The Underground Map

The Underground Map is a project which is creating street histories for the areas of London and surrounding counties lying inside the M25.

In a series of maps from the 1750s until the 1950s, you can see how London grew from a city which only reached as far as Park Lane into the post war megapolis we know today. There are now over 85 000 articles on all variety of locations including roads, houses, schools, pubs and palaces.

You can begin exploring by choosing a place from the dropdown list at the top.

As maps are displayed, click on the markers to view location articles.

Latest on The Underground Map...

Yiewsley

Yiewsley is a large suburban village in the London Borough of Hillingdon. Yiewsley’s transition from an agrarian community began when the Grand Junction Canal was opened. Construction started in May 1793 and connected the area to the Thames at Brentford, passing through Yiewsley on its way north following the River Colne. An aqueduct was built at Cowley Lock to cross the Fray’s River. In 1794, the canal opened between the Thames and Uxbridge, and in 1795, the aqueduct over the Fray’s River was likely completed.

The following year, in 1796, Colham Wharf, Yiewsley’s first dock, was established near Colham Bridge. In 1801, the Paddington Arm of the canal opened, connecting the area to national trade routes.

The canal played a vital role in transporting Cowley stock bricks, which were made from the abundant brick-earth in Yiewsley. The bricks were transported mainly along the Grand Junction Canal and the Regent’s Canal to supply the demand for building materials in Victorian London.

By t...

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NOVEMBER

2023

South Harrow
South Harrow originally spread south and west from the hamlet of Roxeth as a result of easier access from Central London by rail In the 1890s, the Metropolitan District Railway, which later became the District Line but was operating as an independent company at the time, recognised the inadequate service to Uxbridge and Harrow. To address this, they proposed the construction of a railway line towards both towns, and this led to the formation of the Ealing & South Harrow Railway. The railway line was intended to extend to South Harrow, which was then a rural area located to the south of Roxeth.

Construction of the railway line was completed by 1899, but the District Line faced financial difficulties that delayed its opening until 1903. Consequently, South Harrow became the terminus of a line extending from Park Royal & Twyford Abbey. The location around Northolt Road subsequently developed into South Harrow’s own commercial and residential hub.

The original station building was approximately 170 metres south of the present-day station. This extension marked a significant miles...
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SEPTEMBER

2023

Great Portland Street
Great Portland Street is a London Underground station near Regent’s Park Great Portland Street station was opened on 10 January 1863 as Portland Road, renamed Great Portland Street and Regents Park in 1923 and changed to its present name on 1 March 1917.

The station’s present structure, constructed in 1930, is situated on a traffic island at the intersection of Marylebone Road, Great Portland Street and Albany Street. This building features a steel-framed design with a cream terracotta exterior. The station’s perimeter also houses shops and, in the past, included a car showroom with office spaces above it. Notably, Great Portland Street was a significant sales location for the motor industry. The station’s architectural design, credited to C.W. Fowler, earned it a Grade II listing in January 1987.

The area around Great Portland Street station offers various points of interest. Regent’s Park and the iconic BT Tower are nearby attractions. Additionally, the station’s proximity to Regen...
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SEPTEMBER

2023

Courtfield Gardens, SW5
Courtfield Gardens is named after the field beneath it, cultivated until the 19th century According to 16th-century records, Courtfield Gardens was built on a vast open meadow known as Great Courtfield. This meadow was surrounded by fertile land and small farms and was part of a large area of land that extended from Cromwell Road to The Old Brompton Road in one direction, and from Gloucester Road to Earl’s Court Road in the other direction. Great Courtfield was included in the Earl’s Court ’manor’.

During the 18th century, Earl’s Court House, a grand manor house, was constructed on the land that is now the western terrace of Barkston Gardens. This building replaced an extensive dwelling that was described in 1705 as having fountains, a marble-tiled dairy, engines for water, and impressive gates at its entrance.

In the 19th century, the area surrounding Courtfield Gardens was developed with rows of terraced houses, as the demand for housing in London grew. Earl’s Court House was demolished in the middle of th...
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JUNE

2023

Alba Place, W11
Alba Place is part of the Colville Conservation Area Originally the stable house accommodation for the main houses on Lancaster Road, the primary purpose of the Mews properties is now residential.

Alba Place is located on the site of an original Mews but has been redeveloped to a degree that it no longer contains any surviving Mews properties. It is a gated cul-de-sac off Portobello Road in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, almost opposite Hayden’s Place (another redeveloped Mews). It contains 16 properties used for residential purposes.

Alba Place was Albion Place until 1937, one of the many patriotic names dating from the period immediately following the Crimean War.
»read full article

LATEST LONDON-WIDE CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PROJECT

Eileen Brecknock Road, N7 Added: 10 Nov 2023 09:42 GMT	Brecknock Road Pleating Company My great grandparents ran the Brecknock Road pleating Company around 1910 to 1920 and my Grandmother worked there as a pleater until she was 16. I should like to know more about this. I know they had a beautiful Victorian house in Islington as I have photos of it & of them in their garden. Source: Family history Reply
Squirrel’s Lane, IG9 Added: 6 Nov 2023 16:59 GMT	061123 Why do Thames Water not collect the 15 . Three meter lengths of blue plastic fencing, and old pipes etc. They left here for the last TWO Years, these cause an obstruction,as they halfway lying in the road,as no footpath down this road, and the cars going and exiting the park are getting damaged, also the public are in Grave Danger when trying to avoid your rubbish and the danger of your fences. Source: Squirrels Lane. Buckhurst Hill, Essex. IG9. I want some action ,now, not Excuses.MK. Reply
Christian Cornwall Road, W11 Added: 31 Oct 2023 10:34 GMT	Cornwall Road, W11 Photo shows William Richard Hoare’s chemist shop at 121 Cornwall Road. Reply
Vik Oaks Road, TW6 Added: 30 Oct 2023 18:48 GMT	Old pub sign from the Rising Sun Hi I have no connection to the area except that for the last 30+ years we’ve had an old pub sign hanging on our kitchen wall from the Rising Sun, Stanwell, which I believe was / is on the Oaks Rd. Happy to upload a photo if anyone can tell me how or where to do that! Reply
Phillip Martin Ashburnham Place, SE10 Added: 16 Oct 2023 06:25 GMT	16 Ashburnham Road On 15 October 1874 George Frederick Martin was born in 16 Ashburnham Road Greenwich to George Henry Martin, a painter, and Mary Martin, formerly Southern. Reply
Christine Bithrey Holly Park, N4 Added: 15 Oct 2023 15:20 GMT	The Hollies (1860 - 1900) I lived in Holly Park Estate from 1969 I was 8 years old when we moved in until I left to get married, my mother still lives there now 84. I am wondering if there was ever a cemetery within The Hollies? And if so where? Was it near to the Blythwood Road end or much nearer to the old Methodist Church which is still standing although rather old looking. We spent most of our childhood playing along the old dis-used railway that run directly along Blythwood Road and opposite Holly Park Estate - top end which is where we live/ed. We now walk my mothers dog there twice a day. An elderly gentleman once told me when I was a child that there used to be a cemetery but I am not sure if he was trying to scare us children! I only thought about this recently when walking past the old Methodist Church and seeing the flag stone in the side of the wall with the inscription of when it was built late 1880 If anyone has any answers please email me [email protected] Reply
Chris hutchison Broadhurst Gardens, NW6 Added: 15 Oct 2023 03:04 GMT	35 broadhurst gardens. 35 Broadhurst gardens was owned by famous opera singer Mr Herman “Simmy”Simberg. He had transformed it into a film and recording complex. There was a film and animation studio on the ground floor. The recording facilities were on the next two floors. I arrived in London from Australia in 1966 and worked in the studio as the tea boy and trainee recording engineer from Christmas 1966 for one year. The facility was leased by an American advertising company called Moreno Films. Mr Simbergs company Vox Humana used the studio for their own projects as well. I worked for both of them. I was so lucky. The manager was another wonderful gentleman called Jack Price who went on to create numerous songs for many famous singers of the day and also assisted the careers of Bob Marley and Jimmy Cliff. “Simmy” let me live in the bedsit,upper right hand window. Jack was also busy with projects with The Troggs,Bill Wyman,Peter Frampton. We did some great sessions with Manfred Mann and Alan Price. The Cream did some demos but that was before my time. We did lots of voice over work. Warren Mitchell and Ronnie Corbett were favourites. I went back in 1978 and “Simmy “ had removed all of the studio and it was now his home. His lounge room was still our studio in my minds eye!! Reply
Sue L Battersea Added: 13 Oct 2023 17:21 GMT	Duffield Street, Battersea I’ve been looking for ages for a photo of Duffield Street without any luck. My mother and grandfather lived there during the war. It was the first property he was able to buy but sadly after only a few months they were bombed out. My mother told the story that one night they were aware of a train stopping above them in the embankment. It was full of soldiers who threw out cigarettes and sweets at about four in the morning. They were returning from Dunkirk though of course my mother had no idea at the time. I have heard the same story from a different source too. Reply

Click here to explore another London street
We now have 628 completed street histories and 46872 partial histories

MARCH

2017

Little Paternoster Row
Little Paternoster Row was once known as French Alley. Little Paternoster Row was a narrow alleyway that ran from Brushfield Street to Dorset Street, emerging between Nos.35 (Crossingham’s Lodging House) and 36 Dorset Street. Access to Little Paternoster Row from Brushfield Street was through a covered archway next to the Oxford Arms public house at No.62.

In 1888, the west side of Little Paternoster Row was lined with a row of tenements, while Crossingham’s occupied the east side. The area of Little Paternoster Row was classified as "black" in Charles Booth’s 1898 map of London Poverty, indicating its association with vicious and semi-criminal activities. Descriptions in the surveyor’s original notebook portray a scene of poverty and destitution, with ragged women and children, worn-out boots with holes, dirty and patched windows using brown paper, and the presence of prostitutes, thieves, and criminals. The buildings themselves were owned by Jack McCarthy, a notorious figure from Dorset Street.
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MARCH

2017

Breezer’s Hill, E1W
Breezer’s Hill is a short, narrow hill running between The Highway and Pennington Street. Breezer’s Hill had Gooch & Cousens wool warehouses lining its west side. On the east side, there were several small dwellings numbered 1 to 5. The street was also home to two pubs: "The White Bear" located at 1 St. George Street on the northeast corner, and "The Red Lion" situated at 60 Pennington Street on the southeast corner.

As for Breezer’s Hill, it still exists today and is characterised by warehouses on both sides. The hill has retained its presence and serves as a reminder of the historical context of the area.
»read full article

MARCH

2017

29 Aldgate High Street
29 Aldgate High Street is a demolished property, originally on the north side of Aldgate High Street.. These were premises in front of which Catherine Eddowes was found drunk by PC Louis Robinson.

According to PC Robinson’s inquest testimony, he was on duty in Aldgate High Street at 8.30pm, 29 September 1888 when he saw a crowd outside No.29 - he found Eddowes lying on the pavement. He picked her up and carried her to the side by some shutters and she fell sideways. He got assistance from PC George Simmons and they took her to Bishopsgate Police Station.

Officially, there was no 29 Aldgate High Street in 1888 and it does not appear in any census returns from 1871 to 1901; the numbering, though consecutive on that side, goes from 28 to 30. Research conducted by the late Adrian Phypers in 2001 managed to shed some light on the mystery:

In the late 1860s numbers 28 and 29 were both used by a wine importer. In about 1870 he sold up and the properties were taken on by a Henry Phillips, furniture warehouseman. A year or two later his Kell...
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MARCH
30
2017

St James’s Passage, EC3N
St James’s Passage was formerly known as Church Passage. Church Passage, formerly known as Dark Entry, was a narrow passage that led from Duke Street (now Duke’s Place) to Mitre Square. It gained its earlier name due to its dimly lit nature. The passage started at a width of 18 feet at its entrance in Mitre Square but quickly narrowed to just 5 feet within a short distance.

At the entrance of Church Passage to Mitre Square, there was a wall-mounted gas lamp.

On 1 July 1939, the passage was renamed St James’s Passage. After the Second World War, a footbridge was added between the Kearley & Tonge warehouse on the north side of the passage and the warehouse opposite it. Around 1974, the passage underwent significant widening following the demolition of surrounding buildings.
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MARCH
30
2017

Fashion Street, E1
Fashion Street is a thoroughfare running east-west from Brick Lane to Commercial Street. Fashion Street marks the northern boundary of the original Fossan Estate, owned by brothers Thomas and Lewis Fossan. The southern side was laid out c.1655 and it was originally known as Fossan Street, which was later corrupted to Fashion. The northern side was built by trustees of the Wheler estate in about 1669. White’s Row was at one time depicted as a natural continuation of the street and was known as New Fashion Street in the 17th century.

By the late-Victorian era, Fashion Street had fallen into decline alongside other streets on the estate and was considered part of the area’s worst slums, especially the south side which was connected to notorious Flower and Dean Street by a number of squalid courts and passages. There were also pubs at each end of the street; the Queen’s Head on the northern corner with Commercial Street, the ’George and Guy’ on the northern corner with Brick Lane and the ’Three Cranes’ opposite - none o...
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MARCH
30
2017

Chamber Street, E1
Chamber Street is a thoroughfare running east-west from Leman Street to Mansell Street. Chamber Street’s north side originally housed buildings of the London Infirmary until 1757 when it relocated to Whitechapel Road and became the London Hospital.

Over time, Chamber Street has undergone extensive rebuilding. It currently features the Aldgate East Travelodge, which is situated over Abel’s Buildings, as well as the English Martyrs’ Club. On the south side of the street, most of the railway arches have been converted into garages and private lock-ups.
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MARCH
29
2017

Holles Street, W1C
Holles Street runs north from Oxford Street, on the east side of the John Lewis store. John Holles, Duke of Newcastle, who bought much of the land of the area. In 1711 that land passed to his daughter Henrietta Cavendish Holles who later married Edward Harley, second Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer. This meant that Henrietta Harley held the titles of Countess of Oxford and Countess Mortimer. As a family they were hardly ‘shrinking violets’ because, if you look at the surrounding land, the name of every family member is perpetrated by the streets and squares nearby.

The street was one of those laid out around 1729 when the area north of Oxford Street was urbanised on a grid pattern.

Once the location of small shops and houses, the street is now almost entirely taken up the John Lewis department store on the western side and the former British Home Stores department store (1962-63) and other commercial units on the east, both of which have their main entrances on Oxford Street. The John Lewis store was started in 1936 but damaged by bom...
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MARCH
29
2017

48 Belgrave Square
48 Belgrave Square was occupied for the same family for 170 years. The house was bought in 1840 by Col. Christopher Hamilton MP from the Grosvenor Estate and was the Hamilton family's main London house, the house eventually passed to his granddaughter Sarah Winter in 1890 who continued to live there until her death in 1945. During Mrs Sarah Winter's ownership the house, under the name Hamilton House was the setting for some of London's biggest social events, the annual Hamilton House Christmas Ball was a key feature in the London social calendar. The house was also linked to huge controversy in the run up to the Second World War, Mrs Winter, a known Nazi supporter, used the house as a way of raising money for the Anglo-German Fellowship.

The house was not retained after the war instead being rented out, the family retained a flat in the service part of the house.

It currently serves as the residence of the Mexican Ambassador to the United Kingdom.
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MARCH
28
2017

St Mary’s Harrow Road
St Mary’s Harrow Road was built as the infirmary for the Paddington Workhouse. In 1847 a new workhouse was built by the Paddington Guardians to house its poor, as the neighbouring Kensington workhouse, which had been used until then, had become too crowded.

The Paddington workhouse was located on the north bank of the Grand Union Canal, to the south of Harrow Road. In 1868 its sick wards were extended and new offices and a dispensary also added.

In 1883 work began on a separate infirmary building, which was sited between the workhouse and the adjacent Lock Hospital. It would cost £1,100 and contain six wards, including a lying-in ward and a lunatic observation ward, as well as a dispensary. A midwife was engaged and a Relieving Officer for the dispensary, but the contractors went bankrupt and the infirmary was not completed until 1885.

The Paddington Infirmary opened in 1886. It was a long 4-storey building with a basement, and lay on a north-south axis. It contained 284 beds, although some sick beds remained i...
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MARCH
28
2017

The Paddington Green Children’s Hospital opened in August 1883. In 1862 Drs Eustace Smith and T.C. Kirby established the North West London Free Dispensary for Sick Children at 12 Bell Street, Edgware Road, as a charity for children of the poor. The Dispensary provided medical treatment for any child without notice or recommendation.

The premises at Bell Street soon became too small and, in the early 1880s, £7,000 was raised to buy two houses in Church Street on the northeast corner of Paddington Green. These were converted into a hospital.

The Paddington Green Children’s Hospital opened in August 1883. In 1888 an iron hut was built in the grounds to serve as an Out-Patients Department and waiting room.

By 1892 the Hospital had 27 beds for boys up to the age of 12 years and girls up to the age of 14. In 1893 a serious outbreak of diphtheria, the source of which could not be traced, caused the Hospital to close and the main buildings to be demolished. It was then discovered that two old cesspit...
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MARCH
28
2017

Princess Louise Hospital
The Princess Louise Hospital for Children was opened by King George V and Queen Mary in 1928. It had 42 beds, an Out-Patients Department and Dispensary for Sick Women. The origins of this Hospital lay in the Kensington Dispensary, which opened in 1815 at 13 Holland Street. By 1845 the premises were becoming too small for the increasing number of patients and, in 1849, the Dispensary moved to 49 Church Street, where it remained for the next 75 years

The proportion of children attending the Dispensary had steadily increased and the Medical Board decided what was really needed was a Children’s Hospital. In 1924 Queen Victoria’s daughter, Princess Louise, who was President of the Kensington Dispensary, held a conference about this in her home in Kensington Palace. During this meeting it was decided that the Dispensary should move to North Kensington as the Church Street site was at least two miles away from its neediest patients.

A site on the War Memorial playing field was purchased in 1925 and the foundation stone laid a year later by the Princess. The new road of Pangbourne Avenue was created to serve it.»more

MARCH
28
2017

St Mary’s Hospital, London
St Mary’s Hospital is a hospital in Paddington, founded in 1845. St Mary’s Hospital first opened its doors to patients in 1851, the last of the great voluntary hospitals to be founded.

With the shift towards community healthcare delivered in the early 20th century, partly due to the social medicine revolution, pressure on bed occupancy relaxed, and with the formation of the National Health Service in the 1940s, many of the local hospitals of the St Mary’s teaching hospital group eventually closed and relocated services to the Paddington basin site.

The hospital site incorporates the private Lindo wing where several celebrity and royal births have occurred. The wing is named after Frank Charles Lindo, a businessman and board-member of the hospital, who donated £111,500 before his death in 1938.

The laboratory where Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin has been restored to its cramped condition of 1928 and incorporated into a museum about the discovery and his life and work.
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MARCH
28
2017

Albert Dock Seamen’s Hospital
The Albert Dock Seamen’s Hospital was a hospital provided by the Seamen’s Hospital Society for the care of ex-members of the Merchant navy, the fishing fleets and their dependents. It was opened in 1890 as a branch of the Dreadnought Seamen’s Hospital, Greenwich. The London School of Tropical Medicine was established here in October 1899, by Sir Patrick Manson with assistance from the British Secretary of State for the Colonies (Joseph Chamberlain). Together with the Hospital for Tropical Diseases they moved to Euston in February 1920.

The Hospital was relocated to a new site on nearby Alnwick Road (east of Felsted Road) in 1937-1938 and became part of Newham Health District under the City and East London Area Health Authority (Teaching) in 1974 and was converted from acute to orthopaedic use. It came under the direct control of Newham Health Authority in 1981 and subsequently became a homeward bound mental handicap unit which closed in 1993.

The hospital buildings were demolished in 1993 except for one range which retains its 1930s brown brick elevations and central rendered pediment, now converted to residential use
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MARCH
28
2017

Queen Charlotte’s and Chelsea Hospital
Queen Charlotte’s and Chelsea Hospital is one of the oldest maternity hospitals in Europe, dating from 1739, and until 1998 occupied a site in Goldhawk Road. The hospital strictly dates its foundation to 1739 when Sir Richard Manningham founded a hospital of lying-in beds in a 17-room house in Jermyn Street. This was called the General Lying in Hospital, and was the first of its kind in Britain. Some sources date the foundation to 1752, the year in which the hospital relocated from Jermyn Street to St Marylebone, and first became a teaching institution.

In 1809 Queen Charlotte, the wife of King George III, became its patron, having been persuaded by her son to become involved. A Royal Charter was incorporated in 1885 and when this was amended in 1924 the present name came into use. The hospital subsequently merged with the Chelsea Hospital for Women and is now based at the Hammersmith Hospital site in West London to which it was relocated in 1998. The hospital was originally a voluntary hospital. At different times over the years the hospital has been located in Bayswater, on Marylebone Road and at Ravenscourt Park. The Chel...
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MARCH
28
2017

Hospital of St Thomas of Acre
The Hospital of St Thomas of Acre was the medieval London headquarters of the Knights of Saint Thomas. It was founded as a church in 1227 in the parish of St Mary Colechurch, birthplace of the order’s patron saint, Saint Thomas Becket. In the 14th century and after it was the main headquarters of the military order.

In 1512, the Worshipful Company of Mercers bought from the order a site by the church on which to build their hall, and in 1514 they formally became the patron to the order.

In 1538, during the Protestant Reformation, the order was dissolved and the properties were forfeit to the crown, but were subsequently acquired by the Mercers in exchange for various payments, rents, and undertakings.
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MARCH
28
2017

Foundling Hospital
The Foundling Hospital in London was founded in 1741 by the philanthropic sea captain Thomas Coram. It was a children's home established for the education and maintenance of exposed and deserted young children. The word 'hospital' was used in a more general sense than it is today, simply indicating the institution's hospitality to those less fortunate.

The first children were admitted to the Foundling Hospital on 25 March 1741, into a temporary house located in Hatton Garden. At first, no questions were asked about child or parent, but a distinguishing token was put on each child by the parent. These were often marked coins, trinkets, pieces of cotton or ribbon, verses written on scraps of paper. Clothes, if any, were carefully recorded. One entry in the record reads, Paper on the breast, clout on the head. The applications became too numerous, and a system of balloting with red, white and black balls was adopted. Children were seldom taken after they were twelve months old.

On reception, children were sent to wet nurses in the countryside...
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MARCH
27
2017

Devonshire Hill Farm
Devonshire Hill Farm was part of the manorial land owned by the Curtis family. Formerly known as Clay Hill, in 1881, William Michael Curtis, and fellow trustees of the Curtis Settled Estates, enfranchised the Clay Hill land which was sold to the copyhold tenant, Frederick Alderton.

At the turn of the twentieth century, Devonshire Hill Farm was reached by a winding lane from White Hart Lane passing Devonshire Hill Lodge, River House and terminating at Devonshire Hill Farm, owned by the New River Company. This lane eventually become a road, Devonshire Hill Lane.

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MARCH
25
2017

Upton Farm
Upton Farm began in 1725 and was gone by 1839. The whole Bayswater district of streets, squares, terraces, and crescents sprung into existence in the course of about ten years, between 1839 and 1849.

Before Bayswater was built up, Hopwood’s Nursery Ground and the Victoria Gardens - famed for running-matches and other sporting meetings - faced the dull brick wall which effectually shut out the green glades and leafy avenues of Kensington Gardens from the view of passengers along the Bayswater Road.

Bayswater - derived from the name "Bayard’s Watering Place" - was noted of old for its springs, reservoirs, and conduits, supplying the greater part of the City of London with water. The running streams and gravelly soil were at one time highly favourable for the growth of watercress.

On a slanting grassy bank, about a hundred yards from the back of the line of houses now bearing the name of Craven Hill, stood until about 1820, an ancient stone-built conduit-house, whence the water-suppl...
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MARCH
22
2017

Uxendon Farm
Uxendon was once more important than Wembley. Uxendon, first recorded in a transaction concerning Hugh of Woxindon in 1257, was a small settlement on the western slopes of Barn Hill. The first part of the name is the same as that in the name Uxbridge and stems either from the Wixan, a 7th century Anglo-Saxon tribe, or from the Celtic for ’water’. The second part is the Old English for
hill.

Medieval Uxendon was very small, but in the 14th or 15th centuries some local people, including the Uxendon family, moved south to form another small community at Forty Green,
where the Sudbury to Kingsbury road crossed the Lidding at Forty Bridge. This settlement was known as Uxendon Forty, Wembley Forty or Preston Forty. The farm at Forty Green was at first called Pargrave’s, and later South Forty Farm.

Uxendon became a sub manor under the authority of Harrow Manor Court.

Richard Brembre, a grocer and Lord Mayor of London, lived at Uxendon. In 1388 he exec...
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MARCH
21
2017

Wyld’s Great Globe
Wyld’s Great Globe was an attraction situated in Leicester Square between 1851 and 1862. It was constructed by James Wyld (1812–1887), a distinguished mapmaker and former Member of Parliament for Bodmin.

At the centre of a purpose-built hall was a giant globe, 60 feet 4 inches in diameter. The globe was hollow and contained a staircase and elevated platforms which members of the public could climb in order to view the surface of the earth on its interior surface, which was modelled in plaster of Paris, complete with mountain ranges and rivers all to scale. Punch described the attraction as "a geographical globule which the mind can take in at one swallow." In the surrounding galleries were displays of Wyld’s maps, globes and surveying equipment.

Wyld originally proposed that the globe should be constructed at the Great Exhibition, but its size and Wyld’s desire to run it as a promotional venture precluded it from being featured inside the Crystal Palace, so Wyld negotiated with the owners of the gardens of Leicester Square, and after mu...
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MARCH
20
2017

Hampstead Town
This article first appeared in ’A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 9, Hampstead, Paddington’. The earliest settled area was probably Hampstead town, on the southern slopes of the heath, near the manor and church and on each side of the road to Hendon, later called [[19950|Hampstead High Street]]. The principal parish well, Kingswell, in the heart of the old town and probably associated with the town pond west of High Street, in which a woman drowned in 1274, gave its name to the Kingswell family (fl. 1281-1319) whose freehold property lay between High Street and the demesne on the west. Nearby was the copyhold Slyes and Popes. There was a group of medieval customary tenements in [[26490|Pond Street]], so named by 1484 after another pond which was filled in in 1835 to form South End Green. Four tenants were surnamed atte Pond on the earliest rental (1259) and other medieval tenements, those of the Aldenhams and Bertrams, were in Pond Street.

By the 15th century many of the customary tenements had passed to London merchants and gentry, some of whom began to occupy...
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MARCH
19
2017

Adair Road before redevelopment (1964)
A photo showing Adair Road’s junction with Golborne Gardens in March 1964. The shop in the image was a greengrocers by then but before the First World War had been a pub. There was still an off licence next door by the 1960s and the next building along was a cafe.
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MARCH
17
2017

Cressalls Farm
Cressalls Farm was a Boreham Wood farm on Theobald Street. The farm would have stood opposite today’s junction of Theobald Street with Gateshead Road. Anthony Road was built through what would have been the farmyard.

The farm is shown on the 1900 map. By the 1940s, the buildings there before still exist but the complex has been renamed "The Beeches". Anthony Road was built in the late 1960s.
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MARCH
17
2017

Thrift Farm (1967)
A rare view of Thrift Farm, before the creation of the "Studio Estate". This is a shot from the series "The Prisoner". This view today would have these people running across Studio Way with the camera at a point hovering above the end of Niven Close.

Thrift Farm was purchased by MGM in the late 1940s when they incorporated it into their massive backlot. The farm continued to be used with sheep grazing on the front fields of the MGM studio. It closed in 1970 when the studio closed and was subsequently demolished. The foundations can still be seen in the foliage off the path behind the Toby Carvery/Hotel
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MARCH
16
2017

Sudbury Park Farm
Sudbury Park Farm was opened by the Barham family in 1897, although its fields had been part of another farm, known as North Farm, by the mid-19th century. George Barham had founded the Express Dairy Company in the 1860s, to bring fresh milk to London from the country by train. Around 1880, the family moved into Crabs House (now part of the Barham Park buildings) on the Harrow Road, and bought the mansion in whose grounds it stood in 1895, renaming it Sudbury Park.

The Express Dairy was already supplying milk to Queen Victoria, but their new “model dairy farm”, across the road from Crabs House, with its pedigree herd of Jersey cattle, allowed George Barham, and his son Titus, to demonstrate the latest methods of dairy farming to other milk producers from around Britain and the world. Milk from the farm was very popular, and some of it was supplied to trans-Atlantic liners. When, the by then, Sir George Barham died in 1913, Titus Barham inherited the Express Dairy retail business and the farm, while his brother, Arthur, took over the Dairy Supply Company wholesale business (later United Dairies on [[38169|One Hundred E...
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MARCH
16
2017

Vale Farm
Vale Farm was probably a mixed farm, growing crops and raising livestock for meat, run by a succession of tenant farmers.. Vale Farm existed, on the north-east edge of Sudbury Common, by at least the 18th century, when it was owned by the Lake family, and later by Richard Page of Wembley Park.

By 1875, the farm was owned by the biscuit magnate, Samuel Palmer, and before he died in 1898 it had changed to a dairy farm, with a herd of cows grazing its pastured fields to produce milk. The buildings put up at the time of this change included a new farmhouse.

By the early 20th century, much of Sudbury was still farmland, but the area was starting to be developed for housing, particularly after new railway lines opened (at Sudbury Town in 1903, and to Sudbury and Harrow Road station in 1906). A map given by Wembley’s first estate agent, George H. Ward, ‘for information of intending purchasers’ at this time, shows Vale Farm and some of the new roads for housing nearby.

In the early 1900s, the tenants of Vale Farm were the Panes family.

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MARCH
13
2017

Lavender Hill, SW11
Lavender Hill was once famous for the lavender fields which skirted the road. .
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MARCH
9
2017

Shakespeare Drive, WD6
Shakespeare Drive, which was part of the former Furzehill School is part of a development by Persimmon Plc. For its first two years, it was a private road owned by the developers.
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MARCH
8
2017

White Conduit Fields
White Conduit Fields in Islington was an early venue for cricket and several major matches are known to have been played there in the 18th century. It was the original home of the White Conduit Club, forerunner of Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC). The cricket field was adjacent to the former White Conduit House, immediately south of the modern junction between Dewey Street and Barnsbury Road.

The earliest match known to have been played at White Conduit Fields was the controversial encounter on Monday, 1 September 1718 between London Cricket Club and the Rochester Punch Club. This game provoked a legal case when the Rochester players walked off in an attempt to save their stake money, London clearly winning at the time. The case focused on the terms of the wager rather than the rules of the sport and the judge ordered the game to be played out. It was concluded in July 1719 at the same venue and London won by 21 runs. London’s 21-run victory is the earliest known definite result of any cricket match.

The next known match was on Wednesday, 19 August 1719 between London and Kent. Kent won and the co...
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MARCH
8
2017

Abbey Mills Pumping Station
Abbey Mills pumping station is a much-admired masterpiece of Victorian public works engineering, built in 1865–8 and nicknamed ’the cathedral of sewage’. The Abbey Mill was an ancient tidal watermill in West Ham, dating back to at least the 12th century.

It was sited on Channelsea Island in the Channelsea River and was one of the eight watermills on the River Lea recorded in the Domesday Book. The ’Abbey’ part of the name comes from its ownership by Stratford Langthorne Abbey, a Cistercian monastery founded in 1134 by William de Montfichet. The abbey disappeared during the reign of Henry VIII.

The area nearby the site of the original Abbey Mill is now known as Abbey Mills. There are several pumping stations located there, including the original Abbey Mills Pumping Station.

Abbey Mills Pumping Station was designed by engineer Joseph Bazalgette, Edmund Cooper, and architect Charles Driver. It was built between 1865 and 1868, housing eight beam engines by Rothwell & Co. of Bolton. With two engines on each arm of a cruciform plan, with an elaborate Byzantine style, it was described ...
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MARCH
6
2017

Baitul Futuh
Baitul Futuh (the Morden Mosque) is one of Britain’s largest mosques. Completed in 2003, entirely from donations of Ahmadi Muslims in the UK, the mosque covers an area of 21,000 square metres and the full complex can accommodate up to 10,000 worshippers.

It is located next to Morden South railway station, approximately 700 metres from Morden underground station.
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MARCH
4
2017

White Conduit Street (1950s)
A line of children hold hands as they walk along the middle of White Conduit Street towards the junction with Chapel Market in Islington in the 1950s. Much of the street was demolished in the late 20th century to make way for Tolpuddle Street and a car park.
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MARCH
2
2017

Thrift Farm
Thrift Farm was a farm in Boreham Wood. In 1922 a P. J. Hambrook was farming Thrift Farm.

Thrift Farm was purchased by MGM in the late 1940s when they incorporated it into their backlot. The farm continued to be used but closed in 1970 when the studio closed and was subsequently demolished.
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