Monday, March 5, 2012

(Straw)Bury Field(s) Forever?

For the past two months I have been exploring the rumor posted on a French blog that Paul was involved in a car accident on a secondary road near Milton Keynes.  I was focusing on the Pennyland area north of the old town of Milton Keynes, but I was looking at the maps in the book, The Plan For Milton Keynes (Milton Keynes Development Corporation, 1970) and I noticed an area on the outskirts of the new town of Milton Keynes.  It is a ~ 183 acre site that has been used for centuries by the people of Newport Pagnell as a community farming site.  It is called Bury Field.

In the 1960's (and decades afterward), the field was used in August as a site for Stanley Thurston's Fun Fair--a British equivalent of American carnivals and amusement parks. (See the website:  http://oktrivia.com/REAL_WEBSITE/A_BURY_PARK_CHILDHOOD.html )  Quite close by is the North Bridge that goes over the River Ouse.
On the right is a painting of Bury Field and you can see the North Bridge at the far right, near the bottom of the photo.                                               Just south of the North Bridge at 3 Ousebank St., was the Newport Pagnell Old Fire Station 1 that was in use from 1939-1974.  I checked out the website for the Newport Pagnell fire department (at www.bucksfire.gov.uk/BucksFire/Fire+Stations/Newport+Pagnell ) and they said the fire crew "have been first on the scene at numerous incidents on the M1 Motorway.  These have included road traffic collisions where persons are trapped in their vehicles . . . "  I will add all the audio references that link this information with Paul's possible accident in the next post.
---paulumbo

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