A nation of town criers

Civic publicity and historical pageantry in inter-war Britain

Bibliographic Data

ID8098261
AuthorsTom Hulme (0000-0001-8461-6926, University of London, corresponding author)
Year2016
Volume44
Issue2
Pages270-292
Publication date2016-02-24
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueUrban History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0963-9268 • E-ISSN: 1469-8706
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0963926816000262
OpenAlexW2274427509
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited43

Historical pageantry emerged in 1905 as the brainchild of the theatrical impresario Louis Napoleon Parker. Large casts of volunteers re-enacted successive scenes of local history, as crowds of thousands watched on, in large outdoor arenas. As the press put it, Britain had caught ‘pageant fever’. Towards the end of the 1920s, there was another outburst of historical pageantry. Yet, in contrast to the Edwardian period, when pageants took place in small towns, this revival was particularly vibrant in large industrial towns and cities. This article traces the popularity of urban pageantry to an inter-war ‘civic publicity’ movement. In doing so, it reassesses questions of local cultural decline; the role of local government; and the relationship of civic responsibility to popular theatre

Aesthetics · Art · Crowds · Economic history · Government (linguistics · Local government · Local History · Media studies · Period (music · Political science · Popularity · Publicity · Sociology · Spanish Civil War · Cinema and Media Studies · History · Irish and British Studies · Law · Philippine History and Culture

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