Sutton Coldfield Local History Research Group

I recently wrote about the Top Swan, adjacent to Bishop Vesey's Grammar School, which benefited from trade coming into Sutton from Lichfield. In this week's column we will take a look at the Horse & Jockey, which also well situated - the ...

I am always saddened when I see another part of Sutton's heritage disappear. This is how I felt a decade or so ago when I learned that there would no longer be a pub in the town called the Cup. There had been a pub called the Cup in this plac...

This is my fiftieth local history column for the newspaper. Later today I will mark the occasion by enjoying a glass of Manns Brown Ale. (Yes, really…) Manns' Brown Ale was first produced in 1902. Sadly for our predecessors this marginally s...

On April 23 - Shakespeare's birthday - a copy of the First Folio will be on display at Sutton Library. This is a major coup for the library and for FOLIO, who have - arranged the display as part of a breathtaking Shakespeare festival in Sutton....

On Thursday, January 27, 1887, Robert Green, aged 58, became a resident of the churchyard of Holy Trinity. It was said that 'no man living within the radius of the parish (was) more widely known or more genuinely esteemed and beloved for upri...

In 1944, as the Second World War drew to a close, a Prisoner of War camp was established in Sutton Park. It was intended to house the German soldiers captured after the D-Day landings. It was located near Longmoor Pool, and the prisoners l...

The automobile is very slowly making its way in England', it was reported in a local newspaper in 1899. At that time prices for 'a decent motor car' ranged from £110 to £150. The purchasers of cars were men with money in search of a new inte...

Today, when we move house, a removal van pulls up, our furniture is loaded up and off it goes. It's a time-consuming business. In centuries past many of our predecessors in Sutton did it all in a different way. There wasn't a train of wagons ...

Bands played regularly in the parks of Birmingham. Whether this practice should be extended to Sutton Park became a contentious issue in the early decades of the 20th century. Advocates of the idea believed the park was more than just a p...

'Sutton is a funny place', a Birmingham journalist observed in 1933. 'The people are so touchy and, if you talk about the park, they at once sit up and take notice and then it is time for you to watch your step.' There was some truth in this...