Today’s photo shows part of the rockery complex at Pickering Park, this would have just been completed at the outbreak of the Great War.
It is of some interest to speculate on the possible relationship between Pickering and Ferens (s.p.b.s), the two great municipal park benefactors. I know of no direct evidence regarding this line of thought, but certainly throughout the 1890s and up to the Great War both were fast becoming wealthy businessmen in the same City and it is certain they must have known of each other.
Furthermore, it may be wondered if there was a sense of competing (friendly or otherwise) with regard to the development of Pickering Park and the slightly earlier development of East Park, especially in relation to the development of large boating lakes in each. Was there maybe a sense of the old division – East Hull v. West Hull. The sequence of events is as follows;
The original plan for East Park dated 1883 included a winding lake which has now been partially restored as the new paddling pool.
By 1913 T.R. Ferens (see recent blogs) a much larger lake was being dug on land bought by Ferens to extend East Park. This excavation continued into 1915 to create Hull’s first large municipal boating lake.
By 1909 Pickering Park was being developed in west Hull (s.p.b.) and in 1914 extra land was bought by C. Pickering to provide space on which to excavate a large boating lake.
Progress on the excavation was halted during the Great War and potatoes were grown on the land earmarked for excavation. In 1916 the City Engineer listed the completion of this boating lake as one of six projects to promote after the War was over.
It wasn’t until 1920 that excavation resumed with Pickering Park’s boating lake officially opened on 13/08/1921 by Councillor Costello (after whom the next municipal park was to be named). The excavating was done by unemployed labourers, reluctantly agreed to by the City Engineer who claimed they were even less inclined to work hard than they had been before the War.
(to be continued).