The Arbury Adventure Playground on the Nuns Way playing field in North Arbury was a fixture for over twenty-five years. It made its debut in 1973. One of the featured newspaper articles in this post details progress towards its creation - and is something of a hymn of praise to the original Arbury community spirit. Hello, and welcome to our latest round-up of past newspaper articles about Arbury, which was a hive of community action in its early years. The three articles we include here are shining examples of the community spirit of  'The Arbury', with an adventure playground in the offing, a social club for lonely elderly people already established, and a county councillor happy to chop down four foot high weeds... But first... A Word About Arbury...  Where Is Arbury, What Is It? Readers familiar with historic Arbury as opposed to 'Arbury Ward' and 'King's Hedges Ward' (a name imported into the Arbury Meadows from elsewhere) can skip this. But, for newcome...

The final part of Mrs Muriel Wiles's memories of life in Old Arbury and Chesterton - added to the Arbury Archive in 1986. 'Gran went downhill quite slowly and then seemed to die quite suddenly. She faded away... quite gently, really. We were all really upset. Grace was a lot more outgoing than me, always cheerful, always laughing and talking to people, I liked to keep in the background, but she was really upset by Gran passing away. She insisted on buying her own wreath. I think we'd just started earning then. Mum said I should go in with her and Dad for our wreath, which I was happy to do. 'Looking back it sort of... well... marked the end of my childhood. Well, that sounds a bit fanciful, but you know what I mean,' said Mrs Wiles. 'Things had been unsettled since Gran got ill and the family left Manor Farm.  'When Gran died it was a bit like one chapter coming to an end - all those happy days at Arbury ending sadly - then the whole thing about work and bei...

The Manor Boys' School nearing completion in 1959. At this point, some of the Manor Farm buildings remained. Part Five of Mrs Wiles's 1986 recollections of life in Old Arbury and Chesterton: From The Manor School in the 1970s To Christ's Pieces in the 1920s... 'I've only been to the Manor School once. It was a fete a few years back, with my friend, Mrs Royston. Well, it was a lovely day and I was telling Mrs Royston about the Manor Farm and Gran and Grandad and everything, and we were looking at that big tall block and wondering what the view was like from the top. We met one of the teachers, I think it was the headmaster, and he was lovely, we were chatting to him, just ordinary, about it all. He was very interested. He asked if we'd like to see the view from the top and we said, "Oh, yes, please!" and he got the caretaker and we went in. 'Now, wasn't that nice of him? 'It was better inside than out because there were a lot of windows and ...

The Story So Far... Andy has been driving Debs and her wheelchair all over the original Arbury Estate ('Stop, chauffeur, in need of fish n' chips!' she said at one point), looking at the area, remembering the past, and having a good day of it. Starting in North Arbury at Arbury Town Park, the pair have visited the Arbury Community Centre in Campkin Road, the old Manor School site, North Cambridge Academy, Nicholson Way and Walker Court. Then it was over to South Arbury for Arbury Court and the Carlton Terrace shops and Carlton Arms in Carlton Way.  Sadly, they were too tired to get up to the North Arbury Chapel and Arbury Kebab van in Cameron Road, and the site of the legendary Arbury Adventure Playground on the Nuns Way playing field. They're now finishing off with a look at Carlton Way... Now, READ ON! The 1950s council-built houses in Carlton Way always say 'Arbury' to us, even when we see similar in Cherry Hinton. . . The Arbury Primary School made its debut...

Two of my South Arbury childhood joys - the hump and the hills. The hump, where we kicked up dust and rode our Chopper bikes, is sadly no more. Something I always tried to avoid on rainy Sundays way back then was listening to the Osmonds with cousin Sharon. Cousin Sharon had an old record player - a 1960s portable which had belonged to her mother - and she loved listening to records in her bedroom in Rutland Close. I have strong memories of her rain spattered window and the view of the Kingsway and lead grey sky beyond. Sharon was so overflowing with enthusiasm for Donny Osmond I felt quite unwell. This fixation was followed by another with the Bay City Rollers, then David Soul, and then John Travolta. None of them appealed to me.  We always listened to the charts at teatime on the radio. I think that only the Top 20 was broadcast then, but the pop scene was well established by the early 1970s. We even bought a magazine of current chart songs lyrics. I think this was published beca...

Pondering on Arbury... things that make us go hmm... on Arbury we do sit and ponder... On the Arbury Estate, we archivists often think that the older we get, the more nonsensical life becomes. We decided we'd share a few of the things we find distinctly odd - and, sometimes, downright annoying... It's odd that the Council takes our council tax from us, decade after decade, without once uttering 'PROVE YOU ARE WHO YOU SAY YOU ARE!', but as soon as somebody is ill and needs help paying, various forms of ID are needed... a passport? Chance would be a fine thing! A recent bank statement? But I was pressed to go paperless to save the planet - and you've been receiving payments from my bank account for over thirty years anyway - without question! My birth certificate? Yes, I have it - somewhere! But WHERE?! Shall I fork out for a new one? These sort of nitpicking things can contribute greatly to stress at times of illness, as one of our Arbury Archivists is discovering. H...

                       Photograph from Sara Payne's 1981 'Down Your Street' article - the Kingsway Flats. The photograph was taken by the 'Hump' and the seats on the corner of Verulam Way. The seats were let into the low wall, facing the hills and the flats. They were removed sometime around the late 1990s/early 21st century. The South Arbury 'Hump'... North Arbury had the Arbury Adventure Playground on the Nuns Way playing field, the Arbury Town Park and the Arbury Community Centre in Campkin Road. South Arbury couldn't really compete with those. But the children of the South did have the Hump, the seats, the Kingsway hills and the Kingsway blocks to play on, as well as St Alban's and Arbury Court recs. The hump is fondly remembered for being an exciting bike ride - and for being an excellent place to kick up dust - fascinating play for many children back in the '60s, '70s and '80s. The Hump was bricked in circa 2008. Some of ...

So, via Sara Payne's Down Your Street visit to Carlton Way in 1981, our own memories, and our (mostly previously unpublished) transcripts from the Arbury 1980 project, we're back in the original South Arbury's main street for a further look at its history. Carlton Way did not, of course, arrive all at the same time. While Arbury School opened in 1956, the Carlton Arms public house wasn't built until the late 1950s, for instance. It opened in 1959 - complete with its cosy off licence. Happy memories from years gone by of being taken to the Carlton Arms off licence to buy crisps and fizzy pop on summer evenings in the late 1960s, and also to return Gran and Grandad's Guinness bottles to get the deposit back for 'sweeties' a few years later, make one of our Arbury Archivists go 'all misty-eyed' over this picture. The Carlton Terrace shops were a 1960s innovation. Looking back to the 1970s days of Dean's, Blackwell's, Yarrow's (Yarrer's...