Over the lifetime of this Children’s Parliament, Pope John School
has found itself closely connected with the Shopping and Leisure development
at White City and has considered the impact of this complex on the local
area.
Working with the Urban Studies Centre this term, we began to find out
about the history of the area which is soon to be transformed into shiny
shops.
When Sue and Ieuan visited us they brought some old maps dating back to
1863. The maps showed that, in the area on which our school stands, were
green fields belonging to the nearby farms.
Stretching out towards Shepherds Bush green were orchards and a few grand
houses belonging to wealthy people who wished to escape the grime of the
city, for the country air of Shepherd Bush.
We began to see why shepherds feature in the name of this area!
Sue and Ieuan then surprised us by showing us some old photographs of
this same area about fifty years later.
What a transformation!
The fields, orchards and farms had been replaced by a fairytale land of
sparkling foundations; gondola style boats on steams flowing between gleaming
white buildings.
Shepherds Bush had become a tourist attraction equivalent to today’s
Thorpe Park or Chessington World of Adventure.
It was the Franco-British Exhibition of 1908.
Visitors descended in their thousands from all over Great Britain using
the railway station built specially for the exhibition.
Crowds flocked through an impressive archway, which hinted at the splendours
ahead.
This arch still marks the entrance to the Exhibition whose sparkling white
palaces gave this place the name it is known by today, ‘The White
City’.
In 1908, the Franco-British Exhibition made this area famous all over
the world, as far away as Canada, Australia and Africa. Countries had
their own buildings to show the achievements of their industries.
The name of the countries which took part are remembered by the street
names and buildings in the present White City Estate: Australia Road,
South Africa Road, Commonwealth Avenue, Canberra School.
Over the years since 1908, the exhibition site was demolished and the
land was re-developed.
The BBC stands on old exhibition land as do the blocks of flats of the
White City Estate and our school itself.
Looking at the most recent maps of the area we saw that the area behind
the arch was part of the Chelsfield development. This new complex will
stand on the site of a significant piece of local history but, unfortunately,
the arch itself will not survive.
Sue and Ieuan continued to fuel our growing interest in the history of
the locality by arranging for us to meet with Ivan Gibbons, a Councillor
with great local knowledge; Sandra Knight the Conservator at the Hammersmith
and Fulham Archives; Sav Kyriacou from the Ethnic Communities Oral History
Project; Ken Martindale from the Black British Heritage Group and George
Cochrane from Chelsfield Community Development.
Our discussions were very interesting and the importance of preserving
the history we share seemed even more vital.
We had some ideas how this could be done.
Number
One
We talked with Sandra Knight, the Conservator at the archives, about Time
Capsules and the types of objects which could be preserved in a capsule
and would help people in the future, learn about our lives today. This
Time Capsule could be buried somewhere on the site of the new development.
Number
Two
Within the development, perhaps in the old Power House, there could be
a small museum of Local History containing maps, photographs, artefacts,
information about the past story of the site.
More importantly, this museum could provide a venue for the sharing of
the work dome by the Ethnic Communities Oral History Project, Black British
Heritage Group and similar organisations working with the Community today.
Schools could display their local History work and the public would be
encouraged to make relevant contributions.
This museum would create an opportunity for people to record, in whatever
way they chose, something of their own stories, reflecting their earlier
lives in many different places as well as their experiences living in
Hammersmith and Fulham today.
Such a museum would help everyone to learn about the history of the area
in which we all live and help us learn more about each other.
Isn’t that the point of History?
What we would like to do now, as a group, is begin producing material
to help other children in the borough learn about the history of the area.
We already have a website explaining the history of the White City area
from 100 years ago.
But history is happening every day and we would like to make a record
of what is happening now.
We could create a book about our Time Capsule – what has gone into
it; why and where we have buried it in the new development.
We have already made a selection of items to reflect our lives today which
include: a copy of the Shepherds Bush Gazette, a local map, photographs
of local buses, trains and traffic jams, coins, a diary-completed, and
of course, a school report, a cassette of our favourite songs.
It would also be interesting to record people’s views of the changes
to our area (we have talked about making a radio programme or maybe even
a video).
We are, after all, part of what will be the history of the future. People
will want to know how these changes have affected us, and our local community
in years to come.
Discussing the importance of local history with Cllr. Ivan Gibbons
and
how to conserve material with H&F Conservator, Sandra Knight
