[1] Leave the College by turning right and then turn left into Cope Street. Cross Ladywood Middleway at the pedestrian controlled lights and turn right. Pass over the railway line and then turn left onto a slope leading towards the Birmingham Canal towpath adjacent to a sign on the bridge which says ‘Canal Side Walk, Ladywood Middleway 1999’.
(A) Birmingham Canals are a network of canals connecting Birmingham, Wolverhampton, and the eastern part of the Black Country. The network is connected to the rest of the English canal system at several junctions.
The first canal to be built in the area was this Birmingham Canal, built from 1768 to 1772 under the supervision of James Brindley (there is a now a landmark called Brindley Place in Birmingham). It is said that Birmingham has more miles of canal than Venice. The word towpath means a path along a canal or river used by animals towing boats
[2] On reaching the towpath turn sharp left walking under the bridge you have just crossed. Follow the towpath until alongside a structure in the canal (probably part of an old bridge) when you follow the path off the canal on to Northbrook Street.
[3] Having reached Northbrook Street, turn right and then almost immediately turn left into Coplow Street. As soon as you enter Coplow Street cross the road and take the footpath that goes at an angle of about 45 degrees behind the first set of houses. Follow this path as it crosses Barford Road and then Icknield Port Road and into Summerfield Park.
(B) Summerfield is found in local streetnames and is also the name of a park which takes its name from Summerfield House which stood between the Dudley Road, City Road and Icknield Port Road. This was a large country house dating from the late 17th century which became the home of the Chance family, glassmakers.
Birmingham town council initially bought 6 hectares of its parkland to create Summerfield Park in 1876. The house itself was demolished some ten years later and a bandstand built on the site. Some 20ha were added to the park in 1890. The park was extended in 1981 by the addition of the walkway along the former Harborne Railway. The city's first bonfire carnival was held here in 1960 attended by 25 000 people.
[4] Having entered the Park stay on the footpath bearing left. You will reach a 5 way footpath junction. Take the path at 11 o’clock, not the one to the exit. At the next footpath junction take the path to the left and leave the park via West Gate into Gillott Road.
[5] Cross Gillott Road and almost immediately bear right into Summerfield Crescent and then turn right into Icknield Port Road. Use the pedestrian lights to cross the road continuing in the same direction.
(C) At the junction of Summerfield Crescent and Gillott Road, Christ Church was built as a memorial to George Lea, perpetual curate of St George's, Edgbaston 1864-1883. Built in stone by Birmingham architect J A Chatwin this spacious church is one of Birmingham's few perpendicular-style buildings. It was consecrated in 1885 and is Grade II Listed.
[6] Cross Wiggin Street, turn left into Rotton Park Street and continue along this road until reaching the canal. Turn right onto the canal and re-trace your steps to the College.
(D) The finding in Rotton Park of a worked flint in 1910 was the first evidence of the neolithic period to be found in Birmingham. A barbed arrowhead some five thousand years old was spotted by Professor West on the gravel surface of Gillott Road. The flint, however, may not originate from Rotton Park but have been brought from the source of the gravel. This artefact may now be seen in Birmingham Museum.
The original name of the district is Anglo-Saxon and derives from rot tun meaning 'cheerful farm', though the location of that settlement is unknown. The modern district takes its name from the medieval deer park of the de Birmingham family. The bounds of the park were probably Dudley Road, Ladywood Middleway, Hagley Road, Sandon Road, and Shireland Brook. Deer parks had existed in Anglo-Saxon times but they were made viable after the Norman Conquest by the introduction from Sicily of fallow deer, a more manageable beast than the native red deer. Parks increased in popularity and by 1200 every wealthy landowner had one.
One hundred years later there were over 3000 deer parks in England. Especially common in wooded areas such as the Forest of Arden, they required expensive royal permission and involved a great deal of labour digging ditches and building banks topped with palings or thorny hedges. Sometimes fenced compartments were made within the park to prevent new plantations and coppiced woodland from being eaten by deer. Parks were both expensive to create and to maintain. Towards the end of the Middle Ages they declined in popularity but were revived by the personal enthusiasm of Henry VIII.