Here Comes Tomorrow

For most of the time, I enjoy Facebook groups showing Bristol then and now. It can get slightly tiresome when people of my generation spend their time moaning and saying how much better the city looked in the olden days. Sometimes, they are right. The architects of the 1950s and 1960s had all the subtlety of a breeze block in some of the monstrosities they created, yet not all the change is bad. For instance, Bristol’s decaying harbourside has been transformed into a modern, vibrant area. And much of the history has been retained. But get onto the dire legacy of Bristol’s slave trade and the arguments still rage.

You will all have seen the events of last summer when the statue of Edward Colston was removed from its plinth by a large of people and dumped in the harbour. Colston, who made his fortune from slavery, has been celebrated, if that’s the word by having not just a statue put up on the city centre, but a school and the city’s largest music hall named after him. (There is an argument that suggest the Colston Hall was named after Colston Street on which it stands, but I don’t think that matters. It’s still a Colston.)

I saw a dreary thread on the Bristol now and then – or is it then and now? Who cares? – Facebook group today referring to the Bristol Beacon, the new name for the Colston Hall. Some people are apparently very angry about the change. “I’ll still call it the Colston Hall,” says one person. “We should preserve history and not pretend bad things didn’t happen,” says another. I used to have some sympathy for these arguments, but I’ve changed my mind. The name had to go.

My generation did too little to address our painful past. Not that we were responsible for it, but we accepted the status quo. Colston did some terrible things. And we did little to acknowledge that past.

Either way, we have taken the difficult decision to condemn Edward Colston to where he belongs: in the history books, in the museum; a constant reminder of how not everything was better in the old days.

I came to like the Bristol Beacon name quite quickly. It rolls nicely of the tongue – “I’m off to the Beacon tonight” – and it combines the name of our great city with a word we associate with light.

Change, especially a change of name of an institution that has been at the centre of the Bristol arts scene for many years, can be difficult. I’m not much of one for change, either, but like the architecture of Bristol attitudes change too. What may have been acceptable to Colston’s generation, like the enslavement of black men from Africa, is not acceptable today. And that’s why this boy has had a change of heart.

If people want to carry on calling it the Colston Hall, it’s up to them. At one time, I said much the same thing. But the Colston Hall no longer exists. It’s the Bristol Beacon now.

Some things were better in the old days and some things are better today. Given the choice, I’d much rather live in this era than anytime in the past.

As with most things, time will be the great healer. As my generation fades into history, the next comes along and builds its own history. I hope they understand the history and learn from it too. I shall doubtless make references to the Colston Hall in future, not least because I saw so many great artists and bands there. But that was then and this is now. And here comes tomorrow.