Lost history is found in a sack

Or, to be more precise, the County Ground Bowling Club has suddenly found itself re-united with much of its documented past.

Recently, a key figure in the club, 84 years-old Cyril Dear was handed a black plastic sack which he was surprised and overjoyed to discover was filled with a pile of hardback minute books.

They detail the activities and sporting achievements of the club from 1910 until 1973 - nearly two-thirds of the club's life-span.

No one realised that these records still survived, and Cyril has been delving through them ever since, to discover all sorts of fascinating facts from what had been the club's missing past!

He understands the minute books were discovered this year, in a garage or house at Bromyard, and he would very much like to know who passed them on to the club in order that thanks can be sent.

Cyril had to clean layers of white mould from the minute books but he is extremely impressed with the quality of the records, "all beautifully handwritten" with full membership lists down the years, annual accounts, details of business transactions and "honours boards" of members' bowling prizes.

The historic County Ground Bowling Club was born in very novel circumstances 101 years ago.

For decades, up until the late 1890s, the Worcestershire County Cricket Club played all its home matches on what we know today as the Cinderella Ground in Bransford Road. This was before the move to New Road.

And in late Victorian times, a group of enthusiasts also made good use of the manicured outfield of the Cinderella Ground to play evening games of bowls after the cricket matches had finished for the day. It is fondly believed that even the legendary W.G Grace sometimes "tried his hand" at bowls when he came to play cricket against Worcestershire.

The out-field bowls games went on in a very informal way for years, but when the county cricket club transferred to New Road, the bowls enthusiasts decided it was time to form themselves officially into the "Worcestershire County Ground Bowling Club."

This was born at an inaugural meeting in 1899, and took its name from the former county cricket arena at Bransford Road and not, as we might suspect today, from the "County Ground" at New Road.

Cyril Dear has found a highly significant entry in the re-discovered minute books.

A note for 1910 states: "Our Honorary Secretary read a letter from the Secretary of the County Cricket Club asking to be furnished with the amount which was likely to be handed to the cricket club for the use of the facilities" (at the Cinderella Ground) "as he was desirous of preparing his balance sheet. After a discussion, members agreed to grant the sum of £20 from the funds of the bowling to the cricket club for the 1910 season."

The precise year is not known but the County Ground Bowling Club had a proper bowling green laid in one corner of the Cinderella Ground in the early part of the 20th Century. It still survives in fine condition today, but has been preserve for many years of the Kay's Bowling Club.

I spent an hour or so recently at the Vancouver Close home of Cyril Dear as he pointed out some of the interesting entries in the old minute books. One showed that the Green-keeper was paid two guineas a season while the boy who cleaned the woods was given 1s.6d a week. The annual balance sheet for 1911 itemised total income of £57.19s, while out-goings were £56.11s, giving a balance in hand of £1.8s.

A 1916 entry recorded that the club had given a tea party for wounded soldiers of the Great War who were being treated at the Worcester Royal Infirmary. A letter from the hospital secretary is attached to the minute book, thanking the club for "entertaining the men so splendidly".

A note for a later year stated that club members had enjoyed an Auld Lang Syne dinner party at the Crown Hotel, in Broad Street, for two shillings each.

Cyril says the club clearly had everything going for it at the Cinderella Ground with its own bowling green and full use of the bar and other comfortable facilities in the pavilion. He therefore finds it baffling why, from 1931 onwards, the County Ground Bowling Club should have started playing many of its games on the Cripplegate Park greens where the same level of ancillary facilities did not exist.

The old minute books reveal that in 1933. the club made the move to Cripplegate Park permanent when "the City Council agreed the use of three rinks by the club from May to September at a fee of £25."

Cripplegate has been the base of the County Ground Bowling Club ever since and has witnessed many of its successes including being in the final of the Vernon Turner Cup 13 times and winning a host of individual or team trophies locally, countywide and even nationally.

Jim Coates, current President of the Worcestershire Bowling Association, won several significant trophies as a member of the club. So did George Evans of Worcester.

Earlier this year, the MEB Bowls Club merged with the County Ground Bowling Club to create a membership of more than 40 for what has been a highly successful season.

"It's remarkable that the old minute books have survived and were not destroyed long ago. I'm really glad that haven't been lost to us," says Cyril, who was club President from 1993, until last year, and who continues as club treasurer and match secretary. The new President is Bob Bell.

Despite being 84, Cyril is certainly no retiring character. As well as being a linchpin of the County Ground Bowling Club, he is also President of the St John's and Hallow Branch of the Royal British Legion and treasurer of the Blue Calf Over-60s Club.

* Bowled over by a well-to-do mid-19th Century engraving

THIS superb Victorian engraving offers a graphic reminder of the fine bowling green which once graced pleasure grounds to the rear of the historic Saracens Head pub in The Tything, Worcester.

A coloured print of the engraving was discovered by Bruce Wyatt of Stoulton, near Pershore, among the personal effects of his late father, Billy Wyatt. Both were recently featured in Memory Lane.

The engraving of the "North-east view of the Saracens Head Bowling Green" is dated 1862 and was "drawn and engraved by James Clements."

Bruce Wyatt points out that the pavilion to be seen in the background of the engraving "is in fact the very pavilion in the corner of the car park of the substantial modern block of apartments which now occupies the site of the bowling green off St Mary's Street." Appropriately, the new development is named the "Crown Green Apartments."

Worcester historian Bill Gwilliam says the Saracens Head Inn was a very popular hostelry during the 19th Century, "much patronised by the upper and middle classes of Worcester.

"It had a considerable area of land attached to it, forming pleasure grounds, and the central feature was a bowling green was for long a favourite haunt of the well-to-do citizens from the north of the city."

Bill adds that the engraving showed many notable Worcester characters of the mid-19th Century.

The Saracens Head pleasure grounds were also the regular venue for travelling circuses and for visits by some of the greatest preachers of the time. As many as 2,000 people would gather in large marquees to hear them.

Bill Gwilliam says leading English boxers of the day also delighted big crowds there by taking part in "friendly bouts" with gloves.

"Other popular spectacles were air balloon ascents from the Saracens Head green. In 1848, 1,000 spectators paid admission to see the balloon Rainbow take off, and it is recorded that thousands more people gathered in adjacent meadows."