Villagers Protest Over Airport Plan, April 29, 1969

After a three-year process, Britain’s biggest and most expensive planning exercise carried out by a body called the Roskill Commission recommended to Government that a new London Airport, bigger than Heathrow, should be built in Buckinghamshire. Four villages and their communities were to be destroyed. Early in the process people in the biggest of the villages, Stewkley, mounted the first of many protests. Their slogan “Over Our Dead Bodies” was plastered on huge signs erected for miles around. Two years later, Government overturned the recommendation, saving the homes and communities of 5,000 villagers. They cited public opinion as the reason for the decision.