Ye Olde Red Lion, Bicker

click photo to enlarge
In England in 1665 the Great Plague, the last widespread outbreak of the feared bubonic plague, began killing about 100,000 people, mainly in London, but also across the rest of the country. The same year Robert Hooke's Micrographia, a book detailing his observations through lenses and microscopes, became the first publication of the Royal Society. In the American colonies the City of New Amsterdam was incorporated in the newly named city and territory of New York. And in the small Lincolnshire village of Bicker a new public house (pub), Ye Olde Red Lion, was built by John Drury who had his name and the date carved in a small panel at the top of the central gable.

That building still stands today. It is currently coming to the end of a comprehensive refurbishment and will soon re-open after having been closed for a couple of years. In these straitened times it is heartening to find a pub that has escaped the fate of most that close for lack of custom - namely dilapidation and possibly conversion to an entirely different use. It is also good to see a pub escape the clutches of a "pubco" and be taken on by a local entrepreneur. Ye Olde Red Lion, like many village pubs, has a long history in the community, and the continuation and re-vitalisation of this venerable building is something to celebrate.

The building itself is a Grade II Listed structure described as being in the "Fen Artisan Mannerist style" i.e. the work of the kind of local builder who constructed in the current and traditional way, occasionally adding a few idiosyncratic flourishes of his own. The basic structure is brick laid in an English bond (alternating courses of headers and stretchers), rusticated quoins at the corners, gable bands, a rudimentary pinnacle on the central gable, and all covered with render. Was it always rendered? The quoins suggest probably not, but it's difficult to tell when the coating was added. The nineteenth and twentieth century additions weren't always sympathetic, but original beams and roof timbers still remain inside.

Incidentally, the "Red Lion" is one of the most common pub names in the country, coming either first or second in the two most commonly cited lists. Its origins are not fully known, but a lion is a common heraldic device appearing in the coats arms of John of Gaunt, the House of Lancaster, Scotland and many families of lesser nobility. The Bicker pub's newly hung sign shows a heraldic red lion rampant with the date 1665.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 32mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/400
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.67 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Lament for our disappearing pubs

click photo to enlarge
The evening shadows slowly enveloping the Red Lion pub at Bicker, Lincolnshire, could be a metaphor for the gloom that is snuffing out pub after pub in villages across Britain.

Those running village inns have been hit by the "double whammy" of the ban on smoking in public buildings and work places, followed by the recession. There were those, and I count myself among them, who welcomed the restrictions on smoking, thinking it would make places like pubs more customer friendly as well as healthier places to be. There was the feeling that whilst the new legislation would be a disincentive to smokers to continue to visit pubs (though many would, using the alternative arrangements that enabled them to smoke outside), this reduction in customers would be made up by the non-smokers who would now find the pubs more acceptable. Well, that doesn't seem to have happened: the number of smokers in pubs did decline, but the increase in non-smokers didn't compensate, and so landlords' incomes fell. That started the closures which hit pubs in cities and towns, but particularly those in villages with their smaller customer base and their reliance on the "passing trade." But it was the tightening of consumer spending brought on by the recession that accelerated the number of pubs permanently closing their doors. There are those who think this doesn't matter, and even some who celebrate the closures. However, the pub is a traditional and welcome feature of British life, offering not just drinks, but food and a meeting place. They inject life into their communities, and many are sorry to see them go.

It won't be all village pubs that close of course: many will find a way to struggle along until an upturn in the economy eases their situation. However, pubs in very small villages, like the one in the photograph, that has seen a turnover of three or four landlords in the past year or so, may well cease trading. This particular pub dates from the seventeenth century (a datestone at the top of the central gable says, "John Drury 1665"), and is built in what is described as a Fen Artisan Mannerist Style. It would be a shame if permanent closure prevented it celebrating, in 2065, four hundred years of serving beer to the village!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 18mm (36mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/500 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On