Object Lesson III

Park Farm, Late 1920s – 1939

The Bethlem Royal Hospital acquired Park Farm when it purchased the Beckenham land as the site for their new Hospital buildings in the late 1920s.

The Farm had cows, pigs and poultry as well as arable crops. In the early 1930s the Hospital spent significant sums of money on laying roads around the Farm and renovating the Farm buildings, creating new cowsheds, piggeries and poultry houses as well as installing mains water. Farm staff with specific skills in caring for pigs, cows and chickens were employed. Both pig and chicken breeding were undertaken. Farm staff mostly lived on site in Farm cottages and flats.