To the William Loveless Hall! …late afternoon on Saturday. The occasion was the annual Wivenhoe Memories exhibition.
This usually takes place over the weekend of the August Bank Holiday. The organisers have realised that footfall can be pretty low, with many families still holidaying. A slight switch to later in the season is being trialled for this year.
Each year the curators try and come up with a new theme. Wivenhoe Memories for 2026 goes back to the 1960s and explores the idea and the impact of the University being built at the top of the town.
To our surprise we weren’t the youngest people looking around the exhibition. Previous years have seen the Loveless Hall become something of a youth club for all the owd boys as they gather and share their memories.
It was fascinating to see some of the original photos of the University being built at Wivenhoe Park. Some of these were new to me.
I remarked that if we were 50-something back in the 1960s whilst the university was being built, then we would no doubt kick up a right fuss about Wivenhoe Park being concreted over. You now take it for granted and actually admire the brutalism on show.
It wasn’t all about the 1960s at Wivenhoe Memories. There was one board dedicated to the opening of a Co-op in 1976. I liked the caption describing the celeb of Yootha Joyce opening it as being “half cut.”
Chin chin.
Elsewhere I realised that although some of the old photos dating back 100 years or so have tremendous historical importance, it is perhaps the more recent snaps from the 1970s and 1980s that hold more appeal to me.
You’re looking at streets which you walk day in, day out, which have changed ever so slightly from when the photos were taken. It’s finer the details, such as old phone boxes that that have now been lost.
As you would expect with Wivenhoe Memories, photos of the pubs and booze in particular feature heavily. Some of the scenes of groups of 10, 15, 20 people sitting around a table drinking and smoking are a world away from what takes place inside these pubs in 2026.
And so another decent Wivenhoe Memories. These gatherings are always very communal and prove to be a great way of drawing out some of the old stories.
