ABOUT THE SOCIETY
Since 1981, the Wychwoods Local History Society has been discovering, recording and sharing the history of this remarkable corner of West Oxfordshire.
From photographs and documents to oral histories, original research and personal memories, the Society preserves the evidence of everyday life in the Wychwoods and helps make it accessible to everyone.
HOW IT BEGAN
During the 1970s and early 1980s, local resident Margaret Ware found that older people she met would often tell her fragments of village history: memories, stories and local traditions which had seldom been written down.
She realised that much of this knowledge could disappear as generations passed. At around the same time, Shipton resident Mike Linfield had developed an interest in copying and preserving old photographs.
From those shared concerns came the idea of creating a local history society.
THE WYCHWOODS
On the edge of the former Royal Forest of Wychwood, Shipton under Wychwood, Milton under Wychwood and Ascott under Wychwood are adjacent villages in the valley of the river Evenlode in West Oxfordshire, on the eastern edge of the Cotswold Hills.
Shipton was the mother church for the old ecclesiastical parish which included Shipton, Milton, Lyneham, Langley, Leafield and Ramsden.
These neighbouring communities have long been connected by landscape, agriculture, work, worship and family. Their histories overlap, but each has developed its own character, traditions and stories.
The Society explores both: the individual histories of the villages and the wider story of the Wychwoods and the communities around them.
PLACE & LANDSCAPE
The history of the Wychwoods is inseparable from the landscape around them.
For generations, village life was shaped by the land, by agriculture and local trades, by the routes connecting neighbouring communities and by the changing ways in which people lived and worked.
Buildings acquire new uses. Fields and roads change. Familiar views evolve. Yet the landscape remains a thread connecting the Wychwoods of the past with the villages we know today.
Understanding those changes — and the lives lived within them — lies at the heart of the Society’s work.
THE SOCIETY’S COLLECTION
Over more than four decades, photographs, documents, recordings, memories and research have been entrusted to the Society. Together they form an extraordinary record of life in the Wychwoods.
READ
Research, personal memories, journal articles and stories drawn from the history of the Wychwoods.
EXPLORE
Discover historic photographs of the villages, their buildings, landscapes, activities and people.
LISTEN
Hear voices from the Wychwoods through oral histories, interviews and surviving Society recordings.
WATCH
Watch surviving films, recorded presentations and glimpses of village life from the recent past.
RESEARCH & PUBLICATIONS
The Society has never simply collected history. Its members have helped to uncover it.
Over the years their work has included oral-history projects, archaeological field walking, church surveys, hedge dating, family-history research and detailed investigation of local buildings, people and events.
Much of this original work was published in the Society’s annual journal, Wychwoods History, which ran from 1985 until 2016.
Thirty-one editions created a substantial body of research into the area. They have now been digitised, allowing that work to remain accessible to future researchers.
The Society has also published books and special studies, including photographic histories of the villages and That’s How It Was, recording women’s experiences of life in the Wychwoods during the Second World War.
ORAL HISTORY
Documents tell us a great deal about the past. Memories tell us things documents cannot.
An important part of the Society’s work has therefore been recording the experiences of people who lived through the changing Wychwoods of the twentieth century.
Their voices describe childhood, school, work, wartime, village characters, celebrations and everyday life.
These recordings preserve not only information but voices, expressions and recollections that would otherwise have disappeared.
TALKS, EVENTS & EXHIBITIONS
History is something to share.
From September to May the Society holds a programme of evening talks exploring local history and a much wider range of historical subjects. Visitors as well as members are welcome.
Over the years the Society has also organised exhibitions, excursions, research projects and displays, including regular exhibitions at Wychwood Library.
These activities bring together people who have spent a lifetime in the villages with those who have only recently discovered them.
A LIVING ARCHIVE
Our archive does not end at some convenient date in the past.
The Wychwoods continue to change. Buildings disappear or acquire new uses. Businesses open and close. Families arrive and leave. Traditions evolve. Landscapes alter.
The photographs taken today, the memories people record and the documents we preserve will become the historical evidence of tomorrow.
That means recording local history is never finished.
We welcome photographs, memories, information and original research which can help us understand the Wychwoods more fully. We are particularly keen to identify people and places appearing in historic photographs where information has been lost.
THE SOCIETY TODAY
The Wychwoods Local History Society remains a voluntary organisation run by and for people interested in the history of the area.
You do not need to be a historian, an academic or a long-standing resident of the Wychwoods.
You might want to attend an occasional talk. You might be researching your family. You might recognise somebody in one of our photographs. You might have memories of village life to contribute. Or you may simply be curious about the place in which you live.
All are welcome.
DISCOVER MORE
OUR STORY
From an inaugural meeting attended by more than eighty people in 1981 to today’s physical and digital archives.
THE COLLECTION
Discover the physical collection where documents, books, photographs and records are preserved for research.
THE SOCIETY
Read the formal aims, organisation and governance of the Wychwoods Local History Society.
THE NEXT CHAPTER
A photograph is labelled. A memory is written down. A document is saved rather than thrown away. A story is passed on.
For more than forty years, people across the Wychwoods have helped the Society do exactly that.