Howard & Wyndham Ltd. operated for over 90 years as a theatre-owning, management and production company, running a number of key theatres, especially in Scotland. They were particularly noted for their pantomimes which were carefully tailored to the tastes and interests of local audiences.
The company was founded in 1895 to extend an existing 1883 partnership between Irish-born John B. Howard (1841-1895) and Edinburgh born Frederick WP Wyndham (1853-1930) which had first formed in order to run the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh. The company also owned the Theatre Royal, Edinburgh, Theatre Royal, Glasgow and leased the Royalty Theatre, Glasgow. Howard died of a stroke only weeks after the company was formed but it continued to bear his name until it was dissolved in the 1960s.
In 1904 the company built and opened the King's Theatre, Glasgow, and in 1912 took over the Robert Arthur group of six theatres (four in England - the Theatre Royal, Newcastle in Newcastle upon Tyne, the Royal Court in Liverpool, and the Royal Court in Nottingham - and two in Scotland), in Dundee and Aberdeen. Wyndham continued to run the company productions until 1928, when he retired. Howard & Wyndham Ltd bought the King's Theatre, Edinburgh, appointing its builder, A. Stewart Cruikshank, as managing director of the group, and also making C.B. Cochran a director. The company became based at the King's Theatre, Edinburgh. Howard & Wyndham also held shares and directorships in Moss Empires, London West End theatres, and were the major shareholders in H.M. Tennent & Company. They later expanded into television production. On his father's death in 1949, Stewart Cruikshank junior succeeded as managing director, and concentrated the offices and wardrobe in London while continuing the production facilities and stores in Edinburgh.
In the 1960s Howard & Wyndham Ltd. sold its theatres in England and Scotland to the city councils, with one exception, their British flagship out of over 20 theatres, the Alhambra Theatre Glasgow which Glasgow Corporation declined. It closed in 1969 to meet company debts in film and television production. The collection does not constitute a formal, comprehensive archive of the business but does include a wide variety of unique business records and other material reflecting the company’s activities during the twentieth century.
From the guide to the Howard & Wyndham Ltd Collection, 1906-1973, (V&A Theatre and Performance)
