Day huge fire brought the house down as city bingo hall was reduced to rubble
An overheating chip pan in October 1982 led to a devastating blaze that all but destroyed Derby’s Trocadero and left the city in sadness. Nicola Rippon looks back at that fateful night
FOR decades it had been one of Derby’s most popular venues – where generations of Derbeians had rollerskated, gone to the pictures, danced and played bingo. But in October 1982, the Derby Telegraph reported the sad news that what was now the Trocadero bingo hall in Normanton Road – for more than 70 years one of Derby’s bestknown entertainment landmarks – had all but been destroyed overnight.
A fierce fire, which investigators later suggested was started by an overheating chip pan in the buffet section, had broken out just before 10.30 the previous evening.
Trocadero employee Pat Spencer, aged 25, had spotted the fire. She had been helping new manager Stephen McEvoy – on his first day in the job – lock up for the night when she smelt burning and then saw smoke emanating from the rear of the hall.
“I saw that it was quite serious, so we immediately called the brigade. … it had been a perfectly normal night,” she told the Derby Telegraph.
Indeed, earlier in the evening there had been more than 200 customers playing bingo, plus a further 13 members of staff, inside the complex. Mr McEvoy said: “It was very lucky that everyone had left the hall.”
The Trocadero had been a popular venue throughout its lifetime. Opened 1909 as the Derby Alexandra Rink – to cater for the roller-skating craze that had swept the nation – in 1913 it had been converted into the Alexandra Electric Theatre.
That cinema had closed in the early 1950s and its new owner, local entrepreneur Sammy Ramsden, converted it back to a roller-skating rink, before transforming it into the Trocadero Ballroom later in the decade. The dance hall had eventually closed in the mid-1960s and reopened as a bingo hall soon after.
Sadly, there was little that firefighters could do to save the old building. By the time they arrived, much of it was ablaze.
The Telegraph reported flames shooting almost 100ft into the air as a pall of thick black smoke spread over the area.
Twelve appliances and some 60 firefighters from Derby and the east of the county, utilising nine jets and a turntable ladder, fought the inferno for more than an hour before bringing it under control.
As the blaze intensified, there was concern that the fire might spread to adjacent properties, and the Melbourne Bar pub on Normanton Road, as well as several houses on Melbourne Street, were evacuated, their residents forced to spend the night elsewhere.
In the end, due to the determined effort of the fire brigade, no other properties were damaged.
But the night was not without its drama. Ten firemen narrowly avoided serious injury when they were evacuated from the increasingly unstable structure.
It was very lucky that everyone had left the hall. manager Stephen McEvoy – on his first day in the job
Just a few minutes later, the damaged roof crashed down where they had been standing.
Divisional officer Roy Roberts, who had initially taken control of the incident, said: “It could have been very nasty if the roof had collapsed on the men.”
Elsewhere on the site, a wall collapsed, injuring three part-time firefighters from Belper.
Derek Brown, aged 47, was detained at Derbyshire Royal Infirmary with concussion, but his condition was soon described as satisfactory, while colleagues Terence Allsop, aged 34, and Jack Washbourne, aged 53, were allowed home after treatment for cuts and bruises.
Four months earlier, there had been a less serious fire at the Trocadero, but this time the building was missing a roof and its back wall and was described by DO Roberts as “very unsafe”.
Eventually, city engineers declared the building unsalvageable, and the bingo operation transferred to the former Odeon (previously Gaumont) cinema on London Road, and the ruins were eventually cleared. Today, the Trocadero Court apartments stand on the site.