Long Ashton Research Station

 In 1903 Lady Emily Smyth, widow of Sir Greville Smyth (owner of the Ashton Court Estate) provided six hectares of land in Long Ashton so that a National Fruit and Cider Institute could be set up. In 1912 Lady Emily Smyth gave more land to allow the expansion of the institute.  At this time it became the University of Bristol’s Department of Agricultural and Horticultural Research and it was renamed the Long Ashton Research Station.

During the early years research concentrated on improving the growing of cider apples and the production of cider.  Later its remit widened to include most fruit crops, especially pears, apples, plums, strawberries and blackcurrants. Many new varieties of fruit which were developed were named after local towns, rivers and hills e.g. the Cheddar Cross apple, Mendip cross blackcurrant and Severn Cross plum.

In the 1930s work on fruit juices and syrups led to the commercial production of blackcurrant juice (which was later marketed as Ribena) and rose hip syrup.  These were important home grown sources of vitamin C during the Second World War.  Research into willows started in the 1940s and continued with breeding varieties for biomass production.

In the 1980s the staff at Long Ashton began research into arable crops.  In 1986 fruit research stopped at Long Ashton when this work was transferred to East Malling Research Station in Kent.

Long Ashton Research Station closed in 2003 and many areas of its work were transferred to Rothamsted Experimental Station (now Rothamsted Research) at Harpenden in Hertfordshire.

• The key achievements of the Long Ashton Research Station were:         
• Research into cider making
• Research into plant breeding, nutrition, crop diseases, weeds, cropping systems and crop protection, especially spray techniques
• The creation of the National Willow Collection (which is now located at Rothamsted) and research into the use of willows for biomass production and gasification.
• Research into genetically modified crops, especially wheat and oilseed rape.
• Finding ways to reduce the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides on crops such as wheat, barley and oilseed rape.
• Research into the production of high value chemicals in plants and the role of hormones in plant development.

The site at Long Ashton was sold off and redeveloped for housing.  However its existence is commemorated by an old cider press and in the street names on the new housing estate – Pear Tree Avenue, Bramley Copse, Perry Road and Blackcurrant Drive.

Old cider press on Pear Tree Avenue, commemorating 100 years of agricultural and horticultural research at Long Ashton

Pear Tree Avenue and Bramley Copse - a reminder of the site's past

Blackcurrant Drive, Long Ashton

Dawn Redwood

The Dawn Redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides) tree was discovered growing near the remote village of Mo-tao-chi in the Chinese province of Sichuan in the 1940s. In 1946 it was identified by Professor Cheng of China’s National Central University as a Metasequoia, a species of tree which was thought to have been extinct for 5 million years. Dawn Redwoods are fast growing deciduous conifers.  They have now been planted in many parks and botanical gardens but they are still a critically endangered species in the wild.  The Dawn Redwood at Long Ashton Research Station now stands on Pear Tree Avenue. 

Dawn Redwood on Pear Tree Avenue

Roald Dahl

Roald Dahl was born in Llandaff near Cardiff on 13^th September 1916. His parents, Harald and Sofie Dahl, were Norwegians and his father was a shipbroker. In 1918 his sister Else was born and the family moved to Radyr, a village just outside Cardiff.  In 1920 Roald’s 7 year old sister Astri died of appendicitis, a few weeks later his father died at the age of 57 and later the same year Roald’s youngest sister Asta was born.  In 1921 the family moved back to Llandaff.

From 1923-25 Roald attended Llandaff Cathedral School.  In 1925 he went as a boarder to St Peter’s School in Shrubbery Road, Weston-super-Mare.  He was very homesick at first but remained at the school until 1929 when he was 13.  He then attended Repton Public School until he was 18.  St Peter’s School closed and was demolished in the 1970s and a housing estate was built on the site.  The only physical reminder of its existence is one of the roads, which is named St Peters Avenue.  Roald Dahl’s autobiography, Boy, includes several chapters about his time at St Peter’s School.

St Peters Avenue, Weston-super-Mare

In 1934 Roald began working for Shell Oil in Tanganyika but at the outbreak of the Second World War he joined the RAF in Nairobi, Kenya and learnt to fly a Tiger Moth plane.  He was severely injured in a plane crash in Libya in 1940 and as a result of his injuries he was no longer able to fly and returned to Britain in 1941.

In 1942 he was posted to Washington DC as an Assistant Air Attaché in the British Embassy.  He remained in the USA for 4 years and it was during this time that he began to write and had his first book, The Gremlins, published.  In 1946 his first short story collection, Over to You, was published and he returned to the UK.  He moved to Great Missenden in Buckinghamshire with his mother and sister Asta.

In 1953 he married the American actress Patricia Neal and they had 4 daughters and a son together, although their daughter Olivia died of measles encephalitis aged 7 in 1962.  In 1954 they bought Little Whitefield Cottage in Great Missenden.  They later renamed it Gipsy House.  This was the place where Roald Dahl lived for the rest of his life.  He wrote many of his stories sitting in an armchair in a writing hut, which he had built in the garden of his house.

Gipsy House, Great Missenden

In 1961 Roald Dahl’s first famous children’s book, James and the Giant Peach, was published in the USA.  Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was published in the USA in 1964.  Both were published in the UK in 1967 and so was The Magic Finger.  Roald Dahl wrote the screenplay for the James Bond film, You Only Live Twice, which was released in 1967. Many more of his stories and books of poetry for children, along with several short story collections for adults, were published in the 1970s and 1980s. 

In 1981 Roald separated from his wife Patricia and in 1983 he married Felicity Crosland. Esio Trot was the last book to be published in his lifetime.  He died on 23^rd November 1990 aged 74 and was buried in the churchyard of St Peter and St Paul’s Church in Great Missenden.  His last book, The Minpins, was published posthumously in 1991.

Roald Dahl's grave

Many of Roald Dahl’s short stories and children’s books have been made into films or television programmes.  He is still one of the world’s best-selling authors.

In 2005 the Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre was opened in Great Missenden.

Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre in Great Missenden

Enormous Crocodile, Cardiff Bay