Bernard Sunley
(1910-1964)

Died aged c. 54

Bernard Sunley (4 November 1910 – 20 November 1964) was a British property developer, and the founder of Bernard Sunley & Sons. Born at Catford in south-east London, he was the son of John Sunley, a florist and fruiterer, and was educated at St Ann's School in Hanwell. After leaving school at the age of fourteen, he hired a horse and cart to move earth, and then went into the landscape gardening business. One of his first major contracts was re-laying the pitch at Highbury for Arsenal FC. In November 1931, at Holy Trinity Church, Southall, Sunley married Mary Goddard, a daughter of William Goddard, a farmer, of Waxlow Farm, Southall. They had two daughters and a son. From earth-moving, Sunley moved into the open-cast mining business. In 1940, he founded Bernard Sunley & Sons. During the Second World War he built over 100 airfields, and in 1942 he purchased the business of Blackwood Hodge, then a supplier of agricultural machinery and later a successful plant hire and sale business. He subsequently "ranked alongside the most successful property developers of the 1950s property boom". Sunley campaigned as a Conservative Party candidate for Ealing West in 1945, but was unsuccessful. Sunley established the Bernard Sunley Charitable Foundation in 1960 with a pledge of £300,000-worth of shares. As of 2011, it had made grants of more than £92 million. He died in 1964. His son, John Sunley (died 2011) was a property developer and philanthropist. His grandson is Richard Tice, a businessman and leader of Reform UK. Bernard Sunley Hall, named after him, is a hall of residence for Imperial College London students at 40–44 Evelyn Gardens Square.

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