War, cinema and change

Three brothers go to war

When war broke out in 1914, all three of William Ernest Willson's sons, who had been learning the trade in the works, joined up at once.

• Herbert, the eldest, joined the Leicestershire Regiment. Private William Ernest Herbert Willson was killed on 27 April 1917, aged 24, and is buried at St Patrick's Cemetery, Loos, in northern France.
• Leon was commissioned as an officer in the Leicestershire Regiment in December 1916 and was awarded the Military Cross for gallantry.
• George served in the Royal Navy.

At home the works lost almost all its young men. Large posters were restricted to four sheets, and orders fell. Older printers, many of them from newspapers, filled the gaps, and the firm kept printing for its regular customers every week. Early in 1916 William Ernest handed the day-to-day running of the works to Joseph Tebbutt. The news of Herbert's death was a terrible blow to his father and to everyone in the works.

Printing for the picture palaces

After the war George returned to Leicester and Leon to Nottingham. William Ernest died of a serious illness not long afterwards, and with the founder now largely retired, the two brothers took charge: George in Leicester and Leon in Nottingham. When their grandfather died at a ripe old age, they became the principals of Willsons, Leicester and Nottingham.

Cinema became the nation's favourite night out, and the printing changed with it. Hanging cards replaced daybills, monthly cinema programmes came off the presses, and a hand-lettering department was set up for short runs. New Linotype and Ludlow typesetting machines arrived, and the firm printed vast numbers of roll tickets.

Under the name Willsons Show Printers, the Leicester works also produced colourful stock posters for circuses and funfairs, full of clowns, acrobats, ghost trains and dodgems. Collectors still look for them today, and a Willsons pantomime poster from about 1926 is in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum.

A second war

In September 1939, with the blackout, gas masks and fears of bombing, trade almost stopped for a few weeks. But cinemas, dance halls and concert halls stayed open, so Willsons carried on. Men aged 18 to 40 were called up, large posters were banned and many billboards were taken down. The largest poster allowed was 30 by 40 inches. A small staff working overtime kept most customers supplied.

When the war ended the men came home and the work built up again, with smaller posters, hanging cards and more and more commercial printing. In 1946, shortly before Joseph Tebbutt retired after 58 years, the fourth generation of the family began to join the firm.

Leon Willson in public life

In Nottingham, Leon Willson served as Sheriff of Nottingham in 1949–50 and as Lord Mayor in 1952–53, the year of the Coronation. In 1956 he was made an MBE.

The end of the giant poster

In the 1950s new laws removed many billboards, and television drew audiences away from the cinema. The big letterpress poster's day was over, and Willsons had to change course.

In the early 1960s the business divided into two separate companies. Willsons Printers Leicester carried on with poster printing. Willsons Printers (Nottingham) Ltd, run by Leon's side of the family, moved into commercial printing, bought other print firms and opened sites in Newark and Grimsby. In the early 1980s production moved from Nottingham to Newark, where the business is based today.