Hall Green Stadium, in York Road, on the South side of the City of Birmingham, staged speedway between 1929 and the end of 1938 and survived in spite of an extremely uneasy relationship with local residents. Hall Green was and still is, a good class residential area and following extensive pressure from residents, the speedway club could operate only under severe conditions which included no music to be played between the races, no rattles or bells to be used by the crowd, and no community singing by supporters!

The track was small (302 yards) with very tight bends and people I have met who went there tell me that it wasn't a particularly good racing track. The speedway circuit was grassed over after racing ended there in 1938, but in good daylight from the highest point of the grandstand, parts of the outline of the old track can still be made out.

The track was the scene of the only fatal accident to occur on a Birmingham track, when Stan Hart lost his life after crashing in heat 10 of the Birmingham v Belle Vue Merseysiders match on 25th August 1937. The visitors were actually the Liverpool team who had relocated to Belle Vue and had become the Aces second team following the closure of Liverpool's Stanley Stadium due to lack of support. Hart collided with Birmingham rider Malcolm Craven and died in the ambulance room although the news of his death was not announced to the crowd until after the end of the meeting.
Hart's brother Oliver who was also in the Belle Vue team that evening, witnessed the crash and vowed never to ride again - although he did later resume and became a popular member of the post-war Bradford team.

The last meeting ever to be staged at Hall Green was a Northern Cup tie between Birmingham and Sheffield on 19th October 1938, which was won by the Bulldogs (as the team were then known) by 61 points to 17. The aptly titled "Farewell Scratch Race Final" was the last race to take place at the stadium and was won by Tiger Hart from fellow Birmingham riders Steve Langton, Danny Lee and Jack Hyland.

The Sheffield Team manager that day was Ted Flanaghan who in the 1970's was the track curator at Perry Barr. Ted told me that there had been considerable friction between the Birmingham riders and the promoter Arthur Westwood for some time over Westwood's tardiness at paying their wages, and after some strong exchanges before the start of the match, the entire Birmingham team refused to ride unless they were paid their arrears. On the pretext of going back to his office for his cheque book, Westwood disappeared and it was left to the stadium manager a Mr A.R. Marriott to sort things out which he did by going to each of the turnstiles one at a time and bringing back the takings to give to the riders one by one.

After the meeting had finished, Mr. Marriott rather optimistically told the crowd on the microphone that there would "definitely be speedway at Hall Green in 1939" which forecast was of course, never fulfilled.

Birmingham raced in one further away fixture after this date, losing heavily by 21-63 at Norwich.

After the end of the war, most people expected the new Promoter Les Marshall to move back into Hall Green where the track and facilities were still in place, but Marshall wanted to run on Saturday nights and as neither Hall Green nor the old Perry Barr Dog Track (which later became known as the Ladbroke Stadium), were prepared to accommodate him on this night so Marshall plumped for the Alexander Stadium.

Occasional enquiries about a resumption at Hall Green have been made from time to time, but as these have produced a virtual uprising from the residents, they have never  been seriously pursued.