Where it all began
One hundred and fifty-five years old, and still going strong.
That’s Birmingham Press Club – the oldest one of its kind in the world – which was established on a foggy night in December 1865 when a small group of journalists met at a hotel in the centre of the city.
Today, the Club continues to maintain an important link with the media sector, alongside academia and the region’s business community. And through one of its flagship events – the Midlands Media Students Awards – and a Young Journalists Networking initiative it plays an important part in contributing towards the future of the media industry, which currently faces probably its most challenging time ever.
The Club was originally formed as The Junior Pickwick Club – perhaps as a nod to the first novel of Charles Dickens, who a year earlier had founded what is now known as The Journalists’ Charity. In 1870 it changed its name to Birmingham Press Club.
With a membership largely composed of journalists, photographers and presenters working in newspapers, magazines, television, radio and online, the Club holds monthly get-togethers and stages events, such as celebrity lunches and other functions. Today, as in its early days, the Club has no permanent home, with events being held at various venues in and around the city.
In 1923 the Club moved into premises in Bull Street, which become a permanent home for 43 years. When the city council issued a compulsory purchase order, as part of its plans for the redevelopment of the city centre, the Club moved to Corporation Street and occupied premises above the Ben Johnson public house,
Harold Wilson, the then Prime Minister, officially opened the Club’s new home on 28 January 1966 – and the same year the Club took another momentous step when directors agreed to the admission of women as guests for a trial period! Two years later television personalities Noele Gordon, of Crossroads fame, and ATV presenter Jean Morton became the first women members of the Club.
In 1972 HRH Princess Alexandra became the first woman life member and then, in 1976, the Club made newspaper headlines again when it elected its first-ever women directors – Susan Lane, the Sunday Mercury’s television columnist and Julia Jones, who was deputy press officer for the BBC in Birmingham. In 2016, the Club voted in its first woman (and current) chairman – television and radio presenter Llewela Bailey.
Sadly, increasing overheads and declining use of the Corporation Street premises made another move inevitable and members switched to a new headquarters in the basement of the Grand Hotel – accommodation which Prime Minister John Major officially opened on 8 April 1997. Within two months, however, John Major had lost a General Election and been replaced as Leader of the Conservative Party.
“It must have been an omen,” said Jerry Johns, who was Press Club chairman at the time, ‘for a few months later the Club itself was once again in financial trouble and forced to close its doors. It was a grim task having to salvage what we could in order to keep the Club going without premises.”
The next permanent home of the Press Club was the Old Royal licensed premises in nearby Church Street, where monthly get-togethers were a feature of Press Club life. Since then, the Club has met at a variety of venues across the city.
In 2015, the Club hit a significant milestone – holding its annual Christmas Day Luncheon on December 16; the very day when it was established 150 years ago. It was an occasion not to be forgotten, unlike the Club’s centenary anniversary – which was indeed forgotten!
1965 was the year the Press Club should have been celebrating its centenary. Instead, it was so preoccupied with negotiations for new premises that it contrived to miss the great occasion - surely the only club of any kind to do so!
However, a Centenary Celebration Dinner was eventually held – seven years later - on 29 March 1972, at the Strathallan Hotel, Edgbaston, when Club chairman Stanley Willetts welcomed guests including Sir Eric Clayson, chairman of the Birmingham Post & Mail Ltd, and Hugh Cudlipp, president of the London Press Club and chairman of International Publishing Corporation.
The annual Christmas lunch remains one of the highlights of the Club’s social calendar, but its flagship events are the Midlands Media Awards and the Midlands Media Student Awards – all of them having benefitted from sponsorship provided by key supporters which in recent years have included Amazon UK, Bournville College, Birmingham Airport, East Midlands Airport HSBC UK and Royal Mail.