Description:Ludford Road was a purpose-built children's home with 8 beds which opened in 1963. It was designed to be a family group home on the newly built Bartley Green Estate.
The home was part of a programme of new children’s homes, each built on newly developing housing estates, which were to be small family homes – a move away from the pre-second world war larger children’s homes. These homes were built on the principle of a small ‘family’ unit in a house that looked very much like any other on the estate. The first of these homes was completed in 1951, and a further 11, one of which was Ludford Road, were built over the following eleven years. A second family group children’s home was built on the same estate at the same time – Adams Hill.
The two homes – at Adams Hill and Ludford Road appear to have been built as mirror images of each other.
Ludford Road had accommodation for eight children and was designed so that houseparents would live in the children’s home, with, if they had any, their own children. usually the housefather would have a job outside the home while the housemother worked in the home full-time. All the children would go to local schools with other children from the estate.
Ludford Road closed as a children's home at the end of 1980.
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Image: Unidentified family group home c1965. Courtesy of Birmingham City Council. The Birmingham Children's Homes project has no photograph of Ludford Road children's home at this stage.
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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.