Ron Drew's Theatre Pages

Local Professional Theatre

Richard Thornton was born in South Shields on 4th February 1839, one of eight children, and he lived to become a legend in his home town and famous throughout the country. When only ten years old he worked at the St. Hilda Colliery sharpening picks alongside his father and when about 12 yrs. old he learnt to play the violin like his father who entertained around the  public houses at the week-ends. When he was 15 he was earning extra coppers by playing strathspey, hornpipe and reels, as he had learnt from his father, in the pubs and, during holiday times, he took his violin to Marsden Grotto, by then a pub on the outskirts of the town, to play for the holiday crowds. He also played on the pleasure boats that sailed up and down the Tyne.

When Dick Thornton was 20 his father died so he took over the license of a beer house in High Shields. A year later he was to marry at St. Mary's in Gateshead, and Bella Thornton was soon encouraging him to greater things and he became a violinist at the Theatre Royal in King Street, South Shields at the same time working in a cabinet maker's store in Union Alley at the back of the theatre. Around 1870, in his early 30's, he became leader of the orchestra at the Theatre Royal. 

 He opened three more public houses and started providing music for his customers. In his early 40s, he was running the Shakespeare Arms Public House in Union Alley (or Pig Alley as it was known later) where music and beer were a happy blend, and this was to lead him into his new career. 

It was at the time whilst playing his violin in the the music room at the old Locomotive Inn at the Mill Dam, he had the idea of establishing a music room at the Shakespeare Arms.  At that time the only regular music hall in South Shields was the Alhambra ( a wooden building in Coronation Street). and Thornton set about achieving his dream by expanding the Shakespeare Arms music room. There was, next to the Inn, a large establishment and warehouse which came on the market in 1885 which he bought and adapted them together with his music room to form a Music Hall - which flourished and later was to be known as  "Thornton Varieties." It was a plush building in many senses: it had a glamorous interior with a seating capacity of about 1,000 and was an immediate success. At his newly converted Music Hall he tried to produce entertainment for the whole family. It was a model for beauty and compactness in its day, and was destined to lay the foundation of the future great Moss and Thornton combination. But it was too small to handle the audiences.

It continued until 1898 and in the following year he moved into a new building, the New Empire Theatre - the "Empire Palace of Varieties" with its entrance in the then grand thoroughfare of South Shields, King Street. - what had started as an extended music room in a pub was now a fully-fledged Variety Theatre. Sadly the theatre is no longer there, but in its time it attracted many of the country's best entertainers.

Jenny Hill, the famous comedienne, was beyond the dream of a small provincial town until Dick Thornton made it possible. His first contract was to pay her £40 a week - an unbelievable figure. But to satisfy the incredulous the contract itself was exhibited in a shop window in King Street, South Shields, and thousands saw it. he paid Harry Lauder £12 for his first week's engagement. it cost him £120 a week to book him on the last occasion. 

Dick Thornton was to form the Moss and Thornton Varieties and the Moss Empires Ltd., the largest in the world. In 1890 they built the Newcastle Empire Theatre, another theatre no longer with us. He was a great crusader for music hall reform and with Edward Moss revolutionised and regenerated the music hall stage. As Dick Thornton once recalled ".......... The music hall as I remember it was not a place where a man could take his wife. I laid down the principle that given good clean entertainment, clean people would come to see it. The man did bring his wife and that has been the secret of my success."  

Thornton moved to Eden Villa, Gosforth, where he died in 1922 at the age of 83 leaving more than £100,000.

Copyright (c) 2000 Ron Drew
Last revised: April 18, 2004 .