Following the path to peace

Bradford's place in history as a city for peace and social reform is celebrated in the city's new Peace Trail.

The guide, produced by Bradford: City for Peace and Bradford Peace Museum, is packed with lively social history and a few surprises.

Brenda Thomson, of the organisers, said people may be impressed to learn a former city MP was a Nobel Prize winner and that a women's campaigner helped lower the female pensionable age to 60.

Mrs Thomson said the Bradford: City for Peace project was born out of the fact that there had been so many people committed to peace and advancing social reform.

She said "Together with Peter Nias of the Peace Museum, we set about working out a walk people could do to find out about this city's contribution to the cause of peace."

There is now even talk of a website as part of City for Peace allowing people to write up the lives of ordinary people in the struggle for peace and equality.

It might be billed as a peace trail', but organisers say the route aims to celebrate all people and groups which have promoted harmony in Bradford and the rest of the world.

It includes those who have helped the city and the nation to progress through campaigning, telling their stories of peace, conflict and reconciliation.

The trail also includes sites that immortalise conflicts, including the world wars and related events, such as the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan. The organisers claim these are a reminder of the debt owed to others and act as pointers to a better way of being in the future.

Centenary Square is home to several plaques and memorials.

The Bradford City Fire memorial recalls the 56 people who died during a match at Valley Parade in May 11, 1985.

Among the spectators was Joyce Reisner, who was among a party of civic visitors from Shipley's twin town of Hamm, Germany.

Mrs Reisner, who grew up in Wilsden, asked the people of Hamm to give a gift in response to her experience of the fire.

The memorial was sculptured by her husband, Joachim Reisner, whom she met on an exchange trip to Hamm when she was 15. It was given to the city in May 1986.

To the west is the Memorial Garden, which contains several commemorative plaques. They include the Bradford Pals headstone recalling the soldiers of Bradford, many of whom were volunteers, of the 16th and 18th Battalions of the West Yorkshire Regiment in the First World War. Their numbers were decimated on July 1, 1916, at the Battle of the Somme.

The Bradford City of Peace plaque in the ground was placed in December 1997 to recognise Bradford Council's resolution to declare Bradford a City of Peace.

The nearby Workers' Memorial Day plaque was placed in April 1994 in memory of those killed and maimed in the Bhopal chemical gas leak in India and all employees killed and hurt by work hazards.

Also to be found is a plaque from the people of Bradford commemorating Oslobodenje, a daily newspaper in Sarajevo which continued production during the siege of the city in 1992.

The Hiroshima and Nagasaki plaque under the cherry tree remembers the dropping of atomic bombs on those cities on August 6 and 9, 1945, which killed 108,000 people instantly. It carries the symbol adopted by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

Over to the west is Channing Way, named after the Unitarian church that bore the name of William Channing, the founder of the Unitarian Church in the USA in the early 1800s. Unitarians advocated social and educational reform and warned of the danger of making heroes of prominent military people.

Heading along to Jacob's Well is the Ukrainian Grove on the grassy bank immediately outside the ring road.

It contains plaques linked to the city's sizeable Ukrainian population, including one commemorating the seven million victims of the 1932-33 man-made famine in the Ukraine when it was part of the Soviet Union.

Nearby is another remembering the Chernobyl nuclear power station disaster of 1985, while a third records the trees planted there celebrating anniversaries of the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations and the Captive Nations Committee.

A memorial to the late Bradford South MP and CND peace campaigner Bob Cryer can be found on the main staircase in City Hall, along with a tree in Centenary Square Memorial Garden.

The guide highlights the peace sculpture created during last years Bradford District Peace Festival and presented in memory of PC Sharon Beshenivsky, 38, who was shot dead in the city last November.

It will be on permanent display in the new police headquarters on Nelson Street.

The statue of Bradford-born J B Priestley before the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television earns a mention for the author and playwright's inspiration to the CND for his letter to the New Statesman questioning Britain's place in the nuclear arms race.

The area in front of the Alhambra contains the war memorial remembering the fallen of the world wars and conflicts since.

A curious addition is the aircraft lookout point on the roof of the T J Hughes store on Godwin Street. During the Second World War this was the highest point of any occupied building in the city centre so was used as a lookout for approaching enemy bombers.

Florence White is a name now largely forgotten, but the Bradford shopkeeper's campaign paved the way for the lowering of the pensionable age for women from 65 to 60. Miss White's efforts were prompted by the grave losses of the First World War which forced more women to work until 65 because there were fewer men to marry. Her story is told at the Mechanics' Institute.

And to be found at the top of Ivegate is a plaque marking the site of the lock-up where Birstall stonemason John Nelson was jailed for preaching his Methodist faith during the 18th century.

Heading up to the Oastler Centre brings walkers to the statue of Richard Oastler, the leader of the Ten-Hour Movement which campaigned to improve the plight of Victorian factory children.

Another statue, to Bradford Victorian MP William Forster, highlights the man who laid the foundations for a national school system bringing elementary education within reach of the many. His statue is in storage during the redevelopment of Forster Square and Broadway.

The roots of the Bradford-founded Independent Labour Party are recalled in the large mural on the wall of the Priestley Centre, Little Germany. The ILP was born out of the Manningham Mills strike of 1890.

Carlton Street was the scene of a demonstration by the Bradford Women's Humanity League, a mainly working class group angered by the senseless loss of their menfolk during the First World War. Three thousand women and some men marched her from Westgate on September 9, 1917.

Heading past the Broadway development to Waterstone's at the former Wool Exchange reveals the statue of Richard Cobden, the Victorian-era MP who campaigned for an end to the Corn Laws which were causing hardship for the poor. He also took a stance against the Crimean War and worked with the Peace Society.

At nearby Peace Hall Yard is The Peace Hall Museum, the only one of its kind in the UK. It concentrates on conflict resolution and has travelling exhibitions.

Strolling down to Great Horton Road, a plaque to Dietrich Bonhoeffer can be found on the outside of the German Evangelical Church opposite Bradford College. The German pastor who visited Bradford in 1933 was executed by the Nazis in 1945. He campaigned against fascism in his home country.

Stepping down to the university, walkers will find a bronze sculpture of a man and woman embracing. The work by Josephina de Vasconcellos represents the reunion of a wife who trekked across Europe to find her husband in the aftermath of the Second World War. It is also seen as representing the reunion of all the nations who had been fighting each other.

The Commonwealth Collection, an independent library collection at the university contains some 11,000 books, pamphlets and resources committed to non-violent approaches to social change, with the complete works of Ghandi at its core.

The collection also contains the original drawings of the nuclear disarmament symbol designed by Gerald Holton in 1958.

The guide also highlights the university's Department of Peace Studies, which was unique at its conception.

Listerhills Road, some half a mile west of the city centre, contains the Interfaith Education Centre, which provides reaching support and resources for schools and the community on major world faiths, along with justice and peace.

Heading over to Manningham Lane, the guide marks the route of the Stop the War coalition's anti-Iraq war demonstration of January 18, 2003, when some 3,000 walked towards the city centre.

A blue plaque marks the house at 49 Hanover Square where Margaret McMillan lived with her sister from 1893 to 1902.

Her efforts on behalf of undernourished children earned her the respect of the city.

The guide commemorates the Asian Youth Movement at Hallfield Road. The group was established in 1978 to fight racism, fascism and social injustice.

Bradford's Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Angell, Labour MP from 1929 to 1931, is remembered at 42 Leamington Street where he lodged. He argued against war as making no economic sense.

The majestic Manningham Mills, which are being converted into housing, bears a plaque to the centenary of the strike of 1890 which gave impetus to the formation of the Independent Labour Party.

Miriam Lord, head teacher of Bradford's first open-air nursery in 1921, is commemorated off Oak Lane. The nursery was unique in helping to meet the educational, social and medical needs of working class families.

Oak Lane and White Abbey's part in the Bradford riots of 2001 are also included.

The Bradford Peace Trail will be officially unveiled tomorrow in Centenary Square on the steps of City Hall at 4pm.

Mrs Thomson and Mr Nias are inviting people to wear something bright, to collect a free booklet and walk a few of the sites in and around the square.

e-mail:jonathan.walton@bradford.newsquest.co.uk