In July 1890, Oscar Wilde called at the Whitefriars Club’s rooms at Anderton’s Hotel and had a long talk about Dorian Gray with Friar Sidney Low, then editor of the St James’s Gazette.
Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953) is a prolific Franco-English writer and historian, and the author of the immensely popular collection of humorous poems, Cautionary Tales for Children.
Hilaire Belloc spoke at the Whitefriars on 20th March 1903 on the subject of ‘Is the French Novel a True Representation of French Life?’ He also attended as a guest on 3rd October 1902, 1st May 1903, 30th April 1909. He was due to speak again at the club on 10th November 1922, but owing to having entered the dinner on the wrong date in his diary, he did not appear, and his place was taken by Friar George Whale.