Recognising Tolkien

The great City of Birmingham is fortunate in having many important connections with JRR Tolkien, the world-renowned author of The Lord of The Rings, The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, The Children of Hurin and much else besides including both academic work and some captivating children’s stories. At present however, the City does not make nearly enough of these deep and substantial links - especially in those parts of the City that helped to form the landscape of Middle-earth and the characteristic inhabitants of The Shire.
Tolkien’s family roots were in Birmingham and he himself felt very closely connected to the city. In fact he described himself as a Midlander. As he wrote in a letter, this is how he thought of Birmingham:
"My father’s and my mother’s family were Birmingham people. I was born far away but came home in 1895, and have remained a Birmingham man ever since. The West Midlands are the best part of England".
Tolkien lived as a child in what was then the hamlet of Sarehole at what was then number 5, Gracewell between 1896 and 1900 and at several other locations elsewhere in Birmingham until 1911. Looking back on this idyllic time in his later years, he described the four years that he lived at Sarehole as:
‘the longest seeming and most formative part of my life".
The house in which Tolkien lived with his mother and younger brother Hilary is still there (5 Gracewell is now number 264 Wake Green Road) which is now in Springfield Ward, close by Sarehole Mill just across the road in Hall Green Ward. Sarehole Mill, one of our listed buildings, is now a museum in The Shire Country Park.
Tolkien writes in one of his letters:
"As for knowing Sarehole Mill, it dominated my childhood." In another letter he writes, "…I... lived for my early years in ‘The Shire‘ in a pre-mechanical age."
His own description of his surroundings in Sarehole reveals the profound influence that the area had on him and on his concept of Middle-earth. He said that it was:
"…a kind of lost paradise…there was an old mill that really did grind corn with two millers, a great big pond with swans on it, a sandpit, a wonderful dell with flowers, a few old-fashioned village houses and, further away, a stream with another mill…I took the idea of the hobbits from the village people and children".
The Shire is based on the area around Sarehole Mill, The Dell and Moseley Bog (where Tolkien and his brother played as children) and The Dingles. We are very fortunate that a good deal of the original landscape in which Tolkien delighted still exists. This is why The Shire Country Park was established to conserve and interpret this unique and historic area. In addition to the links with Tolkien, there are Bronze Age burnt mounds in Moseley Bog and Sarehole Mill was also once owned by famous industrialist Matthew Boulton.
In 1900 the Tolkien family moved to Moseley, then to Kings Heath, to be near the tram route for him to attend King Edward’s School, at that time in the City Centre. In 1902 they moved again to be near the Oratory Church in Edgbaston, an area which includes the ‘two towers’ of Perrott’s Folly and the Waterworks. The two towers are strikingly aligned to the eye when leaving the old St Philip’s School into Plough and Harrow Road. This is one reason why many people including myself (I went to St Philip’s Grammar School as did Tolkien for a while) are convinced that they contributed in Tolkien’s imagination to the Towers of Middle-earth. As our picture shows, you couldn’t miss them as you walked out of the school into Plough and Harrow Road - just as Tolkien himself would have done.
Hall Green’s annual weekend at Sarehole in May celebrating Tolkien and his works attracts over 10,000 visitors each year - many from far afield. The sustained popularity of the unique Middle-earth weekend is proof of the vitality of Tolkien’s legacy and how deeply it is embedded in the local community. Hall Green based Shire Productions gives unique dramatised extracts from The Hobbit and The Lord of The Rings. Our image by Shire Productions official photographer, Stuart Williams, ‘Forth Eorlingas’, is from an excerpt from Lord of The Rings performed in Moseley Bog.
A local author, RW (Bob) Blackham, a prominent member of the Birmingham Tolkien Group, has produced a richly-illustrated and authoritative volume ‘The Roots of Tolkien’s Middle-earth’ which sets out in fascinating and original detail the connections to Tolkien and the sources of Middle-earth inspiration in Birmingham. This work is highly recommended!
In the light of all of this, it is very clear that we should mark Tolkien’s connection with Birmingham much more strongly. The scant recognition of Tolkien in Birmingham consistently surprises overseas enquirers. So the Birmingham Tolkien Group (BTG) is working to establish a Tolkien Centre set in The Shire Country Park to commemorate the unique cultural legacy of our deep connection to Tolkien, The Hobbit, The Lord of The Rings and The Shire in particular. I have developed PowerPoint presentations on the proposed Tolkien Centre and The Shire Country Park and have presented these to key individuals, local conservation, local history and community groups, all of whom gave the concept a very warm reception.
A Tolkien Centre would serve the whole of Birmingham from a primary location within The Shire Country Park - ideally with an associated facility in Edgbaston near to the two towers. The strategic vision is of a Tolkien Centre in the Country Park to make Birmingham the world leader in recognising Tolkien. And, very importantly, it would promote sustainable living and engage communities through a state of the art eco-friendly building.
The Park and the Centre together would secure the future of many locations that influenced Tolkien, and should be essential elements in the heritage and tourism strategies for Birmingham. They will greatly enhance the image of the City at home and abroad. The most appropriate location would be near to Sarehole Mill and Tolkien’s childhood home.
There would be many community aspirations for a Tolkien Centre. For example: developing links with schools, colleges and libraries particularly on ecology and the environment; promoting literacy and wider interest in literature; expanding interest in history, heritage and Tolkien; helping to conserve crafts using skilled workers, artists and sculptors; encouraging creative and recreational activities; promoting sustainability and a deeper respect for the environment; building capacity to sustain the Park through volunteering. Hall Green Library already works closely with local schools, and a Tolkien artwork project had very good results.
Broader reasons for a Tolkien Centre include the enhancement of the City’s image through a distinctive building marking Tolkien’s unique connections with Birmingham. A world class eco-friendly building would also be a base for enjoying and conserving the Cole Valley - a green thread of biodiversity in the City - and encouraging lifestyles to combat climate change. A Tolkien Centre would be a notable addition to the City’s distinctive buildings and would signal Birmingham’s commitment to sustainable regeneration.
But could there be a fly in the Ointment? The Environment Agency would (outside of the South East!) object to building in the ‘100 year flood plane’. The Agencies original estimates showed extensive areas flooded on both sides of Cole Bank Road. But a consultant’s report commissioned by BTG shows that the area north of the Mill (behind it, in the main field for the Middle-earth weekend) is much less flooded - a judgement that is confirmed by local observations. So a Tolkien Centre located to the North of Sarehole Mill is the realistic alternative. But there remain many issues to resolve, not least among them that you cannot please everybody!
An Anglo-Saxon style hall would be a central feature of the design, as would sustainability. The Centre would be carbon neutral. This would be achieved by many means: green roofing would be used to reduce water run-off, improve insulation, produce oxygen and harmonise roofs with the local environment; photovoltaic panels would generate electricity backed up by a combined heat and power boiler; a small wind turbine would supplement power generation; there would be extensive use of timber in construction as a renewable resource for sustainability and to fit the aesthetics of the Centre and the Park.
In addition, geothermal heat would be drawn into the building from the surrounding land; a wind driven ventilation system would draw in fresh air from outside and expel stale air; a Ritter grid system for the car park would stabilise the ground and allows grass to grow through; rainwater collection would be used for recycling to flush toilets and a (possible) reed bed sewage system to keep down the load on the City’s treatment plants will be evaluated.
The Centre would use a timber pellet fuelled boiler, which would be carbon neutral using pollarded timber, most of it grown in The Shire Country Park; insulation levels would be well in excess of the building regulations in order to minimise heating requirements; heavy masonry walls where appropriate would provide a heat sump by absorbing sunlight; rammed earth would also be used in construction as local conditions allow.
The result would be a building that would be a great cultural asset for the whole city which would: be ecologically cutting edge; promote all forms of sustainability; act as a focus for life-long learning; be a lasting attraction in its own right; have an inspiring aesthetic reflecting its ideals; provide an anchor for the City’s Tolkien attractions and form a base for regenerating the River Cole Valley.
So that in giving long overdue recognition to Tolkien in Birmingham, the Centre would also be a building of which the whole of the City could justly be proud.