Needing some Info on some Hidden Hamilton - Almada Street

[supergolden]

I really like it too, like molendinar says, its really simple, and also well proportioned. When you look up at the blank sides since theyve been painted, it almost disappears into the sky.

It would look so much better without the residential block over the road. That one is ugly, and bears no relation to the Council bldg, and makes them both look worse from any distance. Im guessing this is more recent?

[Raymond]

The County Buildings were built on the site of the old Hamilton Barracks, weren't they?

If so, I might have a photo of it. I'll go look.

It was Bell College which was built on the site of the old Hamilton Barracks. At one time, one end of the Barracks was a cavalry barracks and the other end was for infantry. Lots of great information available in the Reference Department at Hamilton Town House in Cadzow Street!

[gap74]

Incidentally, Nodrog and I gained access to the old Hamilton Regal/ABC cinema last week, courtesy of South Lanarkshire Council, who recently compulsorarily purchased it for demolition. Photos will be up on our website soon, and we're visiting the nearby La Scala/Vogue cinema this week!

Keep your eyes on http://www.survivingcinemas.org.uk !

Gary

[nodrog]

Full update of our explorations should be up later this week, but in the meantime here are a couple of teaser photos from the inside of the Regal...









I'll post here when the proper update is ready for viewing!

nodrog

[excoriate]

I was wondering when the old ABC would kop it

Flats?

[nodrog]

I was wondering when the old ABC would kop it

Flats?

Nope - 'temporary car park' until they sell the land...

[excoriate]

Makes no sense if the council are trying to reduce car usage, but predictable.

[Molendinar]

very unimaginitive, but then South Lanarkshire council is not known for being any more enlightened than it's big brother in Glasgow. eg.

- The Palace grounds were gifted to the people of Hamilton as the fable goes and was sold to make way for a retail park.

- It is rumoured that the reason that auchingramont road has a speed bump every 3m is not because of the school, but because of certain cooncillors living there.

and yes knocking down the old odeon to make a temporary car park that's been there now for must be going on 10 years....

Very disappointing.

Well done for getting the access and the photos guys though, sterling work!

[gap74]

Cheers, as a resident of South Lanarkshire myself, I can't say I'm entirely happy at many of their decisions.... However I can't fault them at all when it came to requesting access to the Regal/ABC - I asked way back in July, and they remembered and invited us to have a look around when they finally bought the site over 3 months later, even going to the trouble of providing us with the anti-asbestos equipment nodrog is wearing in that last pic!

Due to the asbestos, that visit was supervised, but they are allowing us the keys to wander round the nearby La Scala/Gaumont/Vogue bingo hall tomorrow entirely at our own leisure, with no supervision. Really can't ask for a more helpful attitude to our attempts to create a decent record of these cinemas before they go!

We'll perhaps post a few teaser pics of that tomorrow after we've been!

Gary

[gap74]

As promised, some preview pics of the La Scala cinema in Keith St, which we surveyed today. Sadly, much of the auditorium wall and ceiling has been removed during work to strip the building of asbestos, but much remains of interest, including the fine proscenium arch. Most interesting of all, in a roof void accessible only by projectionists, a collection of posters pasted to the walls of the walkway in the roof, advertising various travelling circuses, Broncho Bill shows and general pictures of animals, ladies and boxing! These were a real find, sadly unsalvageable but at least recorded photographically now. The cinema opened in 1921 and the Bostock and Wombwells circus in one of the posters ceased to exist in 1931, so our best guess is that these date from the late 1920s.







Gary

[Pgcc93]

a collection of posters pasted to the walls of the walkway in the roof, advertising various travelling circuses, Broncho Bill shows and general pictures of animals, ladies and boxing! These were a real find, sadly unsalvageable but at least recorded photographically now. The cinema opened in 1921 and the Bostock and Wombwells circus in one of the posters ceased to exist in 1931, so our best guess is that these date from the late 1920s.




Gary

Great work guy's yet again

Can you not get a wallpaper steam stripper onto those posters or ripsaw the wooden panels?
What a fucking waste

[gap74]

Believe me, if there was a way to have gotten them off, we would have!

The trouble was not only that they were very fragile and difficult to remove - just getting to them was impossible. Where I took the shots from was as close as I dared go, and that involved clambering through a tiny hatch covered in pigeon shit, and edging out a steel roof strut as far as it went whilst clinging to it for dear life!

The wooden planks you can see in front of them are the only means of access to them, and with water ingress and pigeon shit being all too evident, I just didn't want to risk it further. Those holes in the floor look right down onto the balcony about twenty feet below!

Chap we spoke to from South Lanarkshire Museums, who had originally spotted them through the holes, investigated the possibility of erecting a scaffold tower on the balcony to get access to them, but couldn't find a company willing to take on the risk, what with much of the balcony floor being made of water-soaked wood.

There was one I would particularly have liked - drawings of monkeys advertising what it proclaimed to be "the best and most expensive collection of monkeys ever seen in this country!". Thank God, I'm tired of going to these things only to be faced with cheap monkeys...

Gary

[nodrog]

Just to add to Gary's post - the holes in the floor of the wonderful poster room look down to the balcony 20 feet below - which is itself somewhat rickety, full of holes and not the safest of places!

We did manage to rescue a few (literally) fragmentary pieces of poster, (see below) but just enough to realise trying to remove the nicest examples - even if we could have got to them without killing ourselves - would pretty much destroy them (bear in mind they're of the order of around 80 years old). I think removing the wooden boards they're fixed to would be pretty much be the only way to go.





Couple of other random pics:







We should hopefully have the full photo survey up in a few days...

Gordon

[nodrog]

Oh, and I mustn't forget the Expensive Monkeys...

[dazza]

Those posters are truly amazing! What a great find.