding partners of the firm. The bandsmen were reported to be wearing new uniforms, giving them, “a very fine appearance.” (25)

The uniforms were again on display on Dispensary Sunday 1901, when the Band under John Shaw, marched to the cricket field at Banks Garth with the Brotherton Band, conducted by Mr. T. Hardy, and played selections during the annual demonstration. (26)

The demonstration of 1891 was significant in that both the Knottingley bands appeared together. The usual procession was designed to coincide with the conclusion of a cricket match at the Banks Garth field and a lengthy concert programme had been arranged as evening entertainment. Alas, the rain which rendered inconclusive the match between Knottingley Town and Fairburn threatened throughout the speeches of the attendant dignitaries and came down so heavily shortly after the commencement of the concert that proceedings had to be abandoned after only two choruses and a couple of hymns had been sung. (27)

The re-emergence of the Town Band at the demonstration marked the commencement of an era covering more than half a century during which the name of the Band was to become synonymous with the event so that by the time the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948 made fund raising obsolete, the Band had created an unparalleled attendance record. (28)

Owing to the frequent lack of distinction between the two bands in newspaper reports concerning Infirmary Sundays during the 1890s it is uncertain which ensemble appeared on some occasions. Thus, although it was reported that the “Excellent Town Band performed” in 1894 when the event was undertaken in conjunction with a special cricket match arranged by the Town Cricket Club, (29) it is most likely that the Glassworks Band also appeared on other undefined occasions, the last precise reference being that of 1901.

The ultimate fate of the Glassworks Band is equally as obscure as its origin. In 1908 the Band was named as an entrant in the forthcoming National Brass Band Contest to be held at Crystal Palace, London, but for some unknown reason the Band did not attend the contest. Thereafter the record is silent. (30)

Similarities of identity, size and repertoire between the Town Band and the Glassworks Band decreed that the latter were the principal rivals in terms of ability and prestige. There were, however, other ensembles within the town during the late Victorian period which although by their nature posing a less direct threat to the Town Band vied with it in seeking the physical and financial support of the public. It is noteworthy that music played such a significant part in the social and cultural life of the local populace and commendable that so small a community was able to sustain such a rich and varied musical ethos.

The bulk of the musical organisations, whether vocal or instrumental, were associated with the churches and chapels within the town and it is therefore unsurprising that moral attitudes informed both the social occasions, when music played a part, and also the programmes performed on such occasions. A strict regard for Sabbath keeping on the part of a substantial element of the local population was initially, a divisive feature of Infirmary Sunday with many refusing to support the cause on moral grounds because of the day on which the annual demonstration was held. (31) When religious tokenism weakened to the point of acceptance of charitable demonstrations and public concerts held on the Sabbath, it was nevertheless deemed necessary to emphasise the ‘sacred’ nature and content of such events.

Similarly, ethical and moral considerations underlay the formation of some musical groups. As early as 1865, Knottingley Band of Hope had formed a drum and fife band which participated in local galas and street marches and demonstrations in support of the Temperance Movement. (32)

Another local band of religious origin was the Red Ribbon or Salvation Army Band. The local corps had been established within the town by 1880 and by January 1883, had obtained a plot of land at Carr Lane upon which it was proposed to erect a citadel or barracks. (33) The first Salvation Army band had been established by Charles Fry at Salisbury in August 1878 and by 1881 fourteen others were in existence in various English towns. In 1883, to great public complaint, hundreds of bands were formed by the Salvationists. (34) The band of the Knottingley corps was apparently established at this time for in September 1883 it led a parade round the town culminating in a public address by the local leader, General Bairstow. (35) In August the year following, an entertainment was given in the newly opened barracks with proceeds in aid of the Red Ribbon Band. (36)

The newly established sect were obviously enterprising and obtained the support of a substantial element within the local populace for in 1884 it was revealed that the Red Ribbon Army had collected £200 in the previous twelve months to help offset the debt incurred in building their tabernacle, the Band doubtless playing a prominent part in the religious services and allied functions of the organisation. (37)

Initial goodwill was transformed into open hostility, however, when in 1885 General Bairstow published a pamphlet in which the poor, particularly the Catholic Irish, were referred to in less than flattering terms. As a result riotous scenes occurred in April when a local mob attacked a marching column of Salvationists as, led by the Band, they toured the streets of Knottingley to deliver the gospel message. One William Elerington (sic) drove his horse-drawn mail van through the marching column, an action which resulted in an appearance at the local magistrate’s court the following month. (38) A second, successive hostile demonstration occurred against the Red Ribbon Army when a Knottla mob burnt an effigy of General Bairstow on the Flatts after the local police, with considerable difficulty, had succeeded in keeping the two factions apart. (39)

However, within a short space of time the breach had obviously closed for in August 1889 the ‘Tabernacle’ Band appeared at the Infirmary Sunday demonstration held at Vale Head Field, Hill Top, where in conjunction with one of the unidentified Knottingley bands they “played good selections.”

The appearance is all the more surprising, perhaps, because of an initial decree which prohibited the Salvation Army bands from playing musical compositions other than those of religious nature, largely confining their activity to acts of worship. (40) The Ban may also have participated again in 1895 for a somewhat vague report stated that 2,000 people attended the demonstration at Howards Field;

“to the strains of Knottingley Band under the direction of Captain Kellyn and Sgt. Instructor Howland, accompanied by the Castleford Temperance and Featherstone Brass Bands.” (41)

Given the rank of the bandmaster and his assistant it would suggest that the band from Knottingley was that of the Salvation Army corps rather that either of its secular contemporaries.

It was also in the late 1880s that Knottingley String Band was formed to accompany the town Choral Society. The String Band featured in many social events in the following two decades, including regular appearances at the Infirmary Sunday demonstrations. The earliest report is of;

“a small efficient band led by Mr Chambers of Pontefract”, which accompanied the choir, both groups being under the overall supervision of Mr Archer, who had founded the Choir the previous decade. (42) Interestingly, there is no mention of any brass bands being involved in the proceedings in 1887 which paradoxically was a reversal of the situation three years earlier when it was reported that;

“This year the experiment was a tried of having only an instrumental concert with the Brass Bands of Pontefract Borough, Castleford Primitive Methodists and Knottingley taking part.” (43)

The String Band continued to perform at the Infirmary Sunday demonstrations until well into the twentieth century. In 1903 it accompanied the massed voices in a rendering of Handel’s ‘Hallelujah Chorus’ and the following year played a selection from ‘Rousseau’s Dream’. (44) Indeed, as late as 1912 the string band of the Wesleyan Brotherhood, conducted by Mr. A. Kellet, accompanied the singers but this may have been the final bow for although the voices of the Wesleyan Brotherhood were heard the following year they were accompanied by Knottingley Silver Prize Band and on the eve of the Great War the singers were merely accompanied by a pianist, Mrs Jean Arnold, of the Congregational Church. (45)

If the appearance of the Knottingley Town Band in the events of Infirmary Sunday during the 1880s and early 1890s were rare, its voluntary contribution to local organisations and charities was nevertheless significant. Nor were such contributions confined to local institutions. In May 1896, the Band paraded the streets taking a collection en route for the dependants of the Micklefield Colliery disaster and followed up this effort by playing the same evening to a large assembly of the townspeople gathered on the Flatts. (46) The following month the Band again paraded, marching from the concourse of Knottingley railway station through the thoroughfares of the town collecting money on behalf of the Society of Railway Servants’ Orphanage, an event which was for many years an annual engagement. (47) Again, in July 1896, the Band toured the outlying villages of Beal, Kellington, Whitley and Womersley, raising money on behalf of Pontefract Dispensary. (48) Presumably the distance between the rural communities was undertaken by wagonette, yet even so, to parade through each village on this circular tour represents a considerable feat of endurance and dedication.

It was those very qualities which ensured the survival of the Town Band for amidst the rivalries and the vicissitudes of time it was the Town Band which proved to be the more durable of the secular ensembles.

By the turn of the twentieth century the Band’s musical activity fell into four broad categories; public ceremonies, concert performances, dancing and contests. The participation of the Band in concerts and ceremonial events not only engendered its reputation for voluntary work to charities both local and regional, which was to be a hallmark throughout its entire existence, but played an important part in promoting cultural appreciation, for it was through such events that many local people obtained their first taste of ‘serious’ music. While music for dancing was disparaged by a church led puritanical element within local society in the third quarter of the nineteenth century, by the 1880s it was gaining wider acceptance as the ‘brass dance bands’ helped to break social taboos, paving the way in the case of the Town Band for he formation of the ‘Orchestral Band’ early in the new century. Of contests the evidence is sparse to the point of non-existence during the early period of the Band’s history. The fact is somewhat surprising given that generally from 1845 a profusion of local, regional and national contests took place, resulting in the standardisation of repertory and instrumentation. If the Town Band was involved in such events there is no evidence of it until the early years of the twentieth century although the frequency with which the Band participated from that time suggests that contesting was a well established feature of its musical activity in earlier days.

Terry Spencer, 2006

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CHAPTER 1 NOTES:
(1) Pontefract & Castleford Express, Second Section, 17-4-1980 p6. I am indebted to Mr R. Baxter, former Secretary, Knottingley Silver Band, for this information.
(2) Carters Knottingley Brewery Co., Account Book 1860-1870, folio 8.
(3) The background detail for this section is drawn from Herbert T. 'The Brass Band Movement in the Nineteenth & Twentieth Centuries', O.U.P., (1991, pp1-41, passim, & Cooper T.L.'The Brass Bands of Yorkshire', Dalesman Books, (1974), pp16-22.
(4) Wier C., 'Village & Town Bands', Shire Publications, (1981), pp7-8.
(5) Pontefract Advertiser, 14-11-1874.
(6) loc cit, 15-5-1875. Knapton had also received a gift of £5 earlier in the month.
(7) loc cit 17-4-1875. The previous venue for local cricket matches was Howards Field, Marsh End. Novelty cricket matches were a common feature of the period. In 1863, Knottingley Albion Foundry played the Australian Pottery and in 1874 Clown Cricketers played a match in August only a few weeks after a game in which the local glassblowers met the Town Tailors. In 1880, eleven players of the Knottingley Town Club took on 22 of the town's tradesmen. By that date the game had become more regularised with fixtures between neighbouring teams forming the basis of a league competition. However, novelty matches continued to be played for charitable purposes during the first decade of the twentieth century c.f. Pontefract Advertiser 19-9-1863 -6-8-1909, passim.
(8) loc cit 2-1-1875.
(9) loc cit 15-8-1885 p4.
(10) loc cit 21-11-1885 & 19-12-1885.
(11) loc cit 1-8-1885 p6.
(12) loc cit 7-8-1886.
(13) Pontefract & Castleford Express 6-8-1881, p4.
(14) loc cit 28-8-1880, p4.
(15) Spencer T. 'Feasts, Festivals & Frolics: Knottingley circa 1860-2003', (2003), for the history of the town's Hospital Sunday demonstrations. (16) ibid.
(17) Blanchard D. (ed) 'Knottingley: Its Origins & Industry', for the history of the Knottingley Glass Industry.
(18) Pontefract & Castleford Express 14-8-1883, p4.
(19) loc cit 14-6-1884, p4.
(20) Pontefract Advertiser 7-6-1884, p5.
(21) Pontefract & Castleford Express 27-1-1977.
(22) loc cit 2-8-1884, p4.
(23) loc cit 7-8-1886, p8.
(24) loc cit 27-9-1890, p5. Bands named at Knottingley Infirmary Sunday parades and demonstrations throughout the 1880s were Pontefract Borough, Pontefract Victoria, Brotherton, Castleford Primitive Methodist, Castleford Temperance and Featherstone. c.f. Pontefract Advertiser 4-8-1880, p5 & 3-8-1899, p5, and Pontefract & Castleford Express 3-8-1899, p5 & 27-9-1890, p5.
(25) loc cit 27-8-1895, p5.
(26) loc cit 3-8-1901, p5.
(27) loc cit 15-8-1891, p5.
(28) Spencer T. op cit, pp50-51. Also, Pontefract & Castleford Express 9-8-1946.
(29) loc cit 4-8-1894, p4.
(30) Pontefract Advertiser 29-8-1908, p4.
(31) loc cit 12-8-1865; 29-12-1866 & 17-9-1881.
(32) Pontefract Advertiser 12-8-1865.
(33) It was reported in January, 1883, that Mrs Shaw of Darrington Hall had been invited to lay the foundation stone of the new barracks. However, the ceremony was undertaken by Mr John Rhodes, a draper of Knottingley in March, 1883. loc cit 6-1-1883 & 10-3-1883.
(34) Herbert T., op cit, p47.
(35) loc cit 15-9-1883.
(36) loc cit 23-8-1884.
(37) loc cit 16-8-1884. One 'Service Of Song' was given by the Jubilee Singers, three emancipated slaves. c.f. loc cit 14-6-1884.
(38) loc cit 4-4-1885 & 30-5-1885. (39) loc cit 11-4-1885. Effigy burning was a common means of expressing public disapproval in the nineteenth century. During the glassmakers' dispute of 1856 effigies of Edgar Breffit and Thomas Marshall, his works manager, were burnt and thrown into the river from the Aire bridge, Castleford. Nearer home, as late as 1908 the local paper reported "A portion of the townspeople [of Knottingley] last night displayed to the public and afterwards burnt, an effigy of a man and there are some very ugly rumours current.' Pontefract & Castleford Express 26-9-1908 p4.
(40) Pontefract & Castleford Express 3-8-1899, p5.
(41) loc cit 3-8-1895, p5.
(42) loc cit 7-8-1897, p8
(43) loc cit 4-8-1894,p4.
(44) loc cit 1-8-1903, p4 & 9-7-1904,p7.
(45)loc cit 4-8-1912,p1; 13-7-1914,p4 & 1-8-1915,p1. Jean Arnold was later to become joint proprietess of the Palace Cinema, Knottingley. c.f. Spencer T. 'The Palace Cinema, Knottingley', (2000), p5.
(46) Pontefract & Castleford Express 16-5-1896, p5.
(47) loc cit 13-6-1896, p4.; 28-7-1900, p6. Also, Pontefract Advertiser,26-9-1903
(48) Pontefract & Castleford Express 18-7-1896, p4.