The Empire Pool / Wembley Arena Story – Part 1

 Guest post, by local historian Philip Grant. Look out for Part 2 on Saturday July 27th.

 

1.     The Empire Pool in 1934.
(Source: Brent Archives – Wembley History Society Collection)

 

I’ve been writing and speaking about the British Empire Exhibition (“BEE”) in this, its centenary year, and you’d be forgiven for thinking that the Empire Pool (now better known as Wembley Arena) was built for that event. But it was actually constructed ten years later, and 25 July 2024 is the 90^th anniversary of its opening. Why and how it was built, and the variety of events that have taken place there since it opened, are a story that deserves to be told. That is what I aim to do in this short series of articles.

 

2.     Arthur Elvin. (Image from the internet)

 

Arthur Elvin had already earned his place in Wembley’s history by buying, and saving from demolition, the former Exhibition’s Empire Stadium. By 1929, as Chairman and Managing Director of the Wembley Stadium and Greyhound Racecourse Company Ltd, he was welcoming large crowds to the stadium to watch regular greyhound racing and motorcycle speedway meetings, as well as hosting the annual F.A. Cup and Rugby League Challenge Cup finals. The company had also acquired much of the former Exhibition site.

 

Elvin wanted to expand Wembley’s sporting attractions, and by 1932 was planning to use part of that land for an indoor sports stadium. In order to pay for itself, this facility would need year-round use, which would also help to provide full-time employment for the company’s 400 staff. One of his team suggested that he should go and see a new sport for this country, introduced from Canada. Having watched an England v Canada ice hockey match, Elvin was determined that Wembley would have its own team, skating on its own rink. 

 

3.     The site chosen for the indoor stadium, marked on a 1924 BEE plan.

 

The ambitious plans for the new building included a large swimming pool, which could be floored over for indoor sports, including an ice rink during the winter months. The designer chosen for the project was Sir Owen Williams, the expert on reinforced concrete who had been behind the construction of the Stadium and Palaces of Industry and Engineering for the 1924 Exhibition. Concrete provided both speed of construction, and the ability to span a building that would be 240 feet wide, without supporting pillars.

 

4.     An article by Sir Owen Williams from the 1925 booklet “Wembley: The First City of Concrete”.
(Source: Brent Archives)

 

The company had no trouble raising the £170,000 it needed to finance the project, and work got underway in November 1933. Even though Sir Owen’s plans took advantage of the western end of the BEE’s lake, they still needed to dig out 30,000 tons of clay, before they could actually start constructing the building. It was 15 February 1934 before Lord Derby could “lay the foundation stone” – but because of the building’s design, it had to be cast with liquid concrete!

 

 

 

 5. Lord Derby “laying the foundation stone”, 15 February 1934. (From an old book)

 

6.     The Empire Pool under construction in 1934. (From an old book)

 

Soon there were 800 men working on the site, erecting a mass of scaffolding and the formwork, in which to pour 20,000 tons of concrete. The design of the beams across the roof of the building enabled the weight of the roof to be balanced out by heavier sections beyond the side walls, with vertical columns holding the ends in place. In between the beams was space for 56,000 square feet (5,200 square metres) of glass, which along with huge windows at the end of the building allowed the pool to be lit by natural light during the day.

 

The pool itself was 200 feet (61 metres) long and 85 feet (26 metres) wide, with a maximum depth, at the diving board end, of 16½ feet (5 metres). When finished, it needed 700,000 gallons of water to fill the pool, which was pumped direct from the Colne Valley over the space of ten days, then passed through the pools own filtration and purification system. Incredibly, the whole building and its facilities were ready to be opened by July 1934.

 

7.     Arthur Elvin (right) and Sir Owen Williams (centre) taking the Duke of Gloucester (tall man!) on a tour of the building on 25 July 1934. (From an old book)

 

The official opening was carried by the Duke of Gloucester (the third son of King George V and Queen Mary) on 25 July 1934. The building was named the Empire Pool and Sports Arena, at least partly because the swimming events for the 1934 British Empire Games were about to be held there, between 4 and 10 August, although there was just time before that for an opening event to test the facilities. 

 

8.     Leaflet publicising the Pool’s Opening Meeting, 27 July 1934. (Courtesy of Geoff Lane)

 

The Games had first been held in Hamilton, Ontario, in 1930. The British Empire Exhibition at Wembley in 1924 had brought people from over 50 nations together, ‘to meet on common ground and learn to know each other’. A Canadian journalist, covering the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam, had the idea that a similar event for people from across the Empire, again at four-year intervals, would help to further that aim through sport. He helped to organise the first British Empire Games in his home city, when 11 nations sent competitors.

 

The second edition of the British Empire Games in 1934 was originally planned to take place in Johannesburg, but some countries protested that their competitors would be excluded because of South Africa’s apartheid policies. London stepped in, hosting 16 nations, with the athletics events staged at the White City Stadium (where the 1908 Olympic Games had been held). Wembley’s brand-new Empire Pool, with seating for 5,000 spectators, and a wooden pontoon across the shallow end to create the correct length of 55 yards (50 metres), was ideal for the aquatic competitions.

 

9.     Advert for public swimming at the Empire Pool (from the back cover of a 1934 Games programme). (Courtesy of Geoff Lane)

 

 

10.  Public swimming at the Empire Pool, 1930s. (From an old book)

 

The Empire Pool was up and running, with public swimming proving very popular for the rest of the summer, but come the autumn it was time for a change. It took twelve days to drain the pool, install a scaffolding structure to fill the void and a thick wooden flooring over it to create an indoor sports arena, ready for Elvin’s ice hockey team, given the same name as the Stadium’s speedway team, the Wembley Lions.

 

11.  The Wembley Lions ice hockey team, 1930s. (Courtesy of Geoff Lane)

 

In fact, from October 1934 the Empire Pool had two national ice hockey league teams, playing matches on Thursdays and Saturdays. The rink where the Grosvenor House Canadians used to play had just closed, so they became the Wembley Canadians, with their name soon changing to the Wembley Monarchs. And when the ice rink was not being used for hockey matches or practice, it was available for skating, with 600,000 payments for public use of the ice during the first winter alone!

 

12.  A public skating session at the Empire Pool, 1930s. (From an old book)

 

Swimming and ice hockey/skating were far from the only sports that the Empire Pool and Arena catered for, and I will share more of these with you in the next part of its story. I hope you will join me again for that.

 

Philip Grant.

 

Part 2 will be published on Saturday July 27th 2024.