Local History

Welcome to The Journal’s guide to the history of the Bradley Stoke area.

Living Landmarks

Living Landmarks plaque at the site of Manor Farm, Bradley Stoke

During 2007/2008, Southern Brooks Community Partnership obtained funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund to run The Living Landmarks Project. This involved working with residents to raise awareness of the community’s history and to bring to light personal stories and histories particularly from older people. It included workshops and research in schools with both children and older residents. Of particular importance were the meetings between young and old when memories were shared and questions asked about the past. In addition a group of older people worked with an actor and writer to produce a play about their experiences. This was shown at the Arnolfini in Bristol. The project has stimulated interest in the history of the communities with increased membership of the local history groups and more research and writing taking place.

One of the outcomes of the project was the creation of a series of plaques marking significant historical features. The plaques have been either set in large boulders or as pavement markers around Patchway and Bradley Stoke.

More information:

Bradley Stoke latest news.

Bradley Stoke Local History Group

Formed in 2007. Contact David Baker on 01454 613005 for further details.

History of the Modern Town of Bradley Stoke

Nearby Places of Historical Interest

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Local History Books

Landscapes of the Past – The Hidden Heritage of Bradley Stoke

When a new town is built, the rural world that it replaces can easily be forgotten. But clues – in the local woods, wildflowers, ponds, birds and buildings – still exist for the keen-eyed inhabitant. These reveal a heritage that can still enrich our lives today.

Landscapes of the Past is a celebration of the past contained within the present and the natural world as it co-exists with the urban. It will be of interest not only to Bradley Stoke residents but anyone with a concern for our ever-changing countryside.

Author: Sharon Ubank
Published: 1998
Available from Bradley Stoke Library
More information: Landscapes of the Past

A Ring of Rooks – Stories from Little Stoke Farm

A Ring of Rooks - Stories from Little Stoke Farm

Little Stoke today is a 20th century housing estate just north of Bristol. But in the earlier years of that same century, it was a quite different place. Then it was a small hamlet standing in the midst of elm-haunted fields. And at its hub stood Little Stoke Farm.

Author: Sharon Ubank
Published: 2001
Available from Bradley Stoke Library

The Farmer and the Goose with the Golden Eyes – From Little Stoke Farm to Slimbridge

The Farmer and the Goose with the Golden Eyes

A celebration of a vanished part of South Gloucestershire, and the founding of the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust at Slimbridge.

By the mid-1950s the farm in the small hamlet of Little Stoke in south Gloucestershire was doomed. Before 1970, at the stroke of a planner’s pen, its fate was sealed and, with the arrival of the builders’ bulldozers, its destruction was complete. Out of it, but disconnected from it, grew the new Little Stoke and the town of Bradley Stoke, joining earlier development by the Bristol Aeroplane Company Engine Division, later part of Rolls -Royce plc.

Author: Martin Davis
Published: 2009
ISBN: 978-1-906593-37-7
Available directly from the author. Contact us to be put in touch.

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