Electric Picture Hall to Mecca - History of Andover cinemas

The occasion was the first showing of A Boy, a Girl and a Bike, with the Andover and Enham Alamein Wheelers being invited as part of the publicity for the film.

From left to right, they are Dennis Ellison, ‘Roly’ White, John Rowles, Phil Rose, Roy White and Jack Moores.

The arrival of Diana Dors and Michael Blyth, who were supporting members of the cast to Honor Blackman, Patrick Holt and John McCallum, added glitz to the evening, although the film’s main stars were elsewhere.

Andover’s then deputy mayor, Harold Guard, and the recently-elected carnival queen for that year, Pamela Seymour, were drafted in as part of the evening’s entertainment.

The Odeon in those days was a popular venue and there can hardly be any ‘vintage’ Andoverian who did not go there at some time during its heyday, one of three cinemas that the town supported for the 20 years between the late 1930s and the late 1950s before television - cinema at home – was commonplace.

The earliest cinema in Andover was not this one but the Electric Picture Hall, which opened in West Street in 1913.

This was re-named the New Theatre in 1924, finally becoming the Rex in 1940.

Known colloquially as the flea pit, it was always a slightly down-market version of its rivals.

Closure came in 1959 and the building was used as a furniture store until its demolition as part of the plans to build the Chantry Way shopping precinct.

The Odeon in Junction Road first opened in 1926 as the Palace.

It was bought in 1935 and renamed as part of the nationwide chain of Odeon cinemas, a brand started by Oscar Deutsch who was the son of a Hungarian scrap merchant.

Saturday morning pictures for children was instituted soon afterwards.

In 1941, the Odeon brand was bought by J Arthur Rank, and a refit followed, the seats from which are still in place today in the former Circle.

A distinctive intertwined GB for Gaumont-British forms part of the arm rests; this was another firm bought by Rank in 1941.

Those of us attending the Odeon Saturday morning pictures in the 1960s, paying 6d downstairs and 9d upstairs, did not realise we were at the end of an era when plans were afoot to turn the cinema into a bingo hall.

The Andover Odeon was sold, along with 47 others to Classic Cinemas in 1967, and by January 1968 it had become the Vogue Bingo and Social Club.

Part of the building returned to showing films as the Tatler in 1971 but this was unsuccessful and ended two years later.

Today, the old Odeon is owned by Mecca.

The old Odeon is owned by Mecca now

Meanwhile the Andover Wheelers are still going strong. The club that began in 1933 has over 400 members and runs time trials and social events today, just as it did in the 1940s.

My own parents met as members of the Wheelers in the early 1950s and theirs was just one of many successful local marriages that owe their origins to the club.

For a history of Andover’s cinemas see ‘Picture Mad’ by Philip Ray, Andover Film Club, (2015).