The London Daily Newsletter Thursday 25 May

Barra Hall Park
Barra Hall Park is an 11 hectare formal park situated near the centre of Hayes.

Barra Hall was originally a manor house, and formerly known as Grove House. In the late eighteenth century it was home to Harvey Combe, who became Lord Mayor of London in 1799. In 1871 was bought by Robert Reid, an auctioneer and surveyor who claimed descent from the Reids of Barra. After enlarging and refacing the building he changed its name to Barra Hall in 1875. On 20 December 1923, Hayes Urban District Council bought Barra Hall and its grounds from then owner Ethel Penfold for £5700 in order to use it as a town hall. The Barra Hall building was officially opened as town hall on 23 February 1924 and its grounds became a municipal park with playground, tennis courts and a paddling pool opened by music hall star Jessie Matthews. Barra Hall Park features ornamental lawns, recreational grass areas, rose and shrub beds, seasonal bedding and mature trees.

TUM Book Club: Old Covent Garden
The magic of the old Covent Garden Market is evoked through Clive Boursnell’s photographs, taken over the course of numerous visits to Covent Garden in the 1960s and 1970s.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s Clive Boursnell, then a young photographer, shot thousands of photographs of the old Covent Garden, documenting the end of an era before the markets moved out of central London. Boursnell captured these last days of the market over a period of six years, from 1968 until the market’s closure, in a series of beautiful portraits of the feisty life of a city institution.

“Jewin Crescent, London EC1” This 1940 drawing is by Roland Vivian Pitchforth – one of his works for the War Artists Advisory Committee and looks west along Jewin Crescent.

Roland Vivian Pitchforth/Imperial War Museum

Video: Oyster
Getting around London with Oyster