King Street – the motion picture(s)

WE’RE ABOUT to learn a lot more about the history of King Street in Norwich thanks to a lottery fund grant for Dragon Hall. For those who don’t know Dragon Hall is the jewel in King Street’s crown, a magnificent medieval merchant’s hall dating back almost 600 years. The project is called King Street Community Voices and the idea is to “collect a digital archive of stories and memories about the area” over the next two years. It’s not just King Street, they’ll go as far as Bracondale in one direction and the cathedral in the other. And Wherryman’s Way fans will be delighted to know that the Wensum is the other boundary which should provide plenty of opportunities for tales from the riverbank. They’re going to kick off with a two-week show at Fusion in Norwich’s The Forum between March 15th and 26th including some rare footage shot inside The Old Barge Inn which used to be on one side of Dragon Hall. Oh and the picture shows a man driving cattle past an unrecognisable Dragon Hall in the late 1930s or early 1940s. Amazingly an Ipswich resident called Norman Bacon has already identified the man as Ted Carpenter. Mr Bacon was a 12-year old Butchers Boy on King Street at the time. They’ve obviously made a good start…