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Historic Hoyland
by Brian Elliott
 I visited Hoyland in the company of the well known local historian and author Geoffrey Howse who was not only kind enough to provide detailed historical information but also an overview of recent developments.
The historic township of Hoyland has formed an important part of Barnsley MBC since the reorganisation of local government in 1974. Previously, for 80 years, it functioned as an Urban District Council in its own right, also serving the neighbouring villages of Elsecar, Jump and Hemingfield. The former Town Hall, erected just before absorption into Barnsley, is still viewed with some affection by many residents. Earlier still, Hoyland formed the most distant part of the ancient parish of Wath-upon-Dearne.
In recent years, particularly in the wake of pit closures, much work has been done and is ongoing to revive and improve the quality of life, the built environment, community services and the general appearance of Hoyland. New proposals which appear to be the harbinger of Hoyland’s renaissance could be very exciting indeed. One word of caution though. Hoyland, like other similar local places, has lost important groups of Georgian and Victorian shops, chapels and cottages, even its old town hall in the name of progress. One would hope that notable surviving buildings will be an integral part of anynew development.
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 At the time of the Domesday Survey (1086) Hoyland was recorded as ‘Hoiland’, the ‘Hoi’ element originating from the Scandinavian word for a place located at or near the edge of a ridge or spur of land. This explanation also fits for the nearby settlements of High Hoyland and Hoylandswaine. From at least late medieval times Hoyland had an ‘Over’ (or Upper) and a ‘Nether’ (or Lower) part, the latter being increasingly used to distinguish it from the similarly-named townships just mentioned. Nether Hoyland was the name chosen when the Urban District Council was formed. For the purpose of this feature we will be concerned mainly with central Hoyland.
In the 1720s the Townend family, prominent yeoman farmers from Upper Hoyland Hall, had Hoyland Chapel constructed. The present St Peter’s Church replaced this chapel in 1830 and remained a chapel of ease (of Wath) until it acquired its own parish in 1855. In the intervening years various other chapels opened due to Hoyland’s steadily increasing population and by 1890, a second church, St Andrew’s, had opened for worship.
 It is possible to trace Hoyland’s steady growth through a wealth of documentary sources, many of which were meticulously researched by the highly regarded local historian and former miner Arthur K Clayton (1901-2002) of Hoyland Common. Mr Clayton’s study, Hoyland Nether (1973) remains the definitive work on the area. In more recent years Geoffrey Howse’s series of ‘Around Hoyland’ pictorial books (3 volumes, Sutton, 1999-2002) have done much to describe, illustrate and celebrate Hoyland and its neighbouring villages. Hoyland Common is also the birthplace and home of one of Yorkshire’s best fiction writers: Barry Hines. I remember, in 1966, reading and being enthralled by his first book which I think was called The Blinder, involving a young footballer, some of the contents echoing my own aspirations as a professional football player. This was followed by his most famous book, A Kestral for a Knave (1968) which of course as Kes became a classic Ken Loach film, one of the best ever made. His other books include First Signs (1972), The Gamekeeper (1975), The Price of Coal (televised, 2 parts, 1977, influenced by the 1972 and 1974 miners’ strikes), Looks and Smiles (1981), Unfinished Business (1983), The Heart of It (1994) and Elvis Over England (1999). His work also include short stories, articles and plays and screen plays. Barry’s writings about working class life, set on council estates in pit villages also celebrates the countryside in which he was brought up.
We know that by 1830 Hoyland had grown into a small urban centre and had its own post office. The town centre developed around West Street, Milton Road, King Street and what was later to become known as Market Street. High Street linked West Street with King Street. It was West Street, formerly Finkle Street, that many of Hoyland’s nailmakers lived and worked. Today, few physical traces that they ever existed remain.
 Hoyland’s growth and prosperity was in no small part due to the influence and enterprise of the Wentworths and later their descendants, the Watson-Wentworths, the aristocratic families who resided at nearby Wentworth Woodhouse, on whose land Hoyland had grown. From the middle of the eighteenth century coal pits were sunk and ironstone was extracted in the locality. Ironworks soon functioned at Elsecar and Milton and there was a migration of workers into Hoyland, many coming from Staffordshire and Worcestershire.
In 1838 a postal service was running for three days a week between the Gate Inn and Barnsley and by 1851 Hoyland’s population had increased to almost 3,000. The greatest demographic change occurred during the next fifty years when the population reached 12,464 (1901 census). At the 2001 census the population had risen to over 18,000.
Hoyland market opened for trade in 1858 and in 1891 a Local Board was formed to run the affairs of the growing community. Its headquarters were the Town Hall, a building originally constructed in 1840 as a Mechanics’ Institute. The formation of Hoyland Urban District Council in 1894 replaced the Board. This was a boom time for Hoyland. There was ample employment in local collieries such as Rockingham and Hoyland Silkstone, as well as Earl Fitzwilliam’s Central Workshops and colliery in Elsecar. The steelworks of Sheffield and Rotherham also attracted employment from Hoyland residents as did the businesses, factories and mines in and around Barnsley.
 Locally, an infrastructure of local tradesmen and businesses developed to serve Hoyland’s growing community, also stimulated by increasing numbers of visitors from the surrounding area. There were many public houses and beer houses, only a small fraction of which have survived to the present day. Various professionals also set up practices in Hoyland and in the closing years of the twentieth century Hoyland not only had its own police station but also a Fire Station and Ambulance Station.
On Boxing Day 1893, the Princess Theatre, locally built by John Parr and Sons, opened in West Street, to a packed house, many hundreds having to be turned away. Thirty years later the theatre had become a cine variety house, interspersing live entertainment with films. It also changed its name to the Americanised-German ‘Kino’. The Kino gradually staged fewer live shows, turning almost exclusively to films and by the early 1960s the last film had been shown, Bingo taking over. Quite recently the building has become a snooker hall. The name ‘Princess Theatre’ is still emblazoned on its front gable and, although much altered internally, it is much to Hoyland’s credit that the main fabric of the old theatre has survived.
The Electra Palace opened in Elsecar, close to the Hoyland boundary, in 1914. It changed its name to the Futurist and operated as a cinema until closure in 1986. Fortunately the building survives. In 1920 Hoyland Common Cinema House was built on the site of Hoyland Market, adjacent to the Strafford Arms, giving Hoyland a much needed third screen. It showed its last film in 1957, after which the building stood empty until it was demolished in November 1971. The site is once again occupied by the revived Hoyland Market.
 The new Town Hall opened in 1973, accommodating the Co-operative grocery store on the ground floor and was an expensive project, the structure erected with hand-made bricks. The nearby modern shops, though functional, lack the style and character of their replacements. The police station was moved from the town centre to Hoyland Common in the 1970s. The Fire Station is no more, but fortunately the Ambulance Station survives at Platts Common. Some of Hoyland’s long established businesses survive, for example Halls the fruiterers and florists, situated in High Street and Market Street; and Chris Guest continues to run his family’s butcher’s shop in High Street. There were at least fifteen similar shops in the 1960s and 1970s and previously many more. Before the war, a Kelly’s trade directory shows that Hoyland had its own tobacconist (Ardron & Allen), a couple of bakers (Harry Ashbridge and Ernest Slowen) and numerous grocers. The butchers included Arthur Bean, Fred Bean, H Bennett, Walter Burnell, Edward Goddard, James Guest, Thomas Guest, Fred Guest, Henry Hastie, Tom Mellor, Reg Thickett, Fred Thompson and George Wilson. There was a good choice of fried fishshops, many boot and shoe repairers, several chemists and newsagents, two cycle dealers, two pawnbrokers and a good sprinkling of professional services, making Hoyland a fairly self-contained community. There was really only need to travel to larger urban centres, using good public transport, for special items. There was even a watchmaker (Maurice Layte, Milton Rd), a pastry cook (Miss Binns, Hoyland Common), a teacher of violin (Ernest Hutchinson, Platts Common), no less than three teachers of music (Harold Hutson, Hoyland Common, Robert Thompson, Milton Road, Beatrice Walton, West Street), a stationer (with the formidable name of Isaac Lichmere Walker) and two photographers (Douglas Blythe & Roy Colville). The town centre and nearby districts of yesterday were certainly a hub of activity.
 Today, the emphasis given to traffic, via the one-way system, has somewhat isolated the old centre. Most of the area’s larger houses and gentlemen’s residences have seen their gardens and land sold off for building and now sit in smaller plots.
Plans were recently announced for a large new health complex to be built in the town centre by 2011, providing a wide range of facilities previously unavailable locally. However, if this does mean the abolition of the Town Hall, Co-op and other facilities there may well be some opposition. A lot of consultation ahead, hopefully. Any new buildings should also, in the eyes of many residents, be sympathetic to Hoyland’s more distinguished surviving architecture.
Hoyland has a long history and in recent years has emerged from difficult times but its future could be bright if it retains much of its character, and certainly as one of the larger urban centres within a rapidly changing Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley.
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