Pentland Hick

Edwin Pentland Hick, b. 21 July 1919, is a British entrepreneur, author, publisher, and veteran of World War 2. Hick is today best known for founding the Flamingo Land Theme Park and Zoo in North Yorkshire [ [http://www.flamingolandforce.co.uk/xtra/history/ History of the Flamingo, accessed December 18, 2007] ] [ [http://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/features/The-third-man-on-the.1856457.jp John Thorpe, Yorkshire Evening Post, 2 November 2006, Accessed December 18, 2007] ] .

Military service

Hick served with the 8th army as a sergeant in the Royal Army Medical Corps from 1939 to 1945.

Pentland Hick Cinemas

After World War II, he left the army and returned to his hometown of Scarborough, North Yorkshire, where he was given shares in the failing Aberdeen Walk Picture House when his father, a solicitor, was able to arrange for a client to grant a mortgage for it.

He renamed the cinema "The Gaiety" and turned it around financially. He built the business into Pentland Hick Cinemas [ [http://www.kingsdr.demon.co.uk/cinemas/lmwyke.htm Bradford - Low Moor and Wyke Cinema History, Colin Sutton, 2004. Accessed December 18, 2007] ] , a chain of seven cinemas including the "Wyke Star" [ [http://www.merciacinema.org/gaz%20A-C.htm Mercia Cinema Society's History of Cinemas and Music Halls, accessed 4 December, 2007] ] .

The Aberdeen Picture House is now a furniture store, with the original name still visible in stone relief along the front. [ [http://www.filmscarborough.com/content/view/13/28/ Film Scarborough info on venues, accessed December 19, 2007] ]

Playwright

During the 1950s, Hick was also writing -- Samuel French published two of his one-act plays, "The Singing Maid", and "The Emperor Godiva". He was friends with Harry Corbett and contributed scripting and promotion to Sooty, at one point bringing Sooty to the stage at the Adelphi Theatre in London, and the "Floral Hall" in Scarborough, North Yorkshire.

Zoo and Theme Park

In 1959 Hick sold the cinema chain and bought a bankrupt country club on nine acres of land in the Ryedale district and named it the "Yorkshire Zoological Gardens". He originally rented animals until receipts allowed him to buy more. The park housed not only pink flamingos, but the UK's first captive bottlenose dolphins in 1963 [ [http://www.iridescent-publishing.com/rtm/ch5p2.htm The Rose-Tinted Menagerie, by William Johnson, online edition, accessed Dec. 4, 2007] ] and later a whale. One of the dolphins was named "Sooty" after Corbett's creation.

The park grew to incorporate a fun fair and amusement rides, one of the first zoos in Europe to do so. Hick floated the park on the London Stock Exchange in 1965 as Associated Pleasure Parks, and renamed the park "Yorkshire Zoo". Associated Pleasure Parks was then taken over by a larger company (Scotia Leisure) which shortly afterward collapsed in an embezzlement scandal, leaving Hick broke. The park was eventually to come full circle and is now, at 375 acres, once again Flamingo Land Theme Park and Zoo.

Now without capital, Hick tried many activities without notable success, until he went full-time into writing, including theatre and television scriptwriting.

Publisher

In 1992, Hick founded a BDSM publishing house, Silver Moon Books, which has since become the leading British publisher of BDSM erotic fiction. Hick edited the first 50 titles, then sold "Silver Moon" in 1999 to the current owner, UK publisher "Shadowline Publishing".

In 1999 Hick originated the hardcore online e-book publishers "Bdsmbooks.com", "xxxx-ebooks.com", and German imprint "bdsm-buchladen.com", sold in February 2008.

He now owns the paperback imprint Bondage Books.

Bibliography

* [ASIN B0000CHKBT] (1950) The Wasp Without Wings (no ISBN)
* [ASIN B0000CIGU4] (1953) The Singing Maid, A romantic comedy in Chinese the Manner (sic!) (no ISBN)
* ISBN 978-0573022487 The Singing Maid, acting edition
* [ASIN B0000CJS43] (1957) The Emperor Godiva: A play in one act (with apologies to Hans Andersen) (no ISBN)
* ISBN 978-0573052064 The Emperor Godiva: acting edition

External links

* [http://www.flamingoland.co.uk/ Flamingo Land Theme Park and Zoo official site]
* [http://www.flamingolandforce.co.uk/xtra/history/ History and Discussion about Flamingo Land]
* [http://www.silvermoon.co.uk/ Silver Moon Publishing]
* [http://www.bdsmbooks.com/ BDSMBooks Electronic publishers]

References