ABSTRACT
The greatest wartime threat to the availability of spaces for sport, however, was the government’s policy of food production. Most decisions over the use of space were discussed at local level and seen in the context of how national needs were interpreted according to local circumstances and peculiarities. In focusing on the importance of locality in the meanings attached to contests over space, the aim is to look beyond the limited multi-national and city/country tensions that have been thought to have best characterised the divided geography of the British wartime nation. Open recreational spaces were subject to increased restrictions as concerns about enemy invasion grew during the summer of 1940. The requisitioning of buildings and open spaces by military and civil defence authorities ensured that state intervention was to be a crucial factor in defining the physical landscape of wartime sport.
