Portstewart.
The seafront.
You know, as a teenager, walking up and down – the harbour, the promenade, the crescent; window seat at Morell’s for ice cream and coffee; or a bit older, driving up and down and round again with the car windows open playing music loudly, looking out for the talent.
Cruising down the crescent, hoping to find a parking space, but just having to 7-point turn around at the end.
And there at the end of the crescent, in the shadow of the convent, the rather small, discreet, a bit dilapidated, rather grey building. People remember roller-skating there, and I played badminton matches there against the Strand club; other folks had St. Dominican’s school classes there.
But in its heydays – whether you called it the Palais de Dance, or the Top Hat ballroom, or the Strand ballroom – it was the Ballroom of Romance.
!!!! There is great exhibition about the ballrooms in the Causeway coast area, at Coleraine Museum / Town Hall, on now! September to end November !!!
Helena Alcorn Espie: “I became a teenager in 1965, and the Strand Ballroom, there at the end of the Crescent, was really special in the ‘Sixties, hosting many famous bands and singers during my teenage years. The province was buzzing and, long before the era of big stadium concerts, bands and singers had no problem coming here to play small venues. That was great for me as my grandfather Jack Alcorn was Caretaker and Entertainments Manager of the Strand Ballroom. I was young, only a teenager, but my parents allowed me to go to concerts because my grandfather was there.”
The girls. Maurice Platt: “A trio of lovely ladies Hazel and Louise McGowan, and Kay Thompson, at the Crescent, looking as they did on Strand ballroom days.” Helena Alcorn, aged 15
The boys. Bobby Baxter: “Photo by Maurice, me with a group of friends, about 1967, dressed in the style of the day”; me, 1982, in the style of the day, my smart suit and tie that I wore on Portstewart prom in Sunday evenings. Great style! though it might just have been just naff.
Foxtrotting back a bit to the 1930s, dances in Portstewart were in the Town Hall, and another dance hall but the neighbours complained of the noise. A new ballroom was built – the Palais de Dance – in 1938, replacing the Strand cottages (photo: Irene Peden) undee the lee of the convent. Good years for ballrooms, with top hat and tails, and Portrush’s Palladium, was built the year after, both with the springy maple flooring.
Those two venues were among the few holding concerts during WWII – including here, (left) fund-raising for Spitfires in 1940, and (right) 1942 advert for dancing. With the connection to Phil’s amusement arcade in Portrush, at the other end of the hall was an amusement arcade too. Other activities too – ‘games’ and ‘novelties’, and Helena remembers her Dad taking her roller skating there.
But the dancing was The Thing. In the late 1940s the Dave Glover’s band played there for a couple of years, Dixieland music, before they de-camped to the Palladium then later to the Arcadia at Portrush. But the Strand – what a venue! And oh the glamour and grace of ballroom dancing, and ‘by the sea’, in the ‘Starlight ballroom’, and moving into the Showband boom in the 1950s.
Then in 1959, the venue became the Top Hat ballroom, under George Connell’s ownership. Phil’s took his amusements away, the restaurant filled that space, and the room was re-designed with a big picture window overlooking the sea. The big opening event was with Joe Loss, in June 1959.
Jimmy O remembers, “The Palais De Dance was my first memories. Then I remember climbing up the outside windows to look in to see the Joe Loss orchestra playing at the Top Hat. That’s when people danced properly – Rock & Roll and the jiving came later, which I dearly enjoyed too.”
Anette M: “Yes many a great night we spent dancing 
at the Top Hat. One of our favourite places xx”
Right: crowds at the Top Hat ballroom (photo by Maurice Platt: “This is my photo used in the painting on the wall of the Strand Ballroom”)
The Top Hat was a big success, with great names coming to Ulster including Emile Ford in 1961 and again in 1962, with Adam Faith.
Val Y: “Loved the Top Hat! I had great times there. That’s where I met my first love. I was 15 when I had my first dance at the Top Hat. The skirts we wore were wide and our underskirts were even wider. We looked good. Emile Ford sang one night, he was great, also dusty Springfield. They were the best times ever. The boys were gentlemen. Great times!”
Eden Kane came in August 1962 – George Connell was pleased to see 1,000 screaming but well-behaved Portstewart teenagers mobbing him at the Top Hat. “An absolutely fantastic success!!” – though he did arrange for bodyguards for Eden’s next gig at his other Top Hat venue at Lisburn.
George Connelly was a boxing promoter and he brought wrestling in 1961 – Mike Marino, oh that name sounds familiar, from watching wrestling on TV on Saturday afternoons – and Miss Ireland competitions with the winner in 1963 being ‘Miss Betty Edgar of Portrush’ – our Croc-na-mac neighbour?
Roberta M: “I remember the Top Hat well! We used to wear dresses with what we called 50-yard petticoats, and we jived all night, to great bands. Then it become the Strand Ballroom – used to go there a lot – great memories!”
Roller skating is mentioned in the 1942 advert at the Palais de Dance, ‘Every afternoon 3 – 5, admission 1s, skates free’. That hobby seems to me to come in fits and starts, and Val Y reckons it started up again in 1954: “I went every Saturday, it was the Top Hat then. I loved it. I was lucky I had my own roller skates, and my brother Jim would take me around the hall by the hand until I could do it myself. Grèat time.”
And Bobby Ann says, “Big Lynn Troy & Ricky Brolly taught me to roller-skate there, early 1960s when I was about 15. It was crowded! The next year I was nearly 16, one of the youngest but almost old enough to dance there at the Strand. Mr McPeak worked with my dad on the buses, and he organised a bus from Coleraine and places to the Strand; so as well as my bus pass he got me a dance ticket. It was great to have friends of dad’s!”
And Maurice says, “Yes the McPeak’s were bouncers – the father was Jim, was nicknamed ‘Bull’ I think!” which to me sounds good for a bouncer role.
After three years of Top Hat, October 1962, the owner George Connell took a big step up and brought in two other promoters and also Portstewart’s Bobby Platt to the venue, and the name changed to the Strand Ballroom.
I presume that Bobby with building experience ensured that “Renovations have been carried out in record time”, and dancing and gigs were arranged, in early 1963, as above.
Source News Letter, 22July22
Helena takes up the story: “Bobby went on to bring in many of the top showbands of the time to the Strand, really good ones too, like Eileen Reid and the Cadets, the Royal Showband, Dickie Rock and the Miami Showband. Those bands were really top class.”
Val Yeoman: “This was me in 1963 with my then boyfriend Hank at the Top Hat, having our drinks between dances” and (right) “This is me and my friend Dorothy, just for an evening out at Portrush so you can see what the fashion is like.” (photos: courtesy Val)
Rock and pop was coming too, and around Northern Ireland the Beatles flew in to scenes of mass hysteria at Belfast concerts in November 1963, and the Rolling Stones in summer 1964 – the same time as teenager Rosemary Brown was starting her career, soon to be Dana, at Portrush Palladium.
I see a whole page of adverts of Showband gigs around Ulster for Christmas 1964. Amazing – so many bands, all seven-piece boy bands, same uniforms, playing same music with some of their own pieces. All lookalike and soundalike?? Well says my cousin Heather, “They all had their individual quirks, and some were better than others” and Barbara McI: “Brian Coll and the Plattermen were my favourites but I have to say the showbands were all great musicians and played a great variety of musical styles.”
Eleanor Og’: “Emile Ford. Helen Shapiro, Adam Faith, The Batchelors, the Royal Showband, and many more. Great stars appeared here. No drink was served, just tea and buns. The blokes stood at the bottom corner of the hall. It also had a balcony. Over before 12 o’clock and home on the bus. Glad to get our stilletto pointed high heels off! Our dad waiting at the front door. Straight to bed. Fantastic night out!
I see the Strand is now without a roof. l hope they restore it. Fantastic memories.”
I see from the ads that the Platters Showband were to appear at the big party at the Strand on Christmas Night 1964. Another big night at the Strand was on New Year’s Eve. Krissi remembers that “There was a large net in the centre of the ceiling full of balloons, and at midnight, they would release the balloons. Oh how easily we were pleased back then……. Lol!”
And Barry Platt remembers, “Yes, a great time. I was the one though who had to put the balloons up in the loft. One year I slipped off the very narrow walkway and put my foot through the ceiling. My father was raging until Jack Alcorn pointed out that I could easily been killed.”
Margaret McM: “How I would love to walk into the Strand Ballroom again and hear that music playing as soon as you stepped in the door! Happy days!
My mother used to let me go the Strand Ballroom on a Saturday night with my sister Anne, she thought I was in safe hands – but as soon as we went through the door Anne left me!! It didn’t matter, I loved to dance and was never on my own for long.
“We lived in Coleraine and there was a special bus on a Saturday night, left the side of the Diamond, for the dance. I polished my brothers’ shoes for them and pressed there trousers for money to get 7/6p to get me in. If a boy ask you to stay up for another dance, you got off!! Met many of my first boyfriends there.
“Would have been about 1964 onwards. OMG I was only about 13!!!
“Happy, happy,happy days.That’s where my brother taught me to jive. Saw a lot of the big names and the best thing of the lot was that we didn’t need drink!!!!”
My cousin Heather: “Showbands: the Miami, Dave Glover and so many more – Saturday night rocked!” Helena continues: “My grandad worked at the Strand as Caretaker and Entertainments manager. Sunday was the weekly cleaning day for the Ballroom, after the Saturday big night concerts. I would accompany grandad to brush the place up and get the dance floor ready. Preparing the floor was a tin with holes in and inside were soap shavings, which were shaken on the floor to make it slippy enough to dance.”
Stephanie F: No alcohol served and the girls sat or stood around the edge waiting to be asked to dance. There were 3 dances before it was all change and at that point you could decide if your partner was worth investing more time in. 
This wouldn’t work now!
Helena says that “After my 13th birthday, I managed to persuade the family that I could go to a concert with grandad. The first one that I got to go to was Helen Shapiro. My first concert as a teenager – a birthday treat, probably 1965. Anyway, she was my first memory of a ‘pop star’ coming there. I loved it. I had been on the stage at Portrush pantomime, but to see a star like Shapiro live at the Strand was so special!! She sang her most famous song, ‘Walkin’ to back Happiness’. I just soaked up the atmosphere, it was so exciting.”
“Thinking back”, Helean says, “my love of music came from both of my parents. My dad loved to sing. After his day’s work as a painter and decorator, my father went out to sing at places around Portrush and Bushmills, Aghadowey and Kilrea. My first memories, in the ‘Fifties, he would blacken his face with soot and go out to sing like Al Jolson. He would obviously sing and practice the songs at home. All my life I have loved the song, ‘Scarlet Ribbons‘, which he would sing to me.
“My granny had a record player, part of a radiogram, often playing Elvis Presley. They had ‘singsongs’ at her house at Hamilton Place in Portrush. Sometimes they would get me up on a table to sing ‘Danny Boy’ or ‘If you were the only girl in the world’. Oh dear, but as a child, the inhibitions aren’t there, you can have a go at anything when you are young! I grew up with a very eclectic taste in music, which I still have.
“During concerts at the Strand, Grandad was ‘On duty’ making sure everything was OK, both for the artists and the audience. He had always treated me as special as I was his first grandchild. Although the Strand was always packed, upstairs was a balcony, a bit quieter and a bit more room, and Grandad made sure that I was settled and had a good view of the band.
And for the taster for Part II to follow shortly.
Helena Alcorn Espie continues, “I don’t know if Grandad enjoyed the music himself, we never spoke of it! And to be honest once I was in there I kept out of his way – the music was the whole thing for me. I just loved the music. And later in the ‘Sixties, Showband music gave way to the era of famous pop stars. Many exciting acts were to come to the Strand, like Englebert Humperdink, and Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass Band, Them with van Morrison. I didn’t see those but I was to see people like Lulu, Donovan, bands like Cream, Rory Gallagher when he was with Taste, the Merseybeats, Dave Dee Dozy Beaky Mick and Titch – the names always reminded me of Snow White’s dwarves – and the Kinks. Acker Bilk played his clarinet there at the Strand, more than once.”
If you have good memories of the Palais de Dance or the Top Hat, please do write a comment, a paragraph or two, and if OK may I add it in to this blog?
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References:
Portstewart Facebook pages (I may have used your FB comments to illustrate a point in this blog – I tried to contact to ask your permission – sorry if I missed you, but let me not if NOT ok and I will remove)
https://www.irish-showbands.com/ <== reports over 2,000 showbands, 1,250 venues, in Ireland, 1950s to 1970s
All newspaper cuttings, source: BritishNewspaperArchive.co.uk
Photographs: copyright, with thanks to Helena Alcorn Espie, Maurice Platt, Irene Peden, Bobby Baxter
Dana at the Portrush Palladium !!
Portrush Ballrooms: the Palladium & Arcadia
Hamilton Place and the Charge of the Light Brigade
Portrush, 1960s – the Swinging Sixties!
Act II – Portrush Panto, 1970s and ’80s
Portrush music: Showbands to Stranglers, ’60s and ’70s
Portrush and the sizzling ’70s
Portrush Tales 