Chiswick Timeline of Writers & Books: A quick guide
From the Writers Trail:
N) Sir John Betjeman 1906-1984. Poet Laureate, conservationist. Patron of the Bedford Park Society and Bedford Park Festival in the 1960s, helping protect the first garden suburb from developers.
St Michael & All Angels Church, Bedford Park, W4 1TT
In defence of the suburbs by Brian Appleyard: New Statesman
50 years of the Bedford Park Festival
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Read the full story: Betjeman and the Battle of Bedford Park (picture above):
The Chiswick Calendar, blog by Kate Bowes of the Bedford Park Society
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John Betjeman, the poet, journalist and heritage campaigner, was the first patron of The Bedford Park Society in Chiswick and also of the annual Bedford Park Festival. Though he did not live in Chiswick, he probably did more for its prosperity than many of those who did. In 1960, in the Daily Telegraph, he wrote that Bedford Park was “the most significant suburb built in the last century, probably the most significant in the Western world”. He called its parish church, St Michael & All Angels, “a very lovely church and a fine example of Norman Shaw’s work”.
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The Bedford Park Society was formed in 1963 by two local residents, Harry Taylor, a community activist, and Tom Greeves, a conservationist and architect, who were horrified by the rash of demolition and inappropriate development in the world’s first garden suburb (Acton Gazette, February 1963, above).
The breakthrough came in 1967 with an exhibition staged as part of the first Bedford Park Festival, highlighting the history of Bedford Park and the dangers it faced. Read: The Exhibition that Saved Bedford Park on the Bedford Park Society website. One visitor was a Ministry of Housing & Local Government inspector, who was so impressed that within a month he recommended the Grade II listing of 356 buildings, including the former Stores (now offices), the Tabard Inn, the Club (now the London Buddhist Vihara), the Church of St Michael and All Angels and its Parish Hall. A few years later both Ealing and Hounslow councils designated Bedford Park a conservation area.
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The full story is told in John Betjeman: The Biography by Bevis Hillier and was celebrated on the 50th anniversary of ‘the Saving of Bedford Park’, during the Festival’s Golden Jubilee.
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AN Wilson: Financial Times, Diary, June 2014:
It is 30 years since the death of John Betjeman, and the BBC has asked me to do a documentary film as a tribute. Each time that I return to Betjeman, I wonder whether disillusionment will set in. Will it emerge that I think his campaigns to save our architectural heritage were somehow a bit quaint or precious? No, I do not find that. I had a walk round Bedford Park in west London – which would have been demolished had he not put his weight behind the plan to save it…These visits only redoubled my admiration for Betjeman the conservationist.
Chiswick Timeline Writers Trail
Read more stories via the Writers Tales page.
The Chiswick Timeline of Writers & Books lists around 425 writers who have written a book and lived in Chiswick W4, or written books about the area. See A Quick Guide.