Description:While all the other homes on the right hand side of the drive were given odd numbers, the last house on the right was Home 16. It was a home for boys only. It was adjacent to Home 15, they were two halves of one semi-detached building.
In 1949 Home 16 became known as Springfield.
In 1972/3, Littledene and Springfield, next door, were formally joined to form one unit which took the name Littledene. At the time of the ‘merger’, each home accommodated 12 children and each of the houses had a large dining/play room, a sitting room, bathroom, WC, kitchen and an office on the ground floor and on the upper floor were two dormitories each for six children, two bedrooms for staff and a bathroom, WC and sluice room. The new combined unit housed 16 children aged 8 and upwards and had a special emphasis on the needs of young adolescents.
Littledene closed in 1982.
Image: Photograph of the backs of Littledene and Springfield (on the far right of the photograph). The photograph was taken in the late 1990s, when the buildings were empty, prior to development of the road. Reproduced here with the kind permission of Mike Beard.
Source: This history was compiled by the Birmingham Children's Homes Project, an initiative to explore Birmingham City Council-run children’s homes between 1949 and 1990.