Cheltenham in the 1980s

When Margaret Thatcher became the prime minister, a new era of great social and economic change in Britain started. For Cheltenham, the 1980s was a time of building up the reputation as a popular shopping destination. For the cost £23 million, the Regent Arcade was built on the site of the forty-five bedroomed Plough Hotel, that fronted on to the High Street, between 1982 - 1984. The 185,000 square feet arcade with its 78 shops and parking for 540 cars was officially opened by the Princess Anne in May 1985. In January of 1987 the Wishing Fish clock was added, now one of the most popular tourist attraction of Cheltenham. The 45 foot high clock was designed by Cotswold artist-craftsman Kit Williams, author of the book "Masquerade", and built by Cheltenham clockmakers, Sinclair Harding & Co. at the cost of £80,000. To this day, the magical performance of the bubble-blowing clock brings the arcade to a stand-still, fascinating young and old. The tradition of catching a bubble to grant you a wish has developed over the years.

1980s also meant the end of Cheltenham as a coach hub. Before 1985 over 300 buses used to leave Cheltenham each day for various destinations and the coach station in St. Margaret’s Road (now a carpark) used to employ about 300 people. The Black & White coach company was taken over by the Cheltenham & Gloucester Omnibus Co. and the number of bus services to Cheltenham where radically reduced, being diverted to Bristol and Birmingham. First multi-storey carpark in Cheltenham was built in Albion Street in 1982.

The Cold War was at its height when GCHQ hit the national headlines in the 1980s with the Geoffrey Prime spy scandal. Geoffrey Prime had worked for the RAF on intelligence duties in West Berlin and also for GCHQ as a linguist. He was a section head and translator at GCHQ and involved in some of its most sensitive operations. He was sentenced at the Old Bailey in 1982 for 14 years of treachery during which time he passed photographs of hundreds of documents to his Russian handlers. He was released from Rochester Prison, Kent, after serving 19 years of a 38 year prison sentence.

GCHQ got to the headlines again in 1984 because of its banning of the independent Trade Unions for a fear that industrial action from their employees would be a threat to national security. Those not prepared to accept these new terms were offered transfers to other departments or had to leave the Civil Service. Eventually the last 14 employees who would not give up their union membership were dismissed. People in Cheltenham felt sympathetic with GCHQ employees and the announcement of the Union Ban in late January 1984 was marked every year from 1985 to 1997 by a rally in Cheltenham town centre. When Labour Party won the 1997 elections, it promised the ban to be removed and those who were dismissed or transferred were able to returned to GCHQ.

If you were a sport fan, the1980s in Cheltenham had plenty to offer. In 1981 the biggest ever athletics event in Cheltenham was staged. Over 1,000 runners took part in the People’s Half Marathon raising money for the cobalt unit in Cheltenham General Hospital. The start was at Cheltenham racecourse and the starting pistol was fired by champion jockey Terry Biddlecombe. In the same year Cheltenham National Hunt Festival brought a surprise when the Gold Cup was won by Jim Wilson, the first non-professional rider since Dickie Black on Fortina in 1947. In 1986 the South African runner Zola Budd appeared unannounced at an athletic event at the Prince of Wales stadium and broke the club’s 800m record by 5.1s.

However, the biggest sporting hit of the 1980s was Cheltenham’s most famous ski jumper Eddie the Eagle. He was working as a plasterer in Cheltenham when following his childhood dream to be a Hollywood stuntman he became Britain's first and only ski jumper and also the British national ski jumping record holder. His birthday ironically is still celebrated as a public holiday for casualty departments all over the world. He first represented Britain at 1987 World Championships in Oberstdorf where he came 98th in a field of 98. But it was the Winter Olympics in Calgary in 1988 which brought him fame. Although he finished 58th in the 70–metre jump (the last 59th competitor was disqualified) and last in the 90–metre jump, with his big glasses, which fogged when he was jumping, and sarcastic wit he became a media sensation.

In the 1980s Cheltenham’s art scene gained another venue in the form of the former Victorian grain warehouse in Winchcombe street which became known as the Axiom Art Centre. Local artists and craftspeople could exhibit their work there and the space was also used as a theatre and a venue for classes and rock concerts. The Axiom closed in 2000. A ten feet tall bronze rabbit appeared in Imperial Gardens accompanied by a flock of metal sheep, work of Cirencester sculptor Sophie Ryder, a decade before her famous Minotaur and Hare statue become one of the features of the Promenade. ABC cinema in the Promenade was pulled down in 1981 to make way for Royscott House. The last films it screened were Kentucky Fried Movie and The Other Cinderella. In 1985 the Everyman Theatre underwent a major refurbishment which took its frontage back to its former glory - the way the theatre looked a century ago. The delicate auditorium was renovated and the entire backstage area was rebuilt.

1982 was one of the coldest winters on record when Cheltenham’s temperature of –20.1 degree Celsius was lower than in Warsaw. But then the long hot summer of 1984 brought droughts and hosepipe bans instead. House prices rose a bit since the 1970s and for £21,350 you would get neo-Georgian, three-bedroom town house in Bournside, Up Hatherley, three-bedroom semi-detached house with a garage would have cost you £24,250, semi-detached cottage in Charlton Kings went for £25,000, while three-bedroom semi with a detached garage in St. Mark’s cost £25,995.