Page 10 - Oundle Life March 2022

OUNDLE
AT WAR
A forgotten legacy?
Some things go without saying, others just have to be said – Oundle is special, and we are so lucky to live here. Over the past 10-
15 editions of Oundle Life I have shone a spotlight on many of the buildings and urban features that make Oundle so special.
Building Historian – suggested that it’s about time I started, especially with arguably one
of the nation’s rarest structures still standing in Oundle; and amazingly, still without any historic listing to protect it. We might need to
The vast majority have been deeply historic and many have been really quite old. I’ve written about Oundle’s 7th Century Monastery, Barnwell’s 13th Century Castle, Oundle’s Georgian & Victorian brewing history and Ashton’s ground-breaking philanthropic model village.
Oundle retains one of the nation’s rarest structures
change that!
So, this months’ feature building is
one you likely know well. You have probably passed it many times and paid it little attention. Unless of course you looked at it and thought ‘Eurgh!’ Indeed, to paraphrase the great Alan Turing (altering his words to suit this feature) “Sometimes it is the buildings
In all this time I’ve barely touched upon 20th Century Oundle or its wartime association and infrastructure. I mean, ‘why would I?’ with
so many other outstanding historic buildings to study and share. Well, my friend Dr Paul Stamper – a local archaeologist and fellow
no one can imagine anything of, that were built to do the things no one wants to imagine.” Today we know the building as the Joan
Strong Centre, but back in 1938/39 when it was first constructed as part of our Civil Defence infrastructure, it was Oundle’s gas
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