Bentham_Town_Hall

Bentham Town Hall

Bentham Town Hall

Municipal building in Bentham, North Yorkshire, England

Bentham Town Hall, also known as High Bentham Town Hall, is a municipal building in Station Road, High Bentham, a town in North Yorkshire, England. The building currently accommodates Bentham Town Council but is also used as a community events venue and a tourist information office.

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History

Following significant population growth, largely associated with the farming industry, parish leaders decided to commission a public hall for the town in the early 1870s. The new building was designed in the neoclassical style, built in ashlar stone and was completed in 1877.[1]

The design involved a symmetrical main frontage of three bays facing onto Station Road. The central bay featured a large opening flanked by brackets supporting a cornice on the ground floor and a tri-partite window with a window sill supported by brackets on the first floor. The outer bays were fenestrated by bi-partite windows on both floors. The frontage was surmounted by a gable with a panel inscribed "Public Hall 1877" in the tympanum. Internally, the principal rooms were a market hall on the ground floor, and an assembly hall on the first floor.[2]

A clock tower with a belfry and a dome was added in 1902.[3] A rectangular bronze plaque, intended to commemorate the lives of local service personnel who had died in the First World War, was attached to the front of the building in the early 1920s.[4][5][6] The town hall also served as a venue for local farm auctions; however, there was some derision in 1937, when the satirical magazine Punch quoted an unnamed local paper as reporting: "Three farmers in the Bentham District came under the hammer at a property sale held by Mr Richard Turner of Bentham in the Bentham Town Hall on Wednesday afternoon and were all disposed of".[7]

For much of the 20th century, the building served as the meeting place of the parish council: it was also used for concerts and theatre performances.[8] Following the re-organisation of local government in 1974, the parish council became Bentham Town Council. The town council continued to hold its meetings in the town hall. In 2004, an extensive programme of works, financed by a grant from North Yorkshire County Council, was initiated. The works included the installation of a new lobby area, a kitchen and a lift, as well as the creation of some office space. Amidst some rationalisation of local facilities, various services, including the town clerk's office and the tourist information office, were subsequently moved into the town hall.[9][10][11]

References

  1. [1]
    "Appraisal of Proposed High Bentham Conservation Area" (PDF). Craven District Council. p. 8. Retrieved 2 February 2024.
  2. [2]
    "Bentham Town Hall". Venues4Hire. Retrieved 2 February 2024.
  3. [3]
    Leach, Peter E.; Pevsner, Nikolaus; Minnis, John (2009). Yorkshire West Riding Leeds, Bradford and the North (Buildings of England Series). Yale University Press. p. 117. ISBN 978-0300126655. the domed clock turret added in 1902 to the entirely plain Public Hall, 1877
  4. [4]
    "High and Low Bentham – WW1 and WW2". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 2 February 2024.
  5. [5]
    "Local War Memorials: High Bentham, North Yorkshire". Cravendale's Part in The Great War. Retrieved 2 February 2024.
  6. [6]
    "High and Low Bentham". War Memorials Online. Retrieved 2 February 2024.
  7. [7]
    Punch. Vol. 192–193. 1937. p. 11.
  8. [8]
    The Amateur Stage. Vol. 5. Stacey Publications. 1950. p. 36. 2 to 4 March, King John, Bentham Phoenix Players, Bentham Town Hall, Lancashire
  9. [9]
    "Built facilities assessment" (PDF). Craven District Council. p. 13. Retrieved 3 January 2024.
  10. [10]
    "Notice of a Full Council Meeting". Bentham Town Council. Retrieved 3 January 2024.
  11. [11]
    "Grant application: Active Bentham" (PDF). North Yorkshire County Council. 1 July 2005. Retrieved 2 February 2024.
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