Milton Keynes is the new city known internationally as the success story of post-war planning. Its name suggests a synthesis of poetry and economics, but, in fact, derives from the ancient village of that name over whose green fields the new factories and houses were built. This new book tells the story of that and all the other parishes and towns, which, in 1968 found themselves within the new city boundary.

Fenny Stratford and Stony Stratford, the medieval towns which grew up to serve travellers on Watling Street, the nation's busiest road, are chronicled together with Bletchley and Wolverton, which in a later age were transformed from sleepy villages into great railway centres. Each pre-1968 settlement is analysed, using a careful selection of maps and old photographs, pinpointing the manor houses, the manorial corn mills and the arrangement of the village fields. The impact of road, canal and railway transport is explored via the coaching inns, canal wharves and railway stations.

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