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Postcards : 1909 York Pageant : Postcard of Guilds and others

Item type: Postcards
Archive reference: YMP/L/2/1
Date/year: 1909
Description: Black and white Postcard from 1909 showing the Guilds of York with their banners and a wagon play (Angels and Shepherds) in front of St Mary's Abbey.  This scene within the overall historical pageant was meant to be the Richard III visit to York in 1483, when among other treats a wagon play was performed for him and the Queen by the Guilds.  Caption reads:  York Historic Pageant. The Guilds. A Pageant within a Pageant.  Stored as YMP/L/2/1.  Another sixteen postcards from the 1909 pageant have since been donated to the archive, stored as YMP/L/7 and YMP/L/8.
NCEM holds the script of the 1909 York Pageant as YMP/Q/7 and in October acquired the score, stored as YMP/I/1/9.  We also have an illustrated souvenir brochure - see more actors below.
Photograph credited to Lane-Smith and Debenham & Co, Lendal, York.  From Mr Antill's donation. In the City
The Guilds Pageant of York Archive, held in York Explore (the central Library) there are some images from behind the scenes at this pageant (found in the Hugh Murray collection, currently in HMU/P/18).
The NCEM archive holds a donation as YMP/E/12, a booklet listing all the performers and musicians of the 1909 Pageant, with their addresses, useful for family historians.
There was another pageant in 1971 to celebrate 1900 years of York, when HM Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip came.
1909 actors

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