Nazareth House Snooker League

Nottingham's Charitable Snooker League

Sadly, Nazareth House itself no longer exists. Nazareth House was an old people's home run by an order of nuns. It was situated at the corner of Priory Street and Abbey Street in Lenton. It was established in the mid/late 1800s and housed both old people and young orphans. In 2005 the home was closed down and the land was sold off for development. Everything except for the Bishop’s House has now been demolished to make way for housing.

Issue 25 of The Lenton Times contains some interesting information about the history of Nazareth House and Lenton Priory.


The Bishop's House


Clary Plowman's first league match?
Long before Nazareth House was established, the site was occupied by Lenton Priory. Lenton priory was the most important religious house in medieval Nottinghamshire and one of the wealthiest in the Midlands. For some four hundred years it clearly dominated life in Lenton but following its dissolution in 1538 its spiritual impact ceased and its physical dominance began to diminish as parts of the buildings suffered demolition. Thereafter the Priory ruins were treated as a local quarry by all and sundry and almost everything above ground level was eventually removed. With the passing of the years and the erection of new buildings on the site, people even became uncertain as to quite where the Priory buildings had been situated. Sufficient of the priory's foundations have since been uncovered in excavations to make it fairly clear how the buildings were positioned and also provide clues as to what the Priory must have looked like.

Lenton Priory

Nazareth House Snooker League was founded in 1940 by Harry Turrill of Lenton Conservative Club.  Harry got together with a few other clubs in the area and created the snooker league.  The league's main purpose was to raise money from players' subscriptions to donate to the Nuns at nearby Nazareth House.  The grateful Nuns used the donations to purchase potatoes in order to feed the young orphans during the war years.  As the popularity of the league grew, more and more teams joined and the league was able to donate enough money each year to allow the children to go away on day trips and even week long holidays.  The money was also used to buy Christmas goodies for the elderly residents of Nazareth House.  Over the years, many different organisations have benefitted from the generosity of the snooker league and hopefully many more will benefit for years to come.

The original league trophy was presented to the first winners of the league by Dr O'Byrne back in 1941 and the same trophy is still played for today.  Many different teams have won the trophy over the years but without doubt the most successful team in recent years is Arnold Civil Defence who, with Tony Hart in their ranks, are consistently challenging for top spot.


The two images here are from a postcard sent from Scarborough on 25 August 1978 where the Nazareth House Children were enjoying a holiday paid for by a donation from the snooker league.