Written and researched by Charlotte Day.
Sport
Marlow of course is well known for its water sports and summertime regatta. Geoffrey Baker and Michael Spracklen of Marlow not only competed in but won the double skulls gold in the British Empire and Commonwealth Games of 1958. Michael went on to become one of the world's foremost rowing coaches.
On dry land football, cricket, darts, lawn bowls, hockey and lawn tennis continued to be popular. The Rugby Football Club was formed in 1948 but were yet to secure their own premises in the 1950s. For most of this decade they used the Sports Club facilities as they were officially a section of that club but unhappiness with the quality of the pitch they were able to use saw the rugby players eventually leave there. We have seen passing mention of a Rugby team called the Marlow Swans during the 1950s. We are uncertain if this was a nickname for the main Rugby Club team or a second, since lost, rugby side in Marlow.
There were at very least around a 100 racing pigeons in the town in the late 1950s belonging to members of the Marlow and District Racing Pigeon Club. The club existed earlier and later than this but probably had never been more popular than in the 1950s.
The boys at Borlase School apparently loved basketball. They played in an inter-Borlase league between themselves. This might imply that the sport was not generally so popular as there doesn't seem to be any matches organised with other schools. Borlase basketball club started in 1957, soon after the school had also formed a badminton one. There was no longer a football team at the school, it having been ditched in favour of rugby some years previously, to apparently warm parental approval. This move however sparked criticism from those connected with Marlow F.C who felt they had been cut off from a vital source of future players.
Bisham Abbey Sports Centre across the river was managed by the Central Council For Physical Education. It had a mission to provide residential and non-residential training courses for youth leaders, teachers, young people themselves, budding professional sportspeople, and members of the public in general in the fields of sports, fitness and outdoor recreation. Peak time for the Abbey was the summer when visitors (sometimes whole sports clubs) arrived from all over the country to spend their holidays as residential pupils there. Activities included camping, sailing, canoeing, gymnastics, athletics, netball, tennis and judo. The Bucks County Tennis Championships were held at the Abbey at least once in the 1950s, as were local fencing competitions. Weekly fencing lessons were offered to Marlow people at the centre by 1950 as we're ballroom dancing ones as this activity while not seen as a sport, was recognised as good physical exercise.
Billiards was for a very long time a craze in Marlow. Not to call our Marlow predecessors heathens but the main reason many people visited the Literary and Scientific Institute was to make use of it's billiards table or enter the billiards competitions held there rather than read books or hear lectures. This was the case for decades. Eventually even the income from the billiards tables, and the newer craze for snooker, couldn't keep the Institute going and it folded in 1958. The library now occupies that building.
An Amateur Boxing Club for schoolboys (10 wasn't seen as too young) and adults met at the Drill Hall in Institute Road for training and it's members of all ages had some success in local competitions.
Marlow had a Motor Cycling Club in 1953 which organised road races.
Other Leisure
Dances regularly occured at the Crown Hotel, George and Dragon and the Compleat Angler. The band at a 1958 Compleat Angler gala dinner and dance was the Tommy Kinsman dance orchestra, famed for its popularity with aristocrats (they were called the 'debs delight band' by some). It is thought they also appeared at the Crown in the 1950s.
Listening at home to records and the radio remained hugely popular. Bodwell's record shop at 31 Spittal Street used the Fitzroy private member's club in St Peter Street for a public demonstration of a Decca stereo system in November 1958, just in time for those writing their Christmas lists!
Though the era is perhaps best remembered for rock and roll, music tastes were diverse. Some teenagers in the town sought out classical orchestral music, even opera, alongside the latest hits. Marlow Operatic Society revived during this decade with a focus on light comic opera. A new Choral Society had been formed in 1947 (several other versions having bit the dust over the previous decades). In their 1954 performance of Hiawatha there were some 50 performers.
Also on the amateur performing front, Marlow Players usually put on a couple of performances a year including Ali Baba And The Forty Thieves in 1953, Robinson Crusoe and The School For Scandal in 1959.
Those that wanted to see productions further afield could use the ticket agency at 2 market Square for theatre tickets. Seaside coach trips were also bookable at Garretts later Jordans Market Square Marlow. Popular destinations included Southsea, Bognor, Littlehampton and Brighton.
Organised works outings were still very popular. The staff of Sunnydene Laundry in Marlow had a trip to the London Palladium at Christmas 1950 for instance.
The woods of Burnham Beeches remained a popular spot for a picnic while Quarry Woods attracted ramblers and amateur naturalists on the lookout for interesting plants and birds.
At West Wycombe late in the 1950s the Hellfire Caves added waxwork dummies and a recorded historical commentary late in the 1950s, though not without some criticism due to the alleged scandalous activities previously practiced there by Hellfire Club members, which the attraction was accused of making light of or even revelling in.
Closer to home for a quick trip out, Marlow's Court Garden sometimes hosted local arts and crafts exhibitions (Keens the photographer sold art supplies in the High Street as did Greville's photographers also in the High Street and the Gallery Bookshop in West Street), putting was available in Higginson Park (where tea and light refreshments could be had from a mobile unit as well as a tea garden in Court Garden) and a 742 seat cinema operated in Station Road. The cinema changed from an Odeon to a Regal in 1959. Peter Pinches at Field House Farm near Newtown Road supplied hacks and hunters for leisure horse riders in the town.
Marlow had its own clubs of a considerably tamer nature than the Hellfire Club. As well as the private Fitzroy Club mentioned above the Berks and Bucks Publicity Club for those who worked in advertising met in Marlow. The Marlow Branch of the Royal British Legion also represented an important social opportunity in the town. At that time it operated from the former Greyhound pub buildings in Spittal Street with a separate women's division using the Marlow Red Cross hut in Institute Road for their meetings. This hut stood where the Mary Balfour garden is now.
There were not one but two branches of the Antediluvian Order Of The Buffaloes in 1950s Marlow not to mention the Freemasons. The Rotary Club existed by 1954 as did the Townswomen's Guild. The former organised a carnival in Marlow at least once during the 1950s.
Children's groups will be covered in a later Childhood In 1950s Marlow post.
For those who wanted to cosy in at home with a good book, Marlow Library opened in the 1950s in the former Literary and Scientific Institute building. This represented the first full time, staffed, public lending library in the town. Previously a part time public library and reading room had been run by volunteers in Liston Hall, and the Institute had had a book collection for its paying members. The new library was a stunning success with some 115,000 book borrowings in 1958 alone.
Televisions could be bought from Electrical services (Marlow) Limited shop in Market Square and Platts in Quoiting Square. Many people still did not possess one however. John Gorringe, based in the High Street would install your first television for you as well as undertake repairs to these and radios, as could Currall's Garage.
Researched and written by Charlotte Day.
©Marlow Ancestors. You are very welcome to use this research for family or local history purposes with credit to this blog.
Sources for the whole series of Life in 1950s Marlow posts=
Marlow Town Guide 1952-4 and 1958 editions.
Chelton: The First 50 Years, 1947-1997. Wellbeck Melland 1997. Thanks to Andrew Day for this.
A Century Of Childhood by Steven Humphries, Joanna Mack, Robert Perks. Published by Sidgewick and Jackson, 1989.
Bucks Advertiser and Aylesbury News 1st January 1955. Reading Mercury 25th May 1958 Reading Mercury 16th August 1958. Bucks Herald 5th 1953. All British Library Archives via the BNA.
https://marlowplayers.org.uk/the-plays/
Biography of Tommy Kinsman, Masters of Melody website.http://www.mastersofmelody.co.uk/tommykinsman.htm
Journal, Furnishing World 9th June 1950.
Bucks Free Press 16th June 1954, 21st November 1958, January 30th 1939 and July 19th 1959. Bucks Free Press Archives.
The Old Borlasian magazine 1953, 1954, 1955 and 1958 editions.
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/1952-10-14/debates/61ac01f8-5696-4d86-a45f-7f22aed41361/NotificationOfVacanciesOrder (employment legislation)
Conservative Fete Programme 1954.
Blog post "Classic Perfumes of the 50s, 60s and 70s" by Charlie Leeves for the Perfume Shop blog, posted on 22nd June 2021.
Personal interview.
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