Shirley is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Solihull, in the West Midlands, England. Historically part of Warwickshire, neighbouring districts include Shirley Heath, Sharmans Cross, Solihull Lodge, Monkspath,Cheswick Green Cranmore and the Hall Green district of Birmingham. History The earliest known settlement in the area was at Berry Mound in Solihull Lodge, part of West Shirley, which was the site of an Iron Age Hill Fort, a fortified village protected by earth banks, dating back to the 1st century BC and which covered approximately . The earth works can still be seen from the North Worcestershire Path which commences in Aqueduct Road, Majors Green. Shirley was part of the Manor of Ulverlei (now Olton) until the establishment of Solihull in the 12th or 13th century after which it became part of the parish of Solihull. Shirley developed slowly as a small village on Stratford Road, called Shirley Street through the settlement. Between 1725 and 1872, Stratford Road was a turnpike road, and the ease of travel along this from Birmingham and Shirley's remoteness attracted sporting activity in the form of bull baiting cockfighting (reputedly at the Plume of Feathers pub) and pugilism. These activities encouraged the church authorities to start building St James Church in 1831, subsequently enlarged in 1882. Finally, in 1893, Shirley became its own ecclesiastical parish. Shirley School which was in School Road until the 1970s was built in 1833. Shirley grew rapidly in the late 19th century and early 20th century, as people moved out of Birmingham, helped by the opening of the railway in 1908 as a Great Western route from Snow Hill railway station to Stratford upon Avon and on to Cheltenham. For a hundred years from the mid-19th century, Shirley had a racecourse, and this was supplemented by a public lido in Sansome Road, the Odeon Cinema on Stratford Road and the public library in Church Road, all in the 1930s. The expansion of Shirley resumed after the Second World War and has continued apace in the recent time. Shirley also had its own council and council house. However, with the rise of Solihull, it became managed underneath the Solihull Council, becoming two district wards: Shirley and Shirley South; the council house has since been demolished. Shirley was struck by an F0/T1 tornado on 23 November 1981, as part of the record-breaking nationwide tornado outbreak on that day. The tornado later moved