Description:This opened as a purpose-built home for eight children in 1952 on the newly-built Woodthorpe Farm estate.
The home was part of a programme of new children’s homes, each built on newly developing housing estates, which were to be family group homes – a move away from the pre-Second World War larger children’s homes. These homes were designed to be a small ‘family’ unit in a house that looked like much any other on the estate, with live-in houseparents. The first of these homes was completed in 1951, and a further 11 followed, one of which was 18 Sunderton.
A year later, a second children’s home was opened on the same road – 196 Sunderton Road.
18 Sunderton Road, unlike its near neighbour 196 Sunderton Road, did not extend beyond its original 8 beds. Both boys and girls were in residence.
By 1981, 18 Sunderton Road, as 196 Sunderton Road, was being used as a residential nursery. However, this role did not last long as the Council closed all its residential nurseries at the start of the 1980s. Instead, very young children were to be found foster homes.
18 Sunderton Road reverted to being a children's home for older children until it closed in 1986 as part of the general policy of closing Birmingham Council-run children's homes. At the time of the closure the officer in charge was Jill Plumley.
The building was demolished when the area was redeveloped in the early 2000s.
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Image: A publicity shot from a 1967 Children's Department leaflet. At this stage, the Birmingham Children's Homes Project does not have any photographs of this children's home.
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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.