Village People
12 July 2023
What I love about living in a village is its history: the landscape, the buildings and the people who made them.
Long Marston past and present
10 July 2022
If the residents of Long Marston had been asked to isolate and not travel from their village less than 100 years ago, I don’t think many lives would have been affected.
A Memory of Ethel May Edmonds
1 July 2022
Ethel was the youngest of three children and is the last of her generation. She was born at Elstree, but at a very young age the family moved to Ivinghoe.
Remembrance this year
20 June 2022
The words community, our country, our world have been vary ill, have seen friends and family die, have had to face times of restriction, job losses, loneliness and so much more.
The History of the Wilstone Farm Shop
10 June 2022
The Mead family have been farming in and around Wilstone since before 1860. Originally the Mead’s came out of London to produce hay and straw for the working horses of the city. Simon and Chris are the sixth eneration and things have changed a lot.
Where is Auntie Em’s husband?
1 June 2022
My great grandmother Orpah Maria Proctor was born in Gubblecote in 1876, one of eight children. Orpah married Joseph Edwards from Wilstone in 1899 and lived in the village for the rest of her life, ultimately at Mardew, now 66 Tring Road.
Wilstone Village Stores from Past to Present
20 May 2022
The Village Stores has held a central role in Wilstone village life for over 120 years. Early photographs show a large white building (known as
A history of Fred and Rose Cooper of the Half Moon, Wilstone
10 May 2022
Frederick Ernest Cooper was born on the 20th January 1877 in the village of Harrold in Bedfordshire. His early upbringing would almost certainly have included helping out on Crow Hill Farm on which he lived with his farm labourer father Thomas and mother Elizabeth.
Branch line to Marston Gate: revealed
1 May 2022
What else can be seen today of the former branch line to Aylesbury
Summer of 1940 in Long Marston
20 April 2022
Congratulations to Long Marston cricket club on their half-century at Marlins. When I was a child, Marlins was one of several areas of allotments in Long Marston, but by the early 1960s times had changed and people were no longer urged to “Dig for Victory” as they had been during WW2.
Formal opening of the Tring Local History Museum
10 April 2022
Sunday 13 March saw the official opening of the Tring Local History Museum, 17 years after the Tring & District Local History & Museum Society was set up by Tring Town Council with the aim of getting a museum started.
Memories of a local boy on February 19th, 1945
1 April 2022
In February 1945 Mike Tomlinson was just seven years old, and lived with his mother (his father was away serving in the RAF) in Astrope Lane, which leads down from the Queens Head pub at the crossroads in Long Marston.
The last flight of the ‘Beast of Bourbon’
20 March 2022
The story behind the memorial to remember the crew. by Peter Walker
Half century at Marlins
10 March 2022
23rd January 2011 saw a significant milestone in the history of Long Marston Cricket Club. It was on this day in 1961 that the trust deeds for the ground were signed by four members of the club, securing the transfer of Marlins field to LMCC.
New bridge restores village link
1 March 2022
A rural parish is not likely to host very many bridge openings in its history, so it was appropriate that a ceremony was organised to inaugurate the splendid new footbridge over the Aylesbury Arm of the canal at Wilstone.
Pumping station revival at Little Tring
20 February 2022
The pumping station at Little Tring is a substantial building, much altered over the years since it opened in 1817. British Waterways have plans to refurbish the historic Tringford pumping station at Little Tring, and make it a base for their local operations crew.
The Home Guard at Long Marston
10 February 2022
During the war the older lads of the village were used as runners – taking messages between Puttenham church tower, where there was a lookout point, and the Queen’s Head which, so my husband told me, was the command post.
Childhood recollections: the winter of 1981-82
1 February 2022
I recently asked the editor of Village News if I could maybe tell a tale of life in the village long before us kids had the gadgets and technology that are so common place in most households these days.
The Old Slaughter-House, Long Marston
20 January 2022
During the 1800’s, the Gregory family lived at The Rose & Crown Inn in Long Marston (now The Rose and Crown Cottage), and the far left-hand end of the building was used as a butcher’s shop, with the old wooden garages (as they are today) being used as the slaughter house.
The Home Guard in West Herts
10 January 2022
Right. Get fell in! Atten-shun! Right dress! Eyes front. Stand at ease. Stand easy.
Canal memories (continued)
1 January 2022
In the June 2009 issue of Village News I related some condensed extracts from the memoirs of Edward Bell, a Tring man and engineer who worked for 49 years on the local stretch of the Grand Junction Canal.
A century at the Half Moon at one sitting
20 December 2021
A hundred years of the Half Moon pub in Wilstone were represented when family members of previous publicans visited recently.
Canal Memories
10 December 2021
A request in the April 2009 Village News from Professor Timothy Peters regarding information on the Wendover Arm and the Woodhouse family, caused me to look through some old articles about the Grand Junction Canal.
Tales of my Grandfather
1 December 2021
Last Autumn Teresa and I attended a fund raising talk showing recently discovered photographs. Tring’s local history exhibition was the target. A local politician was the speaker. The photographs were wonderful, but the jokey, sarcastic remarks about Tring families got very irritating. In fact I had to have a word.
Send in your photos, stories, documents and we’ll get them added!