IN 1948 a historic Oxfordshire village narrowly avoided being flattened by a council that said it was “too old”.

Now, villagers in Letcombe Bassett have created a show to preserve their history, and teach their children how lucky they are their village survived.

The settlement near Wantage is famous for producing winning racehorses and was once a national name in watercress, grown in its famous cress beds.

But in 1948 North Berks Regional Planning Committee said that 29 of the old village cottages were unfit for human habitation.

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Councillors said putting in a mains sewerage system, considered vital, would be too expensive.

They drew up plans to leave a few farmhouses and move the rest of the villagers to neighbouring Letcombe Regis.

The villagers fought the plans in a campaign, which they dubbed Letcombe Bassett is Too Old to Die, and they won.

Eventually, modern sewerage was installed around the houses while preserving the unique character of the Ridgeway village, which dates back to Saxon times.

Now a group of villagers has collected archive television news footage about the campaign and will show it at the village hall on Saturday, January 31.

Organiser Astrid Mehrtens-Haupt started a village history group to research the project.

She said: “I am German and my husband Tony is South African, but when we came to the village 14 years ago we felt really at home.

“It’s a nice community but a lot of people work away and lot of older people have interesting stories to tell that weren’t written down, so we wanted to preserve them.”

She said the project was partly inspired by her 17-year-old daughter Charlie. She said: “We wanted to get all the kids fired up on the village and interested in what is going on around them.”

The group collected photographs dating back to the early 20th century and produced history boards telling the village story.

They recall how the village was a national name in watercress for some 300 years, selling to London markets, and has produced winning racehorses for years such as Martha’s Son, who won nine consecutive steeplechases between 1994 and 1997.

Another history group member, Lesley Gross, 67, said: “We were concerned to get children involved and understand the history of the village as it was for the people who lived in it, concentrating on how they earned their living.”

The group will hold its exhibition at the village hall in Gramps Hill from 2pm on the Saturday afternoon and show film clips from 7.30pm to 9pm.

The show will also run from 11am to 4pm the next day.

 

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