Public Services.
A whipping post and
stocks were erected in 1680. In 1749 there were
complaints of 'idle and disordered' people
destroying and stealing farmers' property. A
parish cage was built following vestry resolutions
of 1757 and 1791. The cage, called the Round
House and repaired in 1798 and 1830, was in
High Road near the church and was demolished
in 1841, when its materials were used for the new
National school building. (fn. 42) By 1828 the two
parish constables were aided by a Bow Street
horse patrol along 5½ miles of public road. (fn. 43)
There were policemen at Stonebridge in 1839, (fn. 44)
and in 1840 Willesden joined the Metropolitan
police district. (fn. 45) By 1851 there were police
stations at Stonebridge and in Kilburn Lane. (fn. 46)
The Stonebridge station had by 1871 been
replaced by a station at Fortune Gate in the
junction between St. Mary's Road and Harrow
Road. (fn. 47) In 1913 the Harlesden station moved to
its present site at the junction of Craven Park and
West Ella Road. (fn. 48) Kilburn was served by successive stations at Kempshall Terrace, Edgware
Road (c. 1873-1885), nos. 11-13 High Road
(1885-c. 1892), and Salusbury Road from c. 1892
until it closed in 1938. (fn. 49) The building was
bombed during the Second World War and from
1965 a temporary station on the site (fn. 50) was used
until a permanent station was opened in 1980. (fn. 51)
Willesden Green station was opened at the
junction of High Road and Huddlestone Road in
1896. (fn. 52)
Willesden petty sessional court opened in St.
Mary's Road, Harlesden, in 1887 and was rebuilt
in 1889. Its jurisdiction includes Acton and
Chiswick. (fn. 53) Willesden was subject to the jurisdiction of Marylebone county court until 1931
when a county court was opened at Craven Park,
in the former high school. It was replaced in 1970
by a new county court in Acton Lane. (fn. 54)
A salaried fire-engine keeper was appointed
in 1840 (fn. 55) and the office, usually combined
with those of constable and beadle, continued
until 1884. (fn. 56) Following a disastrous fire at the
windmill on Shoot-up Hill, which exposed the
inadequacy of the fire service, the Kilburn,
Willesden, and St. John's Wood volunteer fire
brigade was established in 1863. (fn. 57) Equipped with
a steam engine by 1872, it covered the eastern
part of the parish from headquarters in Bridge
Street, Kilburn, until control passed to the local
board c. 1892. A new fire station in Salusbury
Road, opened in 1894, served the Kilburn area
until the Second World War. (fn. 58) Willesden volunteer fire brigade was founded in Church End in
1872 and was not officially disbanded until 1932,
although it had ceased to function by 1910. Its
main station was at the White Horse, Church
End, until c. 1888 and then at the vestry hall in
Neasden Lane. A small sub-station opened in
Harlesden in 1883. The brigade bought a steam
engine in 1888. The local authority had taken
control by 1895. A temporary building in Harlesden Road in 1910 replaced the former Harlesden station and was replaced in turn by the
central station in Pound Lane in 1934. A station
opened at Stonebridge in 1932 and closed in
1960. (fn. 59)
In 1827, following a complaint that the
sick poor in Willesden were left at the cage,
a magistrate ordered the churchwardens to
provide a more suitable place. (fn. 60) The local board's
first sanitary report in 1875 revealed a death rate
of over 24 per 1,000 (compared with the average
22) and the very high rate of 45 (compared with
the average 32) for children under 5 years.
Kilburn was the most unhealthy district, with
diarrhoea, tuberculosis, and respiratory disease
especially prevalent; in more rural districts there
was much typhoid because of open drains. (fn. 61) In
1876 the board appointed a medical officer of
health, arranged for smallpox patients to be sent
to Highgate and fever patients, though not
paupers, to be sent to the London Fever Hospital,
and pleaded for a hospital in Willesden. (fn. 62) The
Kilburn, Maida Vale, and St. John's Wood
general dispensary at no. 13 Kilburn Park Road
(outside the boundary) was the only medical
institution in the area in 1890. (fn. 63) The philanthropist Passmore Edwards paid for the cottage
hospital named after him which opened in 1893
in Harlesden Road, with three wards accommodating 24 patients. It was extended in 1899,
again after the First World War when it was
renamed Willesden General hospital, and in
1926, by which time it had beds for 104 patients. (fn. 64)
There were 127 beds for acute cases by 1950. (fn. 65)
In 1894 the local authority built an isolation
hospital on a 10-a. site in Dog Lane, Neasden.
After extension in 1904 the hospital provided
beds for 150, (fn. 66) and changed its name to Willesden Municipal hospital during the First World
War. In 1921 it was argued that it should be
extended as a general hospital, (fn. 67) but it again
became a fever hospital, with 138 beds, in 1922 (fn. 68)
and was extended in the 1930s, until by 1936 it
had 200 beds. An eye block was added in 1958, (fn. 69)
but the number of beds had been reduced by
1975 to 175 and in 1978 it was a geriatric
hospital. (fn. 70) By 1901 St. Monica's Home for sick
and incurable children, which had opened in the
Hampstead part of Kilburn before 1890, had
moved to Brondesbury Park. (fn. 71) It was closed as a
children's home c. 1950 and reopened with 35
beds for chronic cases, becoming a geriatric
hospital by 1975. (fn. 72) In 1901 the district council
built a temporary smallpox hospital in Honeypot
Lane, Kingsbury. (fn. 73) In 1929 Willesden joined the
county council smallpox scheme and in 1931
opened the Kingsbury building as a maternity
hospital, which it remained until it became
a mental hospital in the 1970s. (fn. 74)
For a few years after it separated from Hendon
union in 1896 the Willesden board of guardians
used a former private house as an infirmary. In
1897 it acquired a 60-a. site in Acton Lane where
a 'splendid new building' designed by Alfred
Saxon Snell opened in 1903. It accommodated
400 people of whom 150 were sick; from 1907 it
was used exclusively for the sick and was called
Willesden Workhouse infirmary. When the
boards of guardians were abolished in 1929 it
became the Central Middlesex County hospital,
also known as the Willesden Institution and the
Park Royal hospital. Extensions were made in
1908, 1911, and 1914 and by 1930 it had 689
beds. There were further extensions and by 1939
there were 890 beds, but the buildings were badly
damaged during the Second World War. (fn. 75) An
extension housing 28 maternity beds was added
in 1966 (fn. 76) but the total number of beds was
reduced to c. 736, mainly for acute cases. (fn. 77)
St. Andrew's Roman Catholic hospital in
Dollis Hill Lane, financed by Marguerite Amice
Piou and administered by the Sisters of the Little
Company of Mary, opened in 1913 with 100
beds; enlargements in 1929, 1952, and 1963 raised
the number of beds to 141, mostly for acute and
chronic cases. Plastic surgery techniques were
pioneered there in the 1930s but the hospital did
not become part of the National Health Service
and in 1972 was sold to Brent council which
closed it a year later. (fn. 78) No. 14 Stonebridge Park,
used as a military hospital during the First World
War along with the Grove, Neasden, and Dollis
Hill House, (fn. 79) became the Edgar Lee Home for
boys with rheumatic hearts. (fn. 80)
The local authority appointed a health visitor
in 1903 and began a policy of providing clinics
and disease prevention (fn. 81) which developed with
the appointment of G. F. Buchan as medical
officer in 1912. (fn. 82) In that year the council published schemes for an ambulance service and for a
sanatorium and dispensaries to treat tuberculosis. (fn. 83) In the event the county council took
control of tuberculosis treatment, establishing
clinics at Pound Lane and in Priory Park Road,
Kilburn. (fn. 84) The death rate steadily declined from
over 24 per 1,000 in 1875 to under 10 in 1910 and
the infant mortality rate, 162 per 1,000 births in
1885, to 80. (fn. 85) An advice centre was opened for
mothers at Lower Place and in 1913 a ringworm
clinic was opened which later included eye treatment. (fn. 86) Maternity and child welfare centres were
opened at Willesden Lane, Kilburn, in 1916 and
at High Road, Willesden Green, in 1918. Midwives and home helps were provided for mothers
in what was described as 'the most complete and
comprehensive scheme of maternity and child
welfare evolved by a municipal council'. (fn. 87) Dental
clinics for mothers and children were also established and more health visitors appointed. (fn. 88) The
cost was criticized by the ratepayers association,
the medical profession, which attacked Willesden's 'municipal socialism', and the Minister of
Health; health was the main issue in the local
elections of 1922, and with Labour's defeat the
scheme was curtailed, maternity cases being in
future referred to Park Royal hospital. (fn. 89) The
Conservative administration, in control until
1933, limited the expansion of the municipal
hospital and restricted, but did not close, the
clinics; in 1930 it opened a third clinic at Stonebridge. (fn. 90) Immunization against diphtheria was
introduced in 1927 and two cancer clinics were
opened in 1929. A midwives scheme was introduced in 1937. (fn. 91) Many overseas visitors came to
see Willesden's advanced medical administration
under Buchan, who became one of the founders
of the National Health Service. (fn. 92)
Under the National Health Act, 1946, the two
municipal hospitals in Neasden and Kingsbury,
the county hospital at Park Royal, and Willesden
General hospital in Harlesden Road were
grouped together under the North-West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board. The health
centres serving Willesden Green, Kilburn, and
Stonebridge passed under the control of the
county council. (fn. 93) A new maternity and school
clinic opened in Pound Lane in 1957, another
clinic in Neasden by 1960 and by 1969 there were
eight clinics in the Willesden part of Brent. (fn. 94) In
the 1950s overcrowding, atmospheric pollution,
and Irish immigration made tuberculosis a
special problem: in 1955 one third of the beds in
the tubercular unit at Park Royal were occupied
by Irish although they formed less than one
twentieth of Willesden's population. (fn. 95) A health
centre opened in Craven Park in 1972. The
health authority was reorganized in 1974 as Brent
health district. (fn. 96)
A burial board formed in 1866 opened Willesden cemetery and two mortuaries in 1868 on 5 a.
next to St. Mary's churchyard. (fn. 97) The board
bought 26 a. in 1888 to form Willesden New
Cemetery, opened in 1893, with Anglican and
nonconformist chapels and a central tower in an
elaborate Gothic style. (fn. 98) In 1895 the powers
of the burial board passed to Willesden
U.D.C. which c. 1928 purchased 33½a. in southeast Kingsbury as an additional cemetery. (fn. 99)
A mortuary formed part of the public buildings
erected in Salusbury Road in 1894. (fn. 1) Willesden is
divided into two natural drainage areas, the
south-east corner (Kilburn, Kensal Green, and
part of Harlesden) draining into the Kilburn
brook and the rest of the parish into the Brent. (fn. 2)
From 1807 the south-eastern area was under the
control of the metropolitan commissioners.
Landowners paid rates and made their own drains
which connected to the metropolitan system by
means of the Ranelagh sewer (the culverted
Kilburn brook). An Act of 1855 replaced the
commissioners by the Metropolitan Board of
Works and redefined its area of jurisdiction,
excluding suburban areas like Kilburn. Building
in Kilburn accelerated from that time and the
new houses continued to drain into the metropolitan system, overburdening the sewers, particularly at their junction at Kilburn bridge. In
1878 the board sued for an injunction prohibiting
the drainage of any new building in Willesden
parish into the Ranelagh sewer; in 1883 the
injunction was refused in respect of Kilburn but
granted in respect of Harlesden. (fn. 3)
The rest of the parish used open ditches, about
which there were complaints in 1846. (fn. 4) In 1855
the vestry appointed a sewer committee which
reported defective drainage but failed to take
action and died in 1866. In 1871 the vestry, under
pressure from Harlesden ratepayers, levied a
sewer rate to build a sewer at Harlesden; (fn. 5) in 1875
the local board became the sanitary authority,
and some drainage works had been constructed at
Stonebridge Park and Nicoll Road, Harlesden,
by 1877. (fn. 6) In 1880 the board acquired land for a
sewage outfall near the Brent at Stonebridge, and
in 1882 the watershed was accepted as the
boundary between the two areas, named Metropolitan and Brent, each separately rated. The
sewage farm at Stonebridge, completed in 1886, (fn. 7)
had expanded by 1898, (fn. 8) and a new sewage farm
was built in 1904. (fn. 9) It continued in use, draining
into the Brent, until 1911 when, under an Act of
1908, a sewer connecting with the L.C.C. system
was completed. (fn. 10)
There were only two or three wells from
borings in the parish in the mid 19th century, one
of them sunk at Willesden Green c. 1830. Most
people relied on rainwater cisterns and ponds
until companies began supplying water in the late
19th century. (fn. 11) The West Middlesex Water Co.
supplied water until 1903 when it was superseded
in Willesden by the Metropolitan Water Board,
which had reservoirs at Harlesden Road and at
St. Michael's Road, Cricklewood, where it also
had a pumping station. (fn. 12) The latter survived in
1978 as the Cricklewood works of the Thames
Water Authority.
Public meetings in 1883 resulted in a petition
to the Corporation of the City of London to
purchase the former agricultural show site
as a park (fn. 13) for the densely populated Kilburn
district. (fn. 14) The Church Commissioners, who
owned the 30-a. site, presented it to the corporation, which opened Queen's Park there in 1887,
naming it in honour of the queen's jubilee.
Willesden local board acquired 26 a. at Harlesden,
part of the Roundwood House estate, which it
opened as a park in 1895. (fn. 15) With aid from the
county council, the urban district bought most of
the Dollis Hill House estate in 1900: most of the
96-a. Gladstone Park was left as it was, the
parkland and gardens of a country house, while
29 a. south of the railway became sports grounds.
The council bought the house in 1908, opening it
a year later as refreshment rooms. (fn. 16) Willesden
U.D.C. in 1909 bought 31 a. at Harlesden,
opened as the King Edward VII recreation
ground and later called Willesden sports centre. (fn. 17)
The council bought 14 a. near Gibbons Road in
1925 for playing fields, (fn. 18) and Neasden (20 a.) and
Stonebridge (11 a.) recreation grounds had also
been acquired by 1931, by which time there were
228 a. of public open space in Willesden. No new
parks were acquired, and in 1949 public and
private open space together totalled 564 a.,
compared with the 1,324 a. thought necessary for
Willesden's population. (fn. 19) By 1966 the reduction
in the population had relieved some of the
pressure on the open spaces, but there had been
no increase in the parks and playing fields
accessible to the public. (fn. 20)
In 1849 the lighting provisions of the Lighting
and Watching Act, 1833, were adopted for
a small portion of Kilburn near Kilburn Bridge;
five inspectors were appointed and rates levied.
The lighted portion was extended along Edgware
Road in 1861 and by 1867 it reached northward
to Walm Lane and westward to Willesden
Green. (fn. 21) The Gas Light & Coke Co., which
supplied the gas, was still laying mains in 1895. (fn. 22)
In 1898 the U.D.C. appointed an electrical
engineer and was authorized to supply electricity. In 1903 it built a generating station in
Taylors Lane, which it sold to the North Metropolitan Electric Power Supply Co. in 1904. (fn. 23) By
1908 the lighting of c. 4½ miles of principal roads
had been converted from gas to electricity. (fn. 24) All
the streets were electrically lit by the early 1920s,
when electric dust-carts were also introduced. (fn. 25)
Taylors Lane power station, with a staff of 200,
closed in 1972. (fn. 26)
In 1891 the local board adopted the Free
Libraries Act and opened three libraries in 1894:
Kilburn, the largest, as part of the complex of
public buildings in Salusbury Road, (fn. 27) Harlesden
in Craven Park Road (then called High Road),
and Willesden Green on the south side of High
Road. (fn. 28) Willesden Green was extended in 1907.
Mark Twain performed the opening of a fourth
library, at Bathurst Gardens in Kensal Rise, in
1900. It was extended in 1904 and 1926. Other
libraries were opened at Olive Road, Cricklewood, in 1929 and on the North Circular Road at
Neasden in 1931. (fn. 29)
A public open-air swimming pool, the first in
the country, was opened in Gladstone Park in
1903. Others were opened in the King Edward
VII recreation ground in 1911 and at Craven
Park in 1936. (fn. 30) In 1937 an indoor swimming
bath, slipper baths, and a public laundry were
built in Granville Road. (fn. 31) Slipper baths opened
at Park Royal about the same time. (fn. 32) The Willesden sports centre, opened in 1965, included a
swimming pool and baths. (fn. 33)
From 1933 to 1957 Willesden's rubbish was
dumped on open ground at Twyford tip by the
North Circular Road; thereafter it was sent to
Yiewsley. (fn. 34)
Nurseries were introduced for the children of
women working in munitions factories in the
First World War. (fn. 35) At the end of the Second
World War there were 12 nurseries. They had
been reduced to nine by 1964 when two were
opened in South Kilburn, and others were added
shortly afterwards at Harlesden and Cricklewood. (fn. 36) By 1976 there were five day nurseries,
two nursery schools and in addition schools with
nursery departments. (fn. 37)
Willesden old people's welfare committee was
established in 1958, provided with money and
staff by the council. (fn. 38) In 1969 the council maintained 10 homes for the elderly. (fn. 39) The local
council of social service was reorganized in 1960
with a grant from the borough council. (fn. 40)
The Willesden International Friendship committee was formed in 1958 to deal with the
problems of immigration. The council appointed
a liaison officer in 1960 and opened a community
relations centre at Dollis Hill in 1972. (fn. 41)