Grazebrook Park

The park was created as a present to the local community by the Grazebrook family who owned local mines in the area.

To commemorate the end of World War 1 a war memorial was placed in the centre of the park as a tribute to soldiers who served and died for their country in the Great War. The original park was much bigger when it first opened, bordering on the old Blows Green Railway Station.

The station served Woodside and the Netherton areas including Old Hill before being axed in 1962.The station building is still standing today as a listed building, just behind Grazebrook Park. Like Buffery Park bushes and shrubs and remnants of pre-war fencing line the periphery of the park.

There used to be a park shed at the entrance of the park and a vast children’s play area at the bottom of the park. A bricked youth shelter with toilet facilities was also on the site. As with Buffery Park budget cuts took their toll. The shelter and the toilets were demolished in the 1970’s. The play park was so run down by the mid 1990’s that it was deemed a health and safety risk and was removed in 1996, leaving the area with no play facilities at all. The park got smaller too with the Dudley Bypass cutting through the open land so that you could no longer see the old Blows green station in the distance, although the land backed onto the old railway track. For many children that grew up round the area Grazebrook Park will always be known as the “swing park”.