The Joe Lyons Story: Food for Thought - A talk by OH Lieutenant Colonel Neville Lyons (Th 42)

Date: Wednesday 4th December 2pm

Many of us will remember the famous Lyon's Corner House restaurants and Tea Shops but there is so much more to the story! So why not join us on Zoom and spend a chilly December afternoon with us a pot of tea and a pre-Christmas mince pie or two, and let the very erudite and engaging Neville tell us all about the history of this iconic institution founded by a member of his family.

Synopsis for Presentation by Neville Lyons

The Lyons Teashops, the Corner House Restaurants and, of course, the Nippy waitresses have become part of social history. But this is only part of the story…..

The power point presentation, with archival photos, stretches from 1887 to 1990’s. Members of two immigrant families from Northern Europe, the Salmons and Glucksteins, together with Joseph Lyons, co-founded a company to sort out the indifferent catering at national exhibition halls of the late Victorian era. All were without previous catering experience, but the company was to progress into catering for the general public and to become the first ‘food empire’ in the world.

We shall hear about all the main activities throughout the history of the company, including those that are not so well known, such as catering for the 1901 Cup Final at Crystal Palace, the largest banquet for 8000 Freemasons at Olympia, for 15,000 guests at Royal Garden Parties and the exploitation of their management skills by control of a wartime bomb-making factory!

The talk includes amusing anecdotes and many surprises along the way, including development and manufacture of LEO, the world’s first business computer .

The speaker is Neville Lyons. There is a family relationship: his grandfather and Sir Joseph Lyons (knighted in 1911) were first cousins. Although Neville was not personally involved with the company business, this relationship was a driving force towards the research that led to his talks.

We very much hope to run this as a series of three talks by Neville over the winter months, so OHs can get together online and enjoy his presentations.

The Zoom link will be sent a week in advance.