North Finchley facts for kids
Quick facts for kids North Finchley |
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 High-rise at Tally Ho Corner |
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 North Finchley
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| OS grid reference | TQ265925 |
| London borough | |
| Ceremonial county | Greater London |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | LONDON |
| Postcode district | N12 |
| Dialling code | 020 |
| Police | Metropolitan |
| Fire | London |
| Ambulance | London |
| EU Parliament | London |
| UK Parliament |
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| London Assembly |
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North Finchley is a busy part of London. It is located in the London Borough of Barnet, about 7 miles (11 km) north-west of Charing Cross, a famous spot in central London. North Finchley is centered around a place called Tally Ho Corner. This is where several roads meet, leading to places like East Finchley, Church End, Friern Barnet, and Whetstone. Church End is also known as Finchley Central because of the tube station there.
North Finchley has many useful things for people who live there or visit. You can find parks like Victoria Park, which are great for relaxing or playing. Getting around is easy too, thanks to many bus routes and nearby tube stations. Stations like Woodside Park and Finchley Central make it simple to travel to central London and other areas.
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What Makes North Finchley Special?
North Finchley is mostly a place where people live and shop. It has many supermarkets and different kinds of restaurants. A special place called the artsdepot opened on October 23, 2004. It is a community arts center with a gallery, a studio, and a theater. The artsdepot was built to make the area more lively. It filled a space where an old cinema and an outdoor market used to be.
Most of the houses in North Finchley were built in the 1800s. You can see charming Victorian cottages and larger Victorian houses. Closer to Woodside Park and Nether Street, you'll find many homes in the Edwardian style. There are also some newer houses, built between the 1930s and 1960s, towards Friern Barnet. Some very grand mansion-style homes are on Friern Barnet Lane. At Tally Ho Corner, above the artsdepot, there are modern flats with great views over Mill Hill and Hertfordshire. There are not many council housing areas here. The largest one is in Woodside Park, where former Spice Girl Emma Bunton grew up.
Getting Around North Finchley
A new bus station in North Finchley opened in 2004. However, it closed a few months later due to safety concerns after an accident. After safety improvements were made, the bus station reopened in March 2007.
The bus station serves many routes, including 13, 125, 221 (to Edgware), 460, 683, SL1, and SL10. If you go south on the Great North Road, you can catch routes like 112, 134, 221 (to Turnpike Lane), 263, 383, 626, and the night bus route N271.
The area is also served by two tube stations: West Finchley and Woodside Park. Both are on the High Barnet branch of the Northern line, which is part of the London Underground network.
A Look at North Finchley's Past
The area of Finchley became an urban district in 1894. This meant it was a special area with its own local government. It was part of Middlesex county back then. In 1932, it became the Municipal Borough of Finchley. But in 1965, this borough was removed, and North Finchley became part of the larger London Borough of Barnet.
A very famous politician, Margaret Thatcher, was elected as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Finchley in 1959. She served as an MP until she retired from the House of Commons in 1992.
Tally Ho Corner and the High Road's Story
The area of North Finchley and Whetstone was first called North End in 1462. North Finchley did not become a town until after 1816. Before that, in 1627, a man named Thomas Rawson built a windmill and a house. By 1722, this place also became an inn called the Windmill. Later, in 1754, it was called the Swan with Two Nicks and was no longer a mill. Today, this spot is a police garage.
Ballards Lane is a very old road, likely named after the Ballard family from around 1300. For many years, it did not connect to the High Road. It ended near where Victoria Park is now. In 1756, a raised path was built from the end of Ballards Lane to the High Road. This made North Finchley an important road junction. This suggests Ballards Lane was already part of a route from London to the Great North Road.
The name Tally Ho came about in the 1830s. A company with the same name used the corner as a stop for their horse-drawn coaches. They kept 16 horses there. After 1816, when the common land was divided, and a new road was built along Ballards Lane in the 1820s, North Finchley started to grow into a suburb.
Charles Jacques built 21 small houses in Lodge Lane around 1824. He also built Torrington Cottage for himself. By the 1830s, more houses appeared. In 1837, a small chapel, called "Cottagers Chapel," was made from the stables of Orchard Cottage.
By 1839, North Finchley had at least five shops, including a blacksmith. These shops were on Lodge Lane, not the High Road. Lodge Lane was also home to Private John Parr, the first British soldier killed in World War I. The famous actor David Jason also lived there.
In 1851, a regular bus service ran from the Torrington to Charing Cross. Train connections to London were also made, first at New Southgate. During the 1850s and 1860s, new streets like Woodside Lane, Torrington Park, Friern Park, Grove Road, and Finsbury Road (now Finchley Park) were created. In 1872, the Edgware, Highgate and London Railway opened Torrington Park Station, which was renamed Woodside Park in 1882.
While a railway was being built through Finchley from 1864, a Reverend Henry Stephens started a mission for the workers. A church was built by 1869 and officially opened in 1870 as Christ Church. It became a new church area in 1872. By 1874, there were about 350 homes in this church area.
In 1905, the Metropolitan Electric Tramways opened a tram line between Highgate and Whetstone. Another tram line from New Southgate to Golders Green crossed it from 1909. To help with this, a tram depot was opened in Woodberry Grove. Trams and motorbus services helped the shopping area we see today grow.
In the 1930s, the old Ballards Lane was replaced by a new road called Kingsway. The old lane ended where the Embassy Lounge (now a pub) is today. In 1937, the new space created by this road change became the location for the Gaumont Cinema. This cinema was taken down in 1987 and replaced by the Arts Depot.
The Finchley Meeting House, where local Quakers worship, was built on Alexandra Grove in 1967. Quakers had been meeting in the area since 1945.
Woodhouse and the Rough Lots Area
The Woodhouse area of Finchley started with three houses called the Woodhouses before 1655. In the mid-1700s, there was one house of this name, and it was home to a famous plasterer named Thomas Collins. The house was rebuilt in 1888. In 1925, it became Woodhouse Grammar School, which is now Woodhouse College.
Summers Lane has existed since at least the 1700s as a shortcut from the main road to Friern Barnet. Below it, to the east, is a small forest called Coppetts Wood. This is one of the last parts of the old medieval Finchley Wood. Near Coppetts Wood, a sewage farm was set up by Finchley in 1885. This farm treated waste water. In 1961, the area's sewage was sent to a different treatment plant, so only the manager's cottage remains.
A small hospital with 18 beds was built for people with infectious diseases. It later became Coppetts Wood Hospital.
After the land was divided, the eastern end of Summers Lane was developed by Henry Dunger. He owned the Flower Pot brewery from the 1830s to the 1870s.
The area commonly called the Rough Lots, also known as the Glebe Land, was where John Lawford's brick works operated from 1879 until the early 1900s. During World War I, a gun battery was placed where Summers Lane meets the High Road. This was to defend against early German air raids.
Finchley football club (now Wingate and Finchley F.C.), started in 1874, began playing football on the Glebe Lands in 1932. Ken Aston, a former president of the club, was the person who created the system of red and yellow cards used by football referees.
The Finchley Lido was a swimming pool opened by Finchley Borough Council in September 1931. It was a beautiful art deco building. The main pool was heated until World War II. During the 1948 Olympic Games, the pool was used for water polo. The pool was the first part of a larger plan for Finchley, which was supposed to include a Town Hall. Plans for the Town Hall were drawn up in 1936 but never built.
In 1938, the War Office built a drill hall at the bottom of the hill. This was for the 61 Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regt RA (TA), also known as the T.A. centre. The outdoor pool closed in 1992 and was replaced by the current complex in May 1996. The T.A. centre was taken down in 2004.
Fallow Corner's History
The area of Fallow Corner was first mentioned in 1429. It was probably Cobley's Farm. By the 1700s, there was a small group of houses and roads connecting them to the main road, forming the distinct Bow Road we see today.
Between 1806 and 1827, the famous clown Joseph Grimaldi lived here. While helping Grimaldi write his life story, Charles Dickens likely stayed at the farm in 1836 and 1837. Later, in 1843, Dickens returned and wrote parts of his novel Martin Chuzzlewit. He thought of the character 'Sairey' Gamp while walking in Finchley. The farm's fields were used for building houses as the Etchingham Park Estate between 1878 and 1920. The farm itself disappeared in 1905.
Two important places were built in the fields within the curve of Bow Lane. Finchley Cottage Hospital opened with 18 beds in 1908. It was renamed the Finchley Memorial Hospital in 1922. The first hospital was paid for by donations. The later additions were built as a memorial to the Finchley people who died in World War I. Finchley County School opened in 1903. Dame Evelyn Turner (1910–1993), whose life partly inspired the TV series Tenko, went to school here. The school building was taken down in 2004.
Moss Hall and Woodside Park Areas
On the north-western edge of Finchley Common, there were four houses by the 1600s. At Nether Street was Moss Hall, named after a house that might have existed in the 1400s. It was definitely there in the 1700s. The house was taken down in 1927 after many homes were built on its land after the 1860s. The name lives on in street names like Moss Hall Grove. Until the 1990s, there was a pub called the Moss Hall Tavern, which is now called the Elephant Inn.
Further up was Court House. This might have been the house owned by the Peacock Family in 1664, who owned Frith Manor. Before Frith manor house was built in 1790, Court House was the main house of the estate. It's possible that important court meetings for the area were held here, which is how it got its name. The house was taken down, and the rest of the land was sold in 1936.
Finchley Lodge (which gave Lodge Lane its name) might have existed by 1564 and was certainly there by 1667. Finally, there was Woodside House. This was possibly a medieval property, but it was known by 1699. A small group of houses grew around it by the 1750s. By the 1800s, it was called Woodside Farm. When the land was left to Henry Holden, after whom Holden Road is named, it was developed into houses as the Woodside Park Estate. Holden built a community hall, Woodside Hall, in 1885. In 1950, it was turned into a synagogue. St Barnabas church started as a small chapel in 1885 and became a proper church in 1912. Spike Milligan, the famous comedian, lived in Holden Road.
