The date was October 1948 and the following month Southampton's former Grand theatre was to celebrate its 50th anniversary.

These days the Grand is just a memory for the many Southampton people who regularly saw the plays, variety shows, pantomimes and, towards the end of its life, the rather more risque presentations of continental revues and exotic dancers which earned the old place the nickname of the "Windmill of the South.''

Gone is the ornate exterior that once stood on the corner of Civic Centre Road and Windsor Terrace - replaced by today's far more anonymous office block from the 1960s.

As 1959 came to an end, it was not just the decade that was drawing to a close - so was the life of the Grand.

The Victorian theatre had all but lived its life and the Grand was no longer grand in terms of audiences, so it came as little surprise that the production of Seagulls Over Sorrento saw the curtain lowered for the last time.

Former Daily Echo journalist, John Edgar Mann, who reviewed that swansong production, wrote: "Outside, as usual, there are pigeons over the Grand, though many a saddened local playgoer may mistake them for vultures.

"This is the week which marks the death of a truly Grand little theatre.''

The theatre had opened its doors on November 28, 1898 after Dame Madge Kendal laid the Grand's foundation stone that was originally placed at the foot of the proscenium arch.

A few years later, in 1904, a publication called the Southampton Annual suggested: "One of the most striking features of the Grand is its cosiness. The auditorium is everywhere in desirable proximity to the stage. Seeing and hearing are both agreeably possible.''

And so it was in those halcyon days, but from the early 1920s the Grand earned a precarious living as it lurched from one crisis to another, twice closing and then reopening before reinventing itself as the New Hippodrome.

The Second World War intervened, and as a sign on the front door clearly stated on September 14, 1940: "Owing to the present international situation, this theatre will be closed until further notice.''

It reopened on December 27, 1950, with the staging of the pantomime Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Safe family entertainment, unlike the nude and fan dancers later put on by an increasing desperate management to attract custom, until the inevitable happened in October, 1959 when the theatre finally closed.