A Boy’s Fight To Save J.R.R. Tolkien Hotel

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oi-Staff

By Staff

Wednesday, July 8, 2009, 15:06

It all started when the developers of The Three Cups Hotel in , Dorset left the building in a derelict state. They found that the hotel is no more beneficial and planned to convert it into flats. But, a 10-year-old Brit boy named Leon Howe had something passionate to that place and he decided to fight against the conversion.

The noted English writer J.R.R. Tolkien wrote a part of 'The Lord of the Rings' in this seaside hotel. Leon Howe discovered that a part of his favourite book had been written there and the hotel is under threat. Then he started a campaign to save a seaside hotel in full vigor.

The boy turned the campaign into a school project, and, on June 20, staged a protest march through the town, collecting 1,000 signatures on the way. Howe and other local residents want West Dorset District Council compulsorily to purchase the hotel from Palmer's Brewery, and sell it to someone who will restore it to its former glory. He also attended a recent public meeting to discuss the hotel and sat at the front.

His mother Rikey, 41, owns a teddy bear shop directly opposite the hotel. She revealed that her son was very excited to discover that Tolkien had stayed there.

The Georgian hotel had many illustrious guests before it closed 20 years ago, including Jane Austin, Alfred Tennyson and Dwight D. Eisenhower, the US military commander who led the D-Day landings. It also featured in the film 'The French Lieutenant's Woman', starring Jeremy Irons, who is also backing the campaign.