Court Lane, 1948

(Birmingham Central Library)

Looking towards Sutton Coldfield, on the left is Jerrys Lane. The trees are just saplings, and gas-lamps too! No white lines in the road suggests few had cars.

Jerrys Lane Area - 1940's/1950's
From a resident who has since moved to Sutton Coldfield;

"My wife to be went to school (as did I) at Lytham House High School in Short Heath Road near the junction with Anderson Road. This was a private school and the quarterly fee was two guineas! The academic teaching was worth far more than what now seems the paltry fee paid. For physical education we marched weekly to the gym teachers' training centre at Anstey College in Chester Road.

To get to school from Goosemoor Lane there was a footpath through allotments to Court Lane. My way to school led from the bend in Jerrys Lane near the present school across two cornfields to Short Heath Road. I lived on the corner of Turfpits Lane and Jerrys Lane with my sister and our parents who had a nursery business.

My maternal grandfather had had the house built and our land stretched right up to where Streetly Road now comes out. From my bedroom at the back of the house I had an uninterrupted view as far as the first semi-detached house on that side where a Mrs Freeman had a sweetshop. The area was still country and full of the sounds of birds. You could see larks ascending whilst in full song.

All around were cottages and cornfields, harvests being gathered in by horsedrawn repears followed by threshing powered by a steam engine. Our plant-growing land now holds ten houses fronting Jerrys Lane and six on Turfpits Lane. The cornfields and farms have disappeared under a huge corporation housing estate. From the corner with Jerrys Lane, Turfpits Lane became The Fordrift and narrowed down between a few houses to just a footpath terminating at a field adjacent to Oscott College. At the far end it was very secluded and not surprisingly known as Lovers Lane."

Court Lane, 2004

House Names
There seems no obvious pattern to the house names carved into house stonework along this road between the Madehurst Road and Anderson Road junctions. Perhaps just random by the builder as they sounded nice. Here they are in case someone can spot a pattern, along with a guess at origins;

Madehurst Road end

Goosemoor Lane History

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