The Cinemas of Hertfordshire
By Allen Eyles and Keith Skone

Hertfordshire is, of course, better known for its films than its cinemas. Besides the studios at Elstree/Borehamwood, films were shot at Bushey, Welwyn Garden City, and (in the early days) at St Albans. Its cinemas were purely of local interest but in common with all the other others in Britain they have become a subject of fascination and nostalgic appeal.

For years they were taken for granted. Now most of them have vanished from the scene. As these words are written, the venerable Palace at Letchworth is finally being pummelled to pieces, vacant sites stand where – it seems only yesterday – the County Hertford and Embassy Welwyn Garden City were solidly rooted, and two other former cinemas, the Astonia Baldock and Regal Hitchin, are about to go under the wreckers’ ball. Even those cinemas still operating (some with considerable success) have changed much in atmosphere and physical appearance from the way they were in the boom years when a visit to the pictures was the leading national pastime.

In this volume we salute all the cinemas, past and present, of Hertfordshire, including those in Barnet (now part of Greater London) and Potters Bar (formerly Middlesex). We are dealing with cinema buildings, and therefore we exclude public halls and civic centres where films were only an occasional feature in the early days or are only part of a wide range of activities today. We would mention, though, that films were shown at Ashwell’s Village Hall, Bushey’s Village Hall, Codicote’s Peace Memorial Hall, Furneux Pelham’s Village Hall, Hexton’s Village Hall, at Knebworth, and at Redbourn’s Public Hall.

Our information and illustrations have been culled from many sources over many years, but of course our research relies heavily on cinema advertising in the local press. For some buildings we have an abundance of photographs; for others, nothing. We hope the appearance of this book will encourage readers to unearth more old photographs and to provide reminiscences of their local cinemas, which we should be delighted to receive.

We have been generously assisted in the compilation of this book. Acknowledgements for specific illustrations are made in the captions but we would like to express our appreciation for more wide-ranging assistance to:
Shelagh Head, the Hertfordshire Local Studies Librarian, for the warm welcome extended on our visits to Hertford;
John Squires, Kevin Wheelan, David Jones, Martin Tapsell, Percy Birtchnell, and Paul Francis for generously and promptly providing illustrations and/or information;
Eric Brandreth, for showering us with so much of his own private research into Harpenden cinemas;
Philip Plumb, for his valuable help in solving many of the problems we had in researching Buntingford;
Tony Moss of the Cinema Organ Society, for his notes on organ history;
Arthur Jones, Hon. Editor, Hertfordshire Publications, for his interest and support;
Martin Ayres, Hugh Corrance, John Foskett and Margaret Shepherd for entrusting us with irreplaceable illustrations;
Elizabeth St. Hill Davies of the Stevenage Museum, Grant Longman of the
Bushey Museum Trust, Mr. Johnson of Watford Central Library, the First Garden City Museum (Letchworth), Mary Gilbert, Wally Wilson, Veronica Hitchcock, and Gordon Coombes.
In addition, we have benefited from previously published articles on particular towns and cinemas:
“ The Picturedrome: Hitchin’s first cinema” by Arthur L. Codling, Herts Countryside, August 1972;
“ Sixty years of the silver screen in Hitchin” by Pat Gadd, Herts Countryside, October 1979;
“ The oldest purpose—built cinema?” [Letchworth Palace] by Audrey Wadowska, Herts Countryside, July 1970;
“ The Era of the Cinema in Rickmansworth” by E.V, Parrott, Rickmansworth Historian, Autumn 1964 and Autumn 1965;
“ Watford’s Edwardian Entertainment” by George Lorimer, Herts Countryside, circa 1982.
“ Watford Cinemas past and present” by Chris Clegg and Ivor Buckingham, Herts Countryside, November and December 1975, February 1976.
Some other sources are identified in the text.