Taken from an article in the Kentish Times, amended and updated by Maureen Hardwen.

Our Theatre is named after Edward Alderton.  But who was he?  Even Bexley Council’s Parks Department, feeling he had died years before, sent flowers to the Theatre’s official opening in 1976 addressed to “The Edward Alderton Memorial Theatre”.  At that time his friends and colleagues knew that Edward Alderton JP was very much alive, and that year would be celebrating his silver jubilee as Area Principal and head of the Adult Education Centre in Bexleyheath.

Councillors and officials knew that in his 25 years, Mr. Alderton had done a great deal to advance adult education in the Borough.  His forceful personality, which took him to the top of the country’s fourth largest union – NALGO (local government union) – was shaped by the pain and struggle he faced in World War 2.  During the war he was an education officer in a prisoner of war camp, Stalag Luft Three, and was responsible for organising classes and courses for thousands of Allied airmen as part of the initiative known as the “Barbed Wire University”.

During 1941, as a prisoner, Sergeant Alderton was asked for speech training by two Londoners.  At that stage, the camp’s only book was a faded copy of John Ruskin’s “Sesame and Lilies”, but from this humble beginning grew a scheme so engulfing that by the spring of 1945, lectures were being held at the rate of 150 a week, with examinations in 84 subjects taking place every day.

Over the years, Mr. Alderton travelled the world for his union.  He was their President in 1978, and was leader of their delegation to the TUC conference in 1975.  He lived in a house overlooking the Centre (now demolished) so was never far from his work.  He was also a Justice of the Peace on the Bexley Bench and a member of Bexley Rotary Club.

You can read more about Edward Alderton in an article on the website of St Anselm Hall’s Alumni Association.