My father became an apprentice electrician and an amateur thespian, learning the latter trade on the stage at the WGSI, aka 'The Inny'. In the early 1930s he wrote and produced his first pantomime there, 'Aladdin', and he and his numerous friends on the Suburb, went on to create fun and laughter for the community for the next 40 years.  WW2 interfered with things, but 'Cinderella' returned in 1948 to everyone's delight, and as these shows took months to prepare, the summer revues and the Xmas pantomimes dominated my parents' lives, and to a large extent my own.

Last Spring, when the news that the Green was up for sale filtered through, my first reaction was disbelief. How could the Green be privately owned in the first instance? Surely an organisation with some sort of authority had to hold the deeds. However, it appears that the history of the Green, and many other smaller parcels of land around the Suburb, is somewhat complicated.

Over the last 12 months I have come to realise that the Green itself is not just 'an extension of the immediate residents' front gardens', but is a very visual symbol of an architectural, political and sociological movement that set out to provide better living conditions for everyone. The telegraphic address of the company that built the whole Suburb was 'ANTISLUM', which sums up everything in a simple manner. The Garden Suburb and City movement has been a major influence on town planners across Europe and America for the last century.

Whilst my initial impulse to buy the Green may have been purely nostalgic, I have now come to believe that it is very important that a permanent solution, providing benign ownership for posterity, is quickly found for Fieldway Green.