... the vengeance of eternal fire.

If I were you tell that this was the site of a former synagogue that was bombed in the war then rebuilt then made into a night club and then that became the Club Heaven and Hell you might not be totally surprised.You might also be at ease with the place closing down a few years ago and standing empty since then. This is after all the city of inertia... But if I was to add that there were 'plans' to convert this space into a 135 bed boutique hotel you'd be amazed at the startlingly original idea; "why has no-body thought of doing this before?" you might exclaim, if exclaiming was your thing... The local paper ran a piece just last year announcing the placing of no less than a poster detailing the immanent arrival of a new hotel.... such was the excitement! You should know, though, that as far as I can find the 'plans' were submitted in 2013 and approved, then withdrawn, the last thing I can find is a discharge of conditions in May 2016 and I'm pretty sure permissions expire after three years... does any of this sound familiar?

I've shown this place before getting on for nine years ago and in that time it seems that the only thing that has happened is flesh suffering the vengeance of eternal fire (which can also be the fate of buildings left empty for so many years, just sayin' is all ...)

The Tradesman's Entrance

This post is just an excuse to show again a favourite tree in Cottingham. (It's been seven or more years so you won't remember.) It sits at the junction of Snuff Mill Lane and Newgate Street in the grounds of what is now a care home but originally must have belonged to someone with higher than average income shall we say. It's splendid all year round but in spring the red leaves are just superb.

The Lost Flip Flop

Another demonstration of the versatility of the Land Rover, stick a wooden hut on the back and hey presto (does any one say that any more?) instant coffee shop. Not that it sells instant coffee or anything like that; well, it might, I don't drink coffee so I wouldn't know ...  It's posted here because I just liked the name. 

There is a web thingy to go with, it's here

The Old Grey Mare

What can I say about this pub that's right outside the entrance to the university? Well first off, when I came to Hull it was not a pub at all but a hotel, the Newland Park Hotel, indeed I spent one night there before being interviewed for a job at the Uni. There was bar then, the size of a small front parlour with three or four armchairs, all very cosy. Margot informs me that members of staff at the Uni would go there to hide from students ... Now the bar or bars extend across the whole ground floor.

Anyway I got the job and worked there (if that is the word) for a few months. One morning on my way in I witnessed a nasty accident on Cottingham Road close by this spot, a young woman was hit by a speeding van ... all very nasty. 

So then some years later I read a really badly written book by Peter James, I think it was called Possession or some such, about well, ghostly possession if you will. Thankfully I've forgotten most of the ridiculous plot, what there was of it, except the part where someone gets run over right outside this building by a speeding lorry if I'm not being too fanciful. 

So nowadays, I'm always very careful when crossing Cottingham Road ...

Here's a quite gratuitous photo of Cottingham Road, looks kind of innocuous don't it?

Ambitious Plans for Civic Vandalism

A few weeks ago Hull Council announced what it called "ambitious plans" to capitalise on the city's maritime heritage, you know the kind of thing a museum here, a dry dock with an old trawler there so far so yada yada ... the plan was to put in for some cash from the National Lottery heritage funding ... and all seems pretty harmless but then for some godforsaken reason, they propose the ruination of this road by Queen's Gardens, Guildhall Road I believe is its name. Yes this delightful grass verge with its dozens of mature flowering trees and shrubs has somehow caught the eye of developers and so inflamed their ire that it must be ripped up and replaced by a brick paved desert just like the rest of the City of Dull. Quite how this goes with the maritime thing is beyond me ... but this is the one-horse-town that gave permission for the extension to Burnett House so I guess the abomination will get the nod from the asses who decide these things. I can only hope the National Lottery people reject the begging bowl from these idiots.

You think I exaggerate? ... well go feast your eyes on this illustration of  civic vandalism and tell me I'm wrong.

"Hemos pasado"

Everybody knows the war is over
Everybody knows the good guys lost

                                                 L. Cohen

Close by yesterday's statue of Mankind Under Threat stands this new memorial to those few (very few indeed) who took it upon themselves to go off from Hull to Spain with the International Brigade while that country was tearing itself apart in a bloody civil war. I suppose they thought they were helping in some way, it's difficult to see how.  The slogan on the top is that old cliché of the Left (and other lost causes) "They shall not pass". The plain truth is not only did the buggers pass they hung around for nigh on forty years ...
I'm not sure that this memorial with its Communist era references (I'm seeing a star, a bulging Stakhanovite arm, a hint of a sickle, it could just be me) is really apt given the well documented bloody betrayals and murders of socialists and anarchists by Stalin's Soviets. The plinth with "Freedom" and "Democracy" inscribed  is, unfortunately,  so white as to be illegible in bright sunlight so the names of the few (Was it eight or nine? Who knows? Who at this distance cares much?) who went off to fight Franco cannot be discerned nor can the little etched scenes. Still there's long been a plaque in the Guildhall with the names of those involved should you have any interest ... and now I'm set to wondering did any go off to fight for Franco? And where is their memorial?

 

Under Threat

 

Ah so there's our old friend Mankind Under Threat squatting in the belated May sunshine all safe and sound now betwixt the City Treasury and the Guildhall. I wondered where he'd gone to. I suppose, technically, he's on public display but so far off any beaten track no visitor to Hull would come across him by accident. Unlike the old place in Queen's Gardens this site is hardly conducive to the contemplation of mankind being under threat. The threat to our friend here is clear: pointlessness and obscurity. He has already become a mere decoration. There are plans to secure this area with gates (the slim to non-existent terrorist threat to Councillors and council staff must be taken seriously ... and a quarter million pounds is the serious money that must be spent to take it seriously). Anyhow once the gates are built our caged friend will be even more secure and even more out of reach.