Hollyfields Recreation Ground

[oldMohawk]

Following Pedrocut's comments the only cricket ground pavilion I could find is this one off Woodacre Rd. This 1945 view shows a cricket ground. If you look on Google Earth today, a much extended pavilion is there but football has replaced cricket. I'm not too sure because the wooden balcony is not on the extended building ...

 

[Pedrocut]

Following Pedrocut's comments the only cricket ground pavilion I could find is this one off Woodacre Rd. This 1945 view shows a cricket ground. If you look on Google Earth today, a much extended pavilion is there but football has replaced cricket. I'm not too sure because the wooden balcony is not on the extended building ...
View attachment 114901

That's the one!

 

[oldMohawk]

That's the one!

The only problem is there are possibly houses on the left of Chris's photo and these would have to be in Woodcote Rd but they look closer in the photo. Half of the field seen in 1945 has been built upon with flats and modern housing.

 

[ChrisM]

This is the best I can do with the houses in the background.

Chris

 

[Pedrocut]

Searching for Woodacre Road on the forum comes up with a post 128 under the Royal Warks Regiment...

John Thomas Billiard of the 1/8th Royal Warwicks is remembered on the Birmingham Gas Board Department War Memorial. The memorial is located on the Bowling Green of the Hollyfield Social Club Woodacre Road Erdington Birmingham. The staff there will I am sure be pleased to let you in to see it. He is also remembered in The Birmingham Roll of Honour and the Hall of Memory in Broad Street Birmingham. (2014)

 

[oldMohawk]

View attachment 114902
This is the best I can do with the houses in the background.
Chris

One thing I have just realised is that the men sitting in the group are at an angle to the pavilion so the possible houses in the photo are in the direction of Paget Rd. Looking at 1945 pics and todays pics whole blocks of houses have been demolished and new ones built. Maybe they were ones which had to be demolished because of structural problems. If it is the field then it is not far from Grange Rd.

 

[Pedrocut]

1945

 

[oldMohawk]

A possible line of sight to the houses.

The much changed 'pavilion' today, the only common feature is the central peak.

 

[ChrisM]

Many thanks for all the thoughts and information. Greatly appreciated. Everything ties in very well and I am going to summarise it as an addition to my website page as follows (with appropriate acknowledgements, of course):

The Company are grouped outside a large sports pavilion. This is a pavilion overlooking a sports field situated off Woodacre Road in Erdington. To the extreme left, very indistinctly, are the rear of houses in Westmead Crescent. If these men glance to their half-right they will be looking across a large expanse of playing fields which stretches right up to Grange Road. At the far end of that expanse a few of the men are to be seen, on another occasion, practising with a spigot mortar (see image below). This area, and perhaps the splendid building itself, are thought to have been the HP Sauce company's recreational grounds at that time. The pavilion still existed in 2017, in a much modified and extended form, and was the home of Hollyfields Sports and Conference Centre.

Chris

 

[oldMohawk]

Hi Chris, in the first pic in #688 someone on bfa put a pin on the lower field in the pic stating 'Holly lane (Delta) sports ground'. You can see it if you log into bfa.
oldmohawk

 

[Pedrocut]

Hi Chris, in the first pic in #688 someone on bfa put a pin on the lower field in the pic stating 'Holly lane (Delta) sports ground'. You can see it if you log into bfa.
oldmohawk

That's interesting as it has stired my memory. I think in the 60s there were two adjoining playing fields and I remember one was referred to as belonging to "the Delta". However I think the one closest to the pavilion (called by many as Holyfields and the "Gas Club,") belonged to what may then have been known as West Midland's Gas.

 

[oldMohawk]

That's interesting as it has stired my memory. I think in the 60s there were two adjoining playing fields and I remember one was referred to as belonging to "the Delta". However I think the one closest to the pavilion (called by many as Holyfields and the "Gas Club,") belonged to what may then have been known as West Midland's Gas.

I've seen references to the Gas Club and wondered what it meant. The field between the Grange Rd field and the 'Gas Club Field' had the 'Holly lane (Delta) sports ground' location pin placed on it by a well known member of the BHF (Erdington resident) so it must be correct ...

 

[ChrisM]

Looking at an A-Z, it seems to me that a surviving sports ground at Holly Lane, which has been mentioned elsewhere in this Forum as being the Delta Metal Co. ground in the 1960s (https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/forum/index.php?threads/delta-metal-dartmouth-street.28464/), is a wholly separate facility to the one we are discussing located between Woodacre and Grange Roads.

Also the "Gas" connection is interesting. The Gas Boards came in after the war. At the time of the Home Guard image the responsibility for gas generation and supplies was that of the Gas Dept. of the Council. That suggests to me that the fancy pavilion is likely to have been put up by someone else (but perhaps taken over by W. Midlands Gas later).

Chris

 

[Pedrocut]

1944

 

[Pedrocut]

I may be wrong, but I seem to remember the sign for the Delta Sports Ground was on Holly Lane, but the Gas Club entrance was in Woodacre Road.

 

[Pedrocut]

Woodacre Road did not exist in 1913, but appears on the 1938 with a building at the site of the "Club".

I can find a reference... "1939 the Birmingham Gas Dept Rec and Social Society's 12th annual sports drew crowd of 3,00 to Hollyfields, Erdington."

It could be that Birmingham Gas obtained the land around 1927?

Delta Metal Ground, Holly Lane is mentioned on a couple of occasions and the earliest being 1944.

 

[ChrisM]

Thanks, Pedrocut. Pardon my ignorance, but, just to be sure, does "Hollyfields" describe the area adjacent to Holly Lane, to the north-east of it, which includes the Grange Road - Woodacre Road stretch of playing field we are talking about?

It certainly looks as though the Gas Dept. had quite an extensive and well-equipped recreational area in that case. (Off-topic - but it makes one wonder if this was replicated elsewhere for all the other City utilities - electricity, water, transport etc., etc. Those were the days!)

Chris

 

[Pedrocut]

Holllyfields seems only to be mentioned in connection with the playing fields and the pavilion. Maybe named by the first users as it was adjacent to Holly Lane.

 

[ChrisM]

Thanks again, Pedrocut, and to oldMohawk and everyone else. It sounds very much as though the image was taken on premises at that time belonging to the Gas Department and I intend to add this and the other thoughts to my record of the activities of these blokes between 1940 and 1944.

(None of it REALLY matters, does it, in the grand scheme of things, but how interesting it is to resolve some of these little mysteries!!)

Chris

 

[Pedrocut]

Thanks again, Pedrocut, and to oldMohawk and everyone else. It sounds very much as though the image was taken on premises at that time belonging to the Gas Department and I intend to add this and the other thoughts to my record of the activities of these blokes between 1940 and 1944.

(None of it REALLY matters, does it, in the grand scheme of things, but how interesting it is to resolve some of these little mysteries!!)

Chris

Sometimes the little things can lead to extraordinary unknown information, perhaps serendipity?

A couple of years ago I had an interest in Parkfield Colliery in Wolverhampton, and went to see a fossil exhibition at Bantock House which included some fossils that were found at Parkfield. On the board explaining the exhibition I noticed reference to the "Coseley Spider". This led to the discovery that the "spider" did not come from Coseley at all...

https://brownhillsbob.com/2015/08/26/arachnofoolya/

 

[oldMohawk]

Thanks again, Pedrocut, and to oldMohawk and everyone else. It sounds very much as though the image was taken on premises at that time belonging to the Gas Department and I intend to add this and the other thoughts to my record of the activities of these blokes between 1940 and 1944.

(None of it REALLY matters, does it, in the grand scheme of things, but how interesting it is to resolve some of these little mysteries!!)

Chris

Thanks Chris for the interesting photos and information leading to thoughts about those far off days when things did not look good for Britain.
It seems that the Home Guard Unit responsible for defending the Erdington area were probably formed in the summer of 1940 which was about the time when every household received a leaflet entitled 'If The Invader Comes' as shown below.

The group shown in the photo in post#703 were sitting not far from Paget Rd which was bombed on 26 Aug 1940 and again in a very intense city-wide raid on 19 Nov 1940. Bomb damage in Paget Rd can be seen (3rd pic) in a post here
https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/for...unidentified-streets.45254/page-5#post-550907
More information can be seen in a post here
https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/for...unidentified-streets.45254/page-5#post-550991

 

[Pedrocut]

Thanks Chris for the interesting photos and information leading to thoughts about those far off days when things did not look good for Britain.
It seems that the Home Guard Unit responsible for defending the Erdington area were probably formed in the summer of 1940 which was about the time when every household received a leaflet entitled 'If The Invader Comes' as shown below.
View attachment 114985
The group shown in the photo in post#703 were sitting not far from Paget Rd which was bombed on 26 Aug 1940 and again in a very intense city-wide raid on 19 Nov 1940. Bomb damage in Paget Rd can be seen (3rd pic) in a post here
https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/for...unidentified-streets.45254/page-5#post-550907
More information can be seen in a post here
https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/for...unidentified-streets.45254/page-5#post-550991

Reminds me of discovering.... If War Should Come by Public Service Broadcasting.