The ’Yorkshire Stingo’ name came about because it became the habit for Yorkshire folk who were in London to meet at the pub (and its adjoining pleasure gardens) on the first three days of May every year. The pub was a significant landmark, just outside Central London. The Stingo part of the pub’s name comes from slang of the 18th century for strong ale.
The pub is believed to date from the 1600s. It was far more than just a tavern, boasting a tea garden, a bowling green and the Apollo Saloon Music Hall.
During 1790 the Yorkshire Stingo was the temporary home of the second cast iron bridge ever built, designed by Thomas Paine, better known as the author of the revolutionary best-seller ’The Rights of Man’.
In May 1808, over 20 000 Yorkshire people gathered, “drinking strong ale, playing football and other rustic Yorkshire sports”.
This was a rural location when it first opened. A bowling green and pleasure gardens were added during the 18th century. An entry fee was charged, redeemable with the waiters, as a method of preventing those with no money from using the facilities.
The Paddington branch of the Grand Union Canal opened in July 1801, and a procession walked from Paddington Basin to the Yorkshire Stingo for dinner. During 1829, George Shillibeer started London’s first omnibus service between the Yorkshire Stingo to the Bank of England. His name is commemorated in the nearby Shillibeer Place.
By the 1830s the Yorkshire Stingo pleasure gardens attracted crowds of spectators to witness the ascent of hot air balloons, including balloonist Margaret Graham on 17 May 1837.
On 14 August that year, a balloon launched here took part in a spectacle to have three hot air balloons visible in the skies above London at the same time. The others were launched from Hoxton and Vauxhall Gardens. The balloonist taking off from the Stingo was Mr H Green. When his balloon had reached an altitude of 200 feet, Green dropped a cat in a basket attached to a small parachute which landed safely near Maida Hill.
The pub was one of the earliest places to use the term ’music hall’ for vaudeville and burlesque. The music hall here opened on 24 August 1835.
By 1847, the pleasure gardens had fallen out of fashion, and the Health of Towns Commissioners suggested the site ’for erecting baths and washhouses for the labouring classes in Marylebone’. The public baths and washhouses opened in December 1849. At the time was the largest building of its kind in London. The establishment contained 107 baths, laundry facilities and two large swimming pools.
In time, the Yorkshire Stingo Brewery started to occupy premises behind the pub. It originally obtained water for brewing from the deep well at Freshwater Place in nearby Homer Street.
In 1909 the Brewery was acquired by the Church Army for £12 000 and converted into a chapel with workshops, a home for first-time offenders and a labour relief depot.
After the Second World War the pub became a popular meeting place of London’s top lawyers – due to bomb damage at the original location, the London Sessions were temporarily held at the neighbouring Marylebone County Court.
The pub closed on 16 July 1964. Later that year the 150-year old building was demolished to make way for road widening for the Marylebone Flyover.
