Business News
Atkinsons department store immediately after the Blitz and (inset) as it looks today
Step into the past with heritage trail
city-based landmark that was completely flattened in the Luftwaffe attacks. Atkinsons, the Sheffield department store that was razed to the ground on 12-13 December 1940, is set to be unveiled as the gateway to the Sheffield Blitz Heritage Trail. The store is one of the 12 sites
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around the city centre which will have their unique World War Two stories brought to life by a combination of interpretation boards, phone app, website and a book.
four-year project to create a legacy to the Sheffield Blitz reaches its culmination in a
The trail will be opened by local
author Neil Anderson. It was nearly a decade ago that he started the campaign to create a legacy to the attacks and the sacrifices made by Sheffielders in the war. He will be joined by a special
guest – an 80-year-old teddy bear that was the last item to be bought from Atkinsons on the fateful day it was destroyed. The bear will be making its first
visit to the store since the day it left – just hours before the German attacks that left nearly a tenth of the city’s population homeless and over 2,000 people dead or wounded. The bear was a Christmas
present for Brenda Spencer – her dad rushed into Atkinsons just before it shut for the day and was the last customer to make a purchase before that fateful evening. Brenda has cared for the bear
ever since and will be returning to the store to help launch the Blitz Trail and to meet Nicholas Atkinson, Joint Managing Director, and great grandson of the store’s founder, John Atkinson. A new book, Countdown to the Sheffield Blitz, which has been compiled by Neil Anderson, will also go on sale at the event.
18 CHAMBERconnect Autumn 2019 Entertainment will be provided
by Britain’s Got Talent finalists, the D Day Darlings, who will be singing a variety of songs from the period, as well as a selection of Christmas songs to help shoppers get in the festive spirit. The success of the Sheffield Blitz project hit the headlines in 2017 with the unveiling of the city’s first permanent exhibition to the attacks. The visitor
attraction – which has been installed inside the city’s National Emergency Services Museum on Shalesmoor – has doubled the number of visitors since it opened. The heritage trail will take
walkers on a guided tour around some of the most important Blitz sites around the city centre area. They include Sheffield Library, which was the hub of the relief effort; Sheffield City Hall, which still bears shrapnel marks; Devonshire Green, which was the site of one of the biggest loses of life and Bramall Lane, which was badly damaged by the bombing.
In November 2015, Neil
Anderson, together with project manager Richard Godley and heritage interpreter Bill Bevan, successfully secured £81,300 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to help create a lasting legacy.
‘Atkinsons
is set to become the gateway to the Sheffield Blitz Heritage Trail’
Neil Anderson said: “It is very fitting that Atkinsons is set to become the gateway to the Sheffield Blitz Heritage Trail. It was one of its
earliest supporters and few institutions played a bigger part in
the Blitz story.” The Sheffield Blitz project has
received donations from Peter Stringfellow, Horrible Histories’ creator Terry Deary, The Moor, Atkinsons and scores of individuals. It also has the backing of Sheffield City Council, The Star, Sheffield College, The National Emergency Services Museum, Sheffield 50 Plus, Sheffield Galleries and Museums Trust and South Yorkshire Aircraft Museum. The Sheffield Blitz event will take
place at Atkinsons on The Moor on Tuesday, 10 December.
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