THE big news story in the Gazette 100 years ago was the laying of the foundation stone at the Victoria Memorial Hall, Christ Church.

The event included lunch at the nearby Imperial Hotel, now Malvern Girls' College, a service, the stone-laying itself and then tea at the vicarage.

£2,230 was the estimated cost of the hall, which was to be built of Cradley stone in the "free style of Gothic architecture".

The paper, which carried few photographs in those days, issued a special supplemental picture of Lady Barbara Yeatman-Biggs, wife of the Bishop of Worcester, carrying out the ceremony.

The Gazette columnist Ariel described an "unexpected incident" which took place during the service.

He wrote: "While Archdeacon Walters was at the lectern reading the lesson, a sacrilegious Irish terrier trotted unconcernedly up the aisle, ascended the chancel steps, made a compete tour round the worthy Archdeacon, sniffed along the choir stalls on both sides, bestowed a passing glance on the Bishop and walked leisurely in to the aisle.

"Here a sidesman, who, with the others, had been on tenter-hooks during the animal's peregrinations, gripped him firmly by the scruff of the neck and walked him on his hind legs out of the church.

"The broad smiles (in some cases prevented with difficulty from developing into laughter) on the faces of the congregation were scarcely in keeping with the solemnity of the occasion."