However, the town’s connection with the site started well before bricks and mortar were laid. Cllr Sue Spittle said: “According to my recollection, and what I was told by my parents Ron and Barbara Newbury, the Druitt Gardens and building that now houses the library was donated by one of the Druitts, Sylvia Druitt, at the end of the 1940s /early 1950s, for the resident of Christchurch. “At around 1947, Christchurch Citizens Association was set up, with my parents as founder members with one of the sole purposes to prevent it going into Christchurch Borough council s hands, so instead was owned by Hampshire County Council, later transferred to Dorset County Council in 1974 following Local Government reorganisation.