The Centre

As explained in the item 'Sarn', until the C19th there was no village.  Maps from around 1830 show a pub and a Baptist Church and a few cottages. A few more houses were added in the late C19th after the school and Parish Church had been built and then a few more during the middle of the C20th.

There were various significant buildings in the valley within a mile of the pub - a Post Office, 2 blacksmiths and from 1920 a Village Hall.

 This building of two dwellings is known as The Old Post Office

Between the Old Post Office and the present centre is the Parish Church built in 1859 and turning 'Sarn' from being just a route over wet ground on a watershed - a 'paved causeway', to being a 'settlement'.

  The lower building was a built in the 1920s as a 'smallholding' and was also a Post Office. Behind it is the end of one of the old cottages and above that is the Baptist Church built in 1827. There are five buildings in Sarn that could be called 'the Old Post Office'... but now there is no Post Office in the vicinity.

Immediately beyond this ex-post office is the pub 'The Sarn Inn'. It is presently undergoing extensive internal renovation

 The nearer end of the building was once a shop (the nearest shop is now approximately 6 kms distant). The original public school shown on the edge of the picture closed in 2006 & is now used by the Exclusive Brethren as a school for their children.

Since the 1990s more buildings have been added in the area near the pub .....

and directly opposite a new village hall was built as a Millenium Project. The village raised a large proportion of the money by voluntary effort.

This is The Centre - simply a road, The Sarn Inn,  Village Hall and in the distance the original  Church School now private. There is also,  by the road a small bus shelter and  noticeboard.

To one side of the Village hall was a telephone kiosk

Unfortunately, as the picture shows, this traditional kiosk, once the focal point of 'The Sarn Siege' when an armed gunman occupied it for a time, was hit by a vehicle on 20th February 2010 and is no more!

The brown patch of earth in the foreground marks where the telephone kiosk stood. Another piece of 'Old Sarn' probably lost forever.

The way life in country districts has changed in the past and is changing again rapidly in our present time.... but in Sarn,as in so many other places, the residents are determined to continue a good and healthy local spirit. The 'Aspirations Project' with its wide European focus, is designed to assist in this process