History
The National Playing Fields Association (NPFA) is the major United Kingdom organisation dedicated to the provision of recreational space. It has the specific objective of acquiring, protecting and improving playing fields, playgrounds and playspace where they are most needed, and for those who need them most – in particular, children of all ages and people with disabilities.
The NPFA was set up in 1925 by Brigadier-General Reginald Kentish to provide healthy recreation opportunities for local communities throughout the United Kingdom. It protects and develops playing fields and play areas and it campaigns nationally for community recreational space. It manages around 13,000 acres of such provision nationwide through County Playing Fields Associations and other organisations.
The NPFA was founded by the Duke of York, later King George V, who was the first President. This royal link continues today with The Queen as Patron and The Duke of Edinburgh as President.
The NPFA is a charity incorporated by Royal Charter in 1932. The Charity’s affairs are conducted through its Council which meets quarterly to set the policy of the Association and to oversee its work. However, the NPFA is also linked to many bodies and membership of the organisation includes local authorities, individuals, playing field associations, schools and sports clubs. In 1972, NPFA supported the Bishop of Stepney, Trevor Huddleston, after his letter to The Times (31 July) denouncing the lack of play provision which had led to the deaths by drowning of 2 boys who lived in his diocese. This gave the impetus to the Fair Play for Children campaign.
NPFA has set standards for playground provision in the UK through The 6 Acre Standard which is widely used by local authorities as a basis, for erxample when stipulating play area provision for new housing development, and in local play policies.
The Duke of Edinburgh has been a generous and enthusiastic President since 1947; the Queen became Patron in 1952.
Read more about this topic: National Playing Fields Association
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Books of natural history aim commonly to be hasty schedules, or inventories of God’s property, by some clerk. They do not in the least teach the divine view of nature, but the popular view, or rather the popular method of studying nature, and make haste to conduct the persevering pupil only into that dilemma where the professors always dwell.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“History is more or less bunk. It’s tradition. We don’t want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker’s damn is the history we make today.”
—Henry Ford (1863–1947)
“The best history is but like the art of Rembrandt; it casts a vivid light on certain selected causes, on those which were best and greatest; it leaves all the rest in shadow and unseen.”
—Walter Bagehot (1826–1877)