Entrance Turnstile Building (Stourbridge)

 1932_construction, Grade II Listed (UK), turnstile pavilion

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A sports ground entrance building with turnstiles and payment booths of 1932, donated by Ernest Stevens. The land on which the Stourbridge Athletics Ground is situated was known in the C17 as Gibbon’s Piece and was originally one of the open fields in the manor of Amblecote known as ’Watery Fields’. From the early C19 cricket was played on the ground, under the patronage of the Earl of Stamford, who owned the land. Stourbridge Football Club began using the ground from 1888. In 1927, as a result of the Public Health Act of 1925, the borough bought the land and, following this purchase the Football Club paid for new stands. At the same time, several more of the ground’s buildings, including the entrance archway (opened in 1928), the northern turnstile building (1932) and sports pavilion (1928) were all, to some degree, the gift of Ernest Stevens, a local JP and hollow ware manufacturer, who was a noted philanthropist in Stourbridge. Worcestershire County cricket matches were played here between 1905 and 1981 and the ground is still used by Stourbridge FC.