Restoring Stonehenge and the Stonehenge Aerodrome Reports

Two excellent reports have just been released by English Heritage - go get 'em!

http://research.english-heritage.org.uk/Report.aspx?i=15238

Title	'Restoring' Stonehenge 1881-1939
Summary	Stonehenge was transformed considerably during the 20th century, the monument itself being subjected to more intervention and alteration from 1901 than at any time since the Bronze Age. Some of the most important episodes of excavation at Stonehenge during the 20th century were driven by a desire to interfere with the monument’s physical appearance, often but not always due to concerns about stability. The romantic ruin of previous generations – leaning monoliths, twisted trilithons and recumbent sarsens – was rationalised into a more upright, orderly design and secured for posterity with concrete. At the same time, the visibility of the enclosing earthworks was enhanced for the paying visitor, the enclosure ditch only partially backfilled and surplus material spread across the site to conceal old trackways. 1901 was also the year that the monument was first enclosed and an admission charge introduced, both intended as means of controlling the numbers and types of visitor. This report pays close attention to the circumstances surrounding three key episodes – the appearance in 1881 of some timber supports; the straightening and concreting of the massive Stone 56 in 1901; and the uncompleted ‘reparations’ of 1919-20.
Series	Research Department Reports
Pages	144
Authors	Barber, M
Keywords	Aerial Photograph Interpretation ,  Aerial Photography ,  Conservation
Hyperlinks	'Restoring' Stonehenge 1881-1939 (PDF) 'Restoring' Stonehenge 1881-1939 File size: 7.44 MB

http://research.english-heritage.org.uk/Report.aspx?i=15239

Title	Stonehenge Aerodrome and the Stonehenge Landscape
Summary	Between 1917 and 1921, Stonehenge had an aerodrome for a near-neighbour. Initially a Royal Flying Corps training establishment, from January 1918 it became the No. 1 School of Aerial Navigation and Bomb Dropping, home to a contingent of RNAS Handley Page bombers. The aerodrome featured two camps either side of a take-off and landing ground, the first located close to Fargo Plantation, and a subsequent and more substantial technical and domestic site situated either side of what is now the A303, a few hundred yards west of Stonehenge. After the war, the aerodrome buildings became the focus of debate about what constituted unacceptable modern intrusions in the Stonehenge landscape. Converted to both agricultural and domestic use, the hangars and accommodation blocks prompted the first demands to ‘restore’ the Stonehenge landscape – not to what it had been prior to the war, but to something deemed more appropriate as a setting for the monument. Following a public appeal, the aerodrome and neighbouring farmland was purchased, the buildings dismantled and removed, and the land handed to the National Trust. The result was intended to be a landscape freed from “the restless and commonplace current of every day life”.
Series	Research Department Reports
Pages	116
Authors	Barber, M
Keywords	Aerial Photograph Interpretation ,  Aerial Photography ,  Airfield ,  First World War ,  landscape
Hyperlinks	Stonehenge Aerodrome and the Stonehenge Landscape (PDF) Stonehenge Aerodrome and the Stonehenge Landscape File size: 15.59 MB