Dickson Nurseries Ltd have been growing and breeding roses for over a hundred years and is still one of the best known rose companies in the world
In 1949 Alexander Dickson from Newtownards, Northern Ireland, moved his English rose growing nursery to Stoke Goldington.
Their previous nursery, at Marks Tey in Essex, had been taken over by the Government during the war as part of an airfield complex.
They purchased Old Park Farm in an area near the church, at the top of Dag Lane, and 20 of the farm’s 70 acres were used to grow 110,000 rose trees every year.
This became quite a tourist attraction for many years.
Dickson’s Rose – ‘Tintinara’
Roses grown by Dickson consistently won Gold Medals at prestigious shows and they held six Royal Warrants. In fact, the flowers grown for the Queen’s Coronation bouquet in 1953 were grown by Dickson.
However they had some problems finding workers with suitable skills with budding knives.
It is not clear how many Stoke Goldington people were employed here. (If any further information comes to light in the archive, we will update this page)
Roses growing at Old Park Farm
The packet of seeds below is dated 1958/1959, but the nursery became economically unviable soon afterwards because of 3 main factors:
- The greater use of machinery
- The advent of Garden Centres across the country
- The loss of the importance of Flower Shows as a means of obtaining orders.
Old Park Farm was later owned by P. Wilson ,who operated a boat transport business for a time in the 1970s
It is now split into several private residences.