Event Type: Local / Community

Takes Place: 14th May 2025

Time: 1 - 2 pm

Venue: Museum of Oxford

Description: The Slade Camp was set out in open fields on the edge of Shotover in the late 1930s as part of the military preparations for war. The camp saw action during WWII: as a training centre, for housing returning troops from Dunkirk and assisting in demobbing soldiers. But it was after 1945 that the wooden huts and network of tarmacked roads served their most useful function, when the camp was used to help to deal with the post-war housing crisis. Army buildings became family homes as hundreds of people arrived to set up a new community. The neighbourhood grew and thrived with Shotover woods becoming a playground for the children who lived there. The last residents left the camp in the early 1970s, but the history of the place and people who lived there mirrors the development of modern-day Oxford and tells us much about social and cultural changes in the city. Join Maurice East to hear how ordinary people built a community in the aftermath of war and how the fascinating story was rediscovered during lockdown fifty years later. Tickets cost £5 and are available online via Eventbrite (booking fee applies) or at the Museum shop.

How to book: Visit the Museum of Oxford Shop or go to https://www.eventbrite.com/e/lunchtime-talk-lost-in-the-woods-the-story-of-slade-camp-tickets-1249335278449

Price: £5 per person (booking fee applies to online bookings)

Tel: 01865 252334

Email: museum@oxford.gov.uk

Website: https://museumofoxford.org/

Organiser: Museum of Oxford

Lecturer: Maurice East

Region: South-East England