Twentieth Century
For a long time, the names of the women who impersonated Lady Godiva were not made public and by the beginning of 20th Century, an actress was usually employed. Godiva processions were held every three to seven years, and were sometimes organised to celebrate special occasions. In 1902, in the procession marking the coronation of Edward VII, Vera Guedes, from the London Hippodrome, rode as Godiva. To celebrate the coronation of George V in 1911, the actress Miss Viola Hamilton rode in the procession, led for the first time by a nun, with 23,000 school children in the parade, and hundreds more dressed as various historical characters. In 1919, Lady Godiva appeared in the full dress robes of a Saxon countess, with even her horse wearing trousers. This was Miss Gladys Mann, the first Coventry girl to act the role.
The first time a non-actress rode in the procession was in the Coventry Hospital Pageant in 1929, when Muriel Mellerup from Gloucestershire was Lady Godiva.
The first Post war Godiva pageant was in 1951 for the Festival of Britain. There were sixty tableaux illustrating historical and industrial aspects. The organiser, Mr Leonard Turner, obtained 1500 period costumes, for tableaux which included the visit of Henry VII to Coventry in 1500 and a representation of the elephant and castle coat of arms, which included real elephants.The 5 mile long procession was led by a London student and Actress, Ann Wrigg, portraying Lady Godiva, surrounded by the now traditional lines of nuns.
During the second half of the 20th century the Godiva aspect was lost and was replaced by Coventry Carnival. With the loss of the large firms and their apprentice schools in Coventry, this carnival dwindled and eventually ceased. However, in 1997 the Godiva procession was revived and in 2000 Coventry Carnival returned with arts group inspired costumes and tableaux. In 2003 the two combined to become the Godiva Carnival Procession which is associated with the three day Godiva Festival held in Coventry's War Memorial Park.
Read more about this topic: Godiva Procession, History
Famous quotes related to twentieth century:
“In the twentieth century, death terrifies men less than the absence of real life. All these dead, mechanized, specialized actions, stealing a little bit of life a thousand times a day until the mind and body are exhausted, until that death which is not the end of life but the final saturation with absence.”
—Raoul Vaneigem (b. 1934)
“The real passion of the twentieth century is servitude.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“The nineteenth century planted the words which the twentieth ripened into the atrocities of Stalin and Hitler. There is hardly an atrocity committed in the twentieth century that was not foreshadowed or even advocated by some noble man of words in the nineteenth.”
—Eric Hoffer (1902–1983)
“The phenomenon of nature is more splendid than the daily events of nature, certainly, so then the twentieth century is splendid.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)
“In the middle of the next century, when the literary establishment will reflect the multicultural makeup of this country and not be dominated by assimiliationists with similar tastes, from similar backgrounds, and of similar pretensions, Langston Hughes will be to the twentieth century what Walt Whitman was to the nineteenth.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)