Date of closure: September 2014
Address (for reference only):
Gala Bingo
Sawclose
Bath
BA1 1EY
At the moment we do not have full details of the events that led up to the closure of Gala Bingo Bath, except that the building was due to be taken over for the construction of a casino and entertainment venue which is scheduled to open in 2016.
The club is located in an historic building, the old Pavilion Music Hall which was opened in 1886. The venue became the Lyric Theatre in 1895, and then the Palace Theatre of Varieties in 1903. Movies were shown as well, up until the end of the twenties when variety took centre stage. After some interior structural alterations in the thirties it eventually closed for variety in 1955, and in the following year reopened as a dance hall. The dance hall lasted until the late sixties, and the club was converted for bingo use, its first owners being Zetters before Gala took over.
If you have any further details that may assist us, and you would like to share them with our readers, we would love to hear from you. If you let us know what you know, we will put the details online with your name credited (if you wish, or we can credit the article as anonymous). You will be doing a service to the bingo community and posterity by helping us record details of all Britain’s bingo clubs and halls. Thank you.
By Gareth Whieldon (September 2014)
Update
In April 2016 the ground on which Gala Bingo was located was been cleared for the construction of the new casino and hotel development, which unfortunately means bath no longer has a bingo hall. The bingo hall is not the only venue to to be built over, as during excavations the remains of an 18th century clay pipe factory were found, along with Roman mosaic tiles.
By Gareth Whieldon (April 2016)
