‘Why we should be raising a glass to Hull’s forgotten architect’

LEGACY: A drawing of Peter Gaskell

Now & Then, a column by Angus Young

Looking back on the life and career of Peter Gaskell

He’s the Hull architect turned politician you’ve probably never heard of.

Yet Peter Gaskell is one of those figures from the past who at the very least deserves a glass being raised to his memory in one of the famous pubs he designed over a century ago.

His legacy ranges from the spectacular curved ceramic-fronted bars in the White Hart and the Polar Bear (two of only 14 left in Britain) to providing the first reliable supply of clean drinking water from Hull to Holderness. He also helped found a pioneering charitable trust which paid out the equivalent of £40m in today’s money to just over 4,000 beneficiaries and their families over its 65-year lifespan.

Despite all this, he’s a largely forgotten figure. There’s not even a street in Hull named after him.

I first came across his name while writing my first column for The Hull Story about the rise and fall of millionaire Hull shipping tycoon Sir Walter Cockerline.

For a while, Sir Walter lived in a grand detached house in Anlaby Road called Fairholme. It’s now the Albert Hotel but back in 1894 it was a newly-built des res designed by Hull architects Freeman, Son & Gaskell.

HERITAGE: The foyer of the Central Picture Theatre. Image courtesy of Historic England

By then, William Freeman was already an established architect having made his name designing a series of chapels for the Primitive Methodist Church. Surviving examples include one in Withernsea and the now regularly-vandalised disused City Temple in Hessle Road. He was also responsible for St. George’s Primary School in St. George’s Road and nearby Somerset Street School. Both remain active today, the latter now being home to the Hull Scrapstore charity.

As Freeman’s practice partner, Gaskell was involved in more commercial projects including factories for the Humber Fertiliser and Fish Manure Company in Stoneferry Road and the Danish Bacon Co-operative next to the River Hull as well as designing prestigious residential commissions such as Fairholme, and pubs and hotels. What became his architectural signature is still in evidence in Jameson Street where his 1903 Waverley Hotel now hosts The Master’s Bar on the ground floor. Above it’s a riot of pale red brick, decorative stone and terracotta with a shaped gable end.

Gaskell also liked using decorative coloured glazed tiles wherever possible, both inside and out. Stand-out examples include The Bull Inn in Beverley Road and the White Hart in Alfred Gelder Street.

Like many of his projects, both were actually re-builds of existing pubs. Invariably, his ability to create eye-catching designs would help transform largely anonymous buildings into show-stopping landmarks.

During an incredibly prolific period between 1903 and 1908 working for the Hull Brewery Company, the practice added extra floors, new frontages and re-designed interior rooms in dozens of pubs across Hull as part of a major upgrade of the brewery’s property portfolio.

Sadly, most no longer exist but Gaskell’s attention to detail and a love of tiles and elaborate stonework can still be seen, such as The Halfway Hotel in Hessle Road and the former Full Measure in Glass House Row.

ICONIC: The tiled bar in the White Hart

A later highlight was the rebuilding of the Lockwood Arms in Green Lane in 1914 when a third floor was added along with a complete external and internal facelift, including a semi-circular glazed bar similar to those previously installed in the White Hart and the Polar Bear. At the latter, he also oversaw a later 1922 extension which featured a stage for music recitals under a grand dome and top light. The Polar Bear’s stone exterior complete with Hull Brewery’s anchor signs and the pub’s name spelled out in gold lettering were added at the same time.

Local historian Paul Gibson was part of a successful campaign to get the Lockwood Arms listed in 1998 when a question mark hung over its long-term future. By then, the beautiful bar had already been removed.

Nonetheless, in an article praising Gaskell’s design, Gibson wrote: “The Lockwood Arms is a little noticed treasure of Art Deco. The more you look the more you begin to realise the quality of the work.”

A trip to see it on the edge of industrial Wincolmlee is still worth it, despite a name change to the Bull and Bush.

Gaskell’s skills were also deployed by the emerging cinema industry and he was hired to design Hull’s first purpose-built cinema. Princes Hall opened in George Street in 1910 featuring another elaborate terracotta facade, an auditorium on two levels and seating for 1,500 people. Designed in Renaissance style and boasting a tea room and refreshment lounge, it cost £10,000 to build and was described in one contemporary newspaper report as “one of the city’s most imposing buildings.”

It remained in use as a cinema until 1960 before being converted into a nightclub. A major fire in the late 1980s led to demolition. The site is now used as a car park but part of Gaskell’s original facade fronting George Street still stands, including one of the original entrances.

HISTORIC: The Princes Hall cinema in George Street

Two more cinemas designed by Gaskell would follow. The richly-decorated Holderness Hall in Witham opened in 1912 which, as the Majestic Ballroom, would eventually play host to The Beatles’ first ever show in Hull in 1962.

In 1915 his even more extravagant Central Picture House, complete with its own confectionery shop, opened in Prospect Street where the Central Library stands today. Destroyed during a bombing raid in 1941, its luxurious features are fortunately captured for posterity in a series of photographs included in Historic England’s publicly-accessible image archive.

By the time the Central welcomed its first customers, Gaskell was a councillor on Hull Corporation and a member of the city’s Emergency Committee, created at the outset of the First World War to put plans in place in the event of a German invasion.

He had first been elected in the city’s Myton ward in 1907 after standing as an Independent, pledging his support for the municipal ownership and operation of gas, water, electricity, telephones and trams as well as the trades union movement.

During a public meeting during his first election campaign, he said: “I come before you as an Independent candidate and hope that I have the backbone sufficient enough to stand by my own knowledge on all matters.

“When a man attains a certain position in business and when he feels he could conscientiously devote his services to the good of the public and appreciate what had been done for him, then it is time to come forward and do the best for humanity in general.”

POLITICIAN: Peter Gaskell

He would serve as a councillor in Hull for 25 years despite living in Hornsea. He cited his role as a leading figure in the city’s business community as evidence of his devotion to its people. Voters seemed to agree.

In 1919 Gaskell became Lord Mayor of Hull and marked the occasion by making a speech setting out his optimistic hope for a better future following the war.

His words were set against his own personal grief, having lost his only son Reginald, a lieutenant serving as an observer with the Royal Flying Corps who died in accident while taking off in a plane at Catterick in North Yorkshire in 1916. Gaskell junior was 27 and had worked as an architect in his father’s office in Carr Lane before enlisting as a private in the Hull Pals at the outbreak of the war.

As Lord Mayor, Gaskell also became president of the City of Hull Great War Trust to offer practical help to disabled servicemen and their families. Through donations and investments, assistance ranged from regular allowances to funding for day trips for orphans and even the construction of 18 new cottages in Dunswell with an acre of land each to promote independent living for tenants with severe injuries, allowing them to earn a modest income from selling fruit and vegetables grown in their smallholdings.

Gaskell’s other civic work continued at pace, notably as chairman of the corporation’s water and gas committee. In this role, he oversaw the first ever publicly-owned supplies of clean drinking water from Hull to Hornsea, Withernsea and South Holderness and the opening of a new pumping station in Dunswell in 1931 to serve the city’s rapidly growing population.

The two surviving almost identical water towers in Rimswell and Mappleton built by Hull Corporation under his watch are yet more examples of his legacy.

CIVIC WORK: The entrance to Dunswell Pumping Station. The words ‘City of Hull Waterworks’ can still be seen on the iron gates along with two corroded Hull coronets

In ailing health, he attended the official opening of the Dunswell waterworks in a bath chair. His wife Sarah performed the ceremony and gave a speech.

By then, he was becoming less involved in his company’s work with a younger colleague Henry Wharf taking the design lead on projects such as the Ritz Cinema in Holderness Road in 1928 and the Art Deco-influenced Mayfair Cinema opened a year later in Beverley Road. I’m certain the old man would have given them his blessing.

Gaskell died in 1933, aged 77. A newspaper obituary described him as “one of the old stalwarts of municipal life”. A month later his wife died too. The couple are buried in a family plot alongside their son in Hull’s Northern Cemetery.

The next time you’re in one of his pubs, don’t forget to toast his memory.