Greenwall Farm, formerly Mid Greenwall

Image: © Ian Dodds Taken: 11 Jul 2022

At some point between the last published OS paper map, copyrighted 2015, and today, this big farm changed its name. And not for the first time. It is first shown on reliable mapping as 'Easter Greenwell'. (All the various 'Greenwall' properties round here used to be 'Greenwell's - they didn't change until some way into the 20th Century, and why they morphed into having such an improbable name so recently is a little odd.) At some stage in the late 19th Century somebody built a short-lived property to the NorthEast, bringing about the first name change. I'm not sure if the mapmaker made a mistake, or there was a naming dispute going on for a while, but at least one OS map shows two 'Easter Greenwell's. The unusual bumpy fenced-off semi-circular area in front of the farm certainly looks man-made, but it is impossible to know for sure. Any activity that may have caused it predated the first OS map made round here, surveyed in the 1850s, which shows the contours as they are today. Update, 17/7/2022: Somebody far better at research than me has pointed out that the large-scale OS map of the area, surveyed in the late 1850s, shows 'Quarry (Disused)' where the bumpy ground is. Due to there also being a disused limekiln shown not too far away on the same map, it's a fair assumption that there was once a small limestone quarry by the farm.

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