Thomas Pensotti's Coronation Album
Bob Millward December 2013
Thomas Pensotti was Chairman of the Kidderminster Borough Council Committee that set up the idea of providing a Dinner for 'The Aged' to celebrate the Coronation of Edward VII. It was arranged that each of the six Wards in the town would organise their own function and Pensotti continued as Chairman of the St John's Ward Committee.
The Coronation Dinners were held on Saturday 28th June and this album was presented to Pensotti on 4th July 1902 in appreciation of his services to the project (see Page 27). At this stage the album contained minutes of the organising committee meetings, the name and age of each person invited (supposedly over the age of 65 but census analysis indicates that this was not always the case), photographs of the Committee members at The Cedars, photographs of street decorations near the Town Hall and other items of memorabilia. Alderman Pensotti appears to have subsequently added other material to the album and allowed school children at a number of local Junior and Infant Schools to add artistic work on any remaining blank pages.
Some items related to the celebrations related to the Coronations of George V in 1911, including another 'Dinner to the Aged', are also to be found towards the end of the album (pages 67-73).
With 83 pages of text, photographs, drawings, paintings and items of memorabilia the album is a unique record of a part of the history of Kidderminster and some of the elderly people living at the time of the Coronations of Edward VII and George V.
Alderman Thomas Pensotti gave the album to his housekeeper Rose Hopkins who later passed it on to her niece Margaret Day (nèe Hopkins). We are grateful to Margaret for allowing this album to be copied and shared freely, thus enhancing our understanding of past life in Kidderminster in very different times.
Thomas Pensotti was in business at 1 Bull ring as a hatter from 1880 to 1923. He was also a prominent local politician and Town Councillor from 1892 until his death in 1935. He lived at 'Como', 28 Birmingham Road (currently a Veterinary Surgeon establishment) but after his wife's death in 1904 he moved to a house at the top of Leswell Lane which he renamed 'Como' (currently number 34).
The whole album can be downloaded as a PDF file by clicking on the following link: