Leighton Buzzard











































































Leighton Buzzard

15 Century market cross, Leighton Buzzard - geograph.org.uk - 956627.jpg
Market Square



Leighton Buzzard is located in Bedfordshire

Leighton Buzzard

Leighton Buzzard



Leighton Buzzard shown within Bedfordshire


Population
37,000 [1]
OS grid reference
SP921250
Civil parish
  • Leighton-Linslade

Unitary authority
  • Central Bedfordshire

Ceremonial county
  • Bedfordshire

Region
  • East

Country
England
Sovereign state
United Kingdom
Post town
LEIGHTON BUZZARD
Postcode district
LU7
Dialling code
01525

Police
Bedfordshire
Fire
Bedfordshire and Luton
Ambulance
East of England

EU Parliament
East of England
UK Parliament
  • South West Bedfordshire



List of places

UK

England

Bedfordshire


51°54′59″N 0°39′42″W / 51.9165°N 0.6617°W / 51.9165; -0.6617Coordinates: 51°54′59″N 0°39′42″W / 51.9165°N 0.6617°W / 51.9165; -0.6617

Leighton Buzzard (/ˈltən ˈbʌzərd/ LAY-tən BUZ-ərd) is a town in Bedfordshire, England, near the Chiltern Hills and lying between Luton and Milton Keynes. It adjoins Linslade and the name Leighton Linslade is sometimes used to refer to the combination of the two towns; parts of this article also apply to Linslade as well as Leedon.


For local government purposes, the town is part of the Central Bedfordshire district and is administered jointly with Linslade as the civil parish of Leighton-Linslade.[2]




Contents






  • 1 History


  • 2 Amenities


    • 2.1 Sport




  • 3 Geography


    • 3.1 Climate




  • 4 Education


    • 4.1 Lower schools


    • 4.2 Middle schools


    • 4.3 Upper schools


    • 4.4 Other schools


    • 4.5 Further education




  • 5 Infrastructure


  • 6 Industry


  • 7 Expansion


  • 8 Twin towns


  • 9 Notable people


  • 10 In popular culture


  • 11 See also


  • 12 Notes


  • 13 References


  • 14 External links





History


There are a number of theories concerning the derivation of the town's name, but the most likely is that "Leighton" came from Old English Lēah-tūn, meaning 'farm in a clearing in the woods'. The "Buzzard" was added by the Dean of Lincoln, in whose diocese the town lay in the 12th century (arguably it was Beau-desert, which later turned into "Buzzard".)[3] Having two communities called "Leighton" and seeking some means of differentiating them, he added the name of his local Prebendary or representative to that of the town. At that time it was a Theobald de Busar and so over the years the town became known as Leighton Buzzard. The other Leighton became Leighton Bromswold.[4]


Leighton Buzzard is also famous as the Grand Union Canal was opened there. More recently, Leighton Buzzard station was the location for part of the film Robbery, which is based on the so-called "Great Train Robbery" (1963), whereas the actual robbery took place just outside the town, at Bridego bridge, Ledburn. In the Domesday Book, Leighton Buzzard and Linslade were both called Leestone.



Amenities


Leighton Buzzard contains All Saints' Church, an Early English parish church dating from 1277. The church has a 190 ft spire and has been described as the 'cathedral of South Bedfordshire'.[citation needed] The church was damaged by fire in the 1980s, but has since undergone restoration.


The town is also known for the Leighton Buzzard Light Railway, a narrow gauge heritage railway.[5]


The town has a combined library and theatre (called the Library Theatre) where both live events and film screenings are regularly held.[6]


Stockgrove Country Park is in nearby Heath and Reach.


After the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834 Leighton Buzzard became the centre of a poor law union that consisted of 15 surrounding parishes with the union workhouse (still standing) being sited in Grovebury Road.


A network of historic tunnels exists under the High Street;[citation needed] these are believed to date from medieval times. The tunnels have not been investigated, but one is easily accessible from the cellarage of Wilkinson Estate Agents at the top of Market Square. The cellar, probably an ice house, extends under the road by some 16 feet and is in very good condition. The tunnel is sealed for safety reasons. It goes in a southerly direction towards the former Market Tavern (now Bell) public house some 100 yards and legend has it that other tunnels from the church and other public houses link up under the street in network that covers some 500 yards.


Leighton Buzzard Children's Theatre, run by Sally and David Allsopp, has been based in Heath and Reach since 1992. The group has raised over £90,000 for various charities through musical theatre and drama productions starring local children aged 4 - 18 who regulrly perform at the local Library Theatre and School Theatres.



Sport



Leighton Buzzard is represented by the sporting teams of Leighton Town F.C. who play football in the Spartan South Midlands Football League. Also at the Bell Close Site are Leighton Buzzard Tennis Club who have been a part of the town since the 1930s. Leighton Buzzard Hockey Club[7] established in 1901, play field hockey and run 4 Men's and 4 Ladies teams of all ability. The Men's teams play in the South Hockey League[8] and the Ladies teams play in the 5 Counties Hockey League.[9] Leighton Buzzard Hockey Club[10] also have junior sides; starting age of 5. Leighton Buzzard R.F.C. play rugby union in South West 1 East and the Ladies rugby team[11] play in NC South East North 2. Leighton Buzzard Golf Club was established in 1905 and there is also an active running club, Leighton Buzzard Athletics Club. Established in 2011 Leighton Buzzard Road Cycling Club is a cycling club for riders of all abilities. Their race team LBRCC-Solgar compete in local, as well as national, cycling events.[12] Established in 2000, Leighton Linslade Croquet Club ([2] www.leightonlinsladecroquet.org.uk), a member of the Croquet Association, have three croquet lawns in Pages Park next to the pavilion. The club takes part in many national croquet competitions and is a member of the East Anglian Croquet Association (EACF).



Geography




Climate


Leighton Buzzard experiences an oceanic climate (Köppen climate classification Cfb) similar to almost all of the United Kingdom.





































































Climate data for Leighton Buzzard
Month
Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
Jun
Jul
Aug
Sep
Oct
Nov
Dec
Year
Average high °C (°F)
6
(43)
7
(45)
10
(50)
12
(54)
16
(61)
19
(66)
21
(70)
22
(72)
18
(64)
14
(57)
9
(48)
6
(43)
13
(55)
Average low °C (°F)
3
(37)
3
(37)
4
(39)
5
(41)
8
(46)
10
(50)
12
(54)
13
(55)
11
(52)
8
(46)
5
(41)
3
(37)
7
(45)
Average precipitation mm (inches)
69.3
(2.728)
59.4
(2.339)
46.5
(1.831)
70.1
(2.76)
58.1
(2.287)
58.9
(2.319)
46.0
(1.811)
68.9
(2.713)
51.7
(2.035)
84.3
(3.319)
93.9
(3.697)
80.9
(3.185)
788.0
(31.024)
Source: [13]


Education



Lower schools



  • Beaudesert Lower School – Apennine Way

  • Clipstone Brook Lower School – Brooklands Drive

  • Greenleas School – Derwent Road

  • Greenleas School, Sandhills – Kestrel Way

  • Dovery Down Lower School – Heath Road

  • Heathwood Lower School – Heath Road

  • Leedon Lower School – Highfield Road

  • Linslade Lower School

  • Mary Bassett Lower School – Bassett Road

  • Pulford VA C of E Lower School – Pulford Road

  • St George's Lower School – East Street

  • St Leonard's (Heath & Reach) V A Lower School

  • Stanbridge Lower School

  • Southcott Lower School – Bideford Green



Middle schools



  • Brooklands Middle School – a school near the south east edge of the town.

  • Gilbert Inglefield Academy – next door to Vandyke Upper School.

  • Leighton Middle School[14] – in the centre of the town, Mary Norton, who wrote 'The Borrowers' books, lived there in her childhood.

  • Linslade Middle School – Situated over the road from Cedars.



Upper schools




  • Cedars Upper School – Located on the west edge of town, adjoined to Tiddenfoot Leisure Centre. Cedars was once a grammar school.


  • Vandyke Upper School – Situated on the east edge of town, on Vandyke Road. As of late 2006, the school has been undergoing a £2½ million refurbishment.



Other schools



  • Oak Bank School – located on Sandy Lane.


Further education


Central Bedfordshire College has a campus near the town centre of Leighton Buzzard called the Learning Warehouse. The college provides a range of full-time and part-time courses for the local community. The college also operates a Learning Shop in the town, which offers basic IT courses.



Infrastructure




The NatWest Bank at Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, England in the style of an Italian palazzo is an example of Neo-Renaissance architecture.




High Street, Leighton Buzzard. The former "Bassett's Bank" (now Barclays Bank) designed by the eminent Victorian architect Alfred Waterhouse.


Leighton Buzzard is close to the M1 motorway and A5 road, and is served by Southern and West Midlands Trains services on the West Coast Main Line railway at Leighton Buzzard railway station (in Linslade). The Grand Union Canal runs through the town, alongside the River Ouzel. Leighton Buzzard is served by the F70 bus route, operated by Arriva Shires & Essex, which provides a direct Bus rapid transit service to Luton via the Luton to Dunstable Busway, with an onward connection to Luton Airport.[15][16]



Industry


The town is, or has at one time been, the home to various industries including B/E Aerospace (Aircraft Interiors), Polyformes, Lipton Tea which has now closed down, Gossard clothing, Lancer Boss (forklifts, etc.).


The town has a sizeable sand quarrying industry, with good enough quality building sand to export to Egypt.
The first and only TXE1 telephone exchange was developed by the General Post Office and went into service in 1968. To meet the growing demand it was added to by two TXE2 exchanges and a TXE6 exchange on the night of 18 August 1971. A third TXE2 was added later but everything was replaced by a TXE4 exchange around 1977. Some of the TXE2 equipment was used to provide a new TXE2 at West Mersea Island in Essex. The large building, built on the site of the former Lake House, that housed all these TXE exchanges and the current digital exchange can be found in Lake Street.


Countrywide and Connells/Sequence, the UK's two largest estate agents' chains, both have their head offices in the town, as does the UK branch of Tupperware. FTSE 250 company Rightmove had their first ever office in the town, which at the time consisted of just 25 employees.


Since 2014 it has had its own brewery.[17]



Expansion


In the west, Linslade has merged with Southcott. Leighton Buzzard is expanding eastwards: 2,500–4,500 homes including 35% affordable housing are planned for east Leighton Buzzard for the Luton/Dunstable/Houghton Regis growth area and 900 homes including 35% affordable housing are being considered west of Linslade. Leighton Buzzard now encompasses RAF Stanbridge and the former hamlet of Leedon.


The population of Leighton-Linslade was originally recorded in the 2001 census as 32,417.[18] Part of Billington parish was transferred in 2003 to Leighton-Linslade, and the revised census result including this area was 32,753.[19] The population is estimated to have reached 37,000 in 2009 and is forecast to rise to 39,900 by 2012.[20]


The town is expanding southwards, with the development of sites in Southern Leighton Buzzard[21] through the Southern Leighton Buzzard Development Brief.[22]



Twin towns


Leighton Buzzard was twinned with Coulommiers in 1958. The twinning was renewed in 1982.
It was also twinned with Titisee-Neustadt in 1991.



Notable people








  • Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild (1839–1898) lived in Leighton House in the High Street (demolished in 1959 for the Co-op furniture store, but now the site is occupied by Wilkinson's) before building and moving to Waddesdon Manor.


  • Mary Norton (1903–1992), children's writer, was brought up in The Cedars on the High Street.


  • Philip O'Connor (1916–1998), poet, was born in the town.


  • Louise Dearman (born 1979), who played Glinda in the West End production of Wicked, was brought up in Leighton Buzzard, attending Linslade Middle School and Cedars Upper School.

  • Simon Tofield, creator of the popular Simon's Cat series of YouTube animations, grew up in Leighton Buzzard.[23]

  • Other famous residents of the town and nearby villages include Kriss Akabusi, Steve Askew, Nick Beggs, Frank Bruno,[24]Alastair Cook, Darren Gough and Bob Monkhouse.

  • Triple Olympic gold medallist Charlotte Dujardin was brought up in the town and attended Vandyke Upper School.[25]

  • The 1960s group The Barron Knights formed in Leighton Buzzard, as did the 1980s pop group Kajagoogoo.

  • Actor Rusty Goffe lives in the town.[26]

  • Twin Actors, Thomas and Joseph Odwell, who play The Twins in Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, also live in the town.



In popular culture


One of the local quarries was used in the Hamunaptra scene in The Mummy Returns and more recently a scene for The Da Vinci Code.


In addition, the town and surrounding area is referenced in Mary Norton's popular series, The Borrowers. It is mentioned in Saki's short story "The Secret Sin of Septimus Brope".


A 'Leighton Beau-desart in Bedfordshire' is mentioned in Chapter 4 of The Storm by Daniel Defoe.



See also



  • Operation Netwing, a long-running investigation of forced labour and human trafficking in Bedfordshire, by Irish Travellers.


Notes





  1. ^ 2009 estimate for Leighton-Linslade. See the Expansion section above for further information.


  2. ^ Council Website: Council tax Archived 21 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine. retrieved 7 August 2007


  3. ^ Wedgwood, Hensleigh (1855). "On False Etymologies". Transactions of the Philological Society (6): 67..mw-parser-output cite.citation{font-style:inherit}.mw-parser-output q{quotes:"""""""'""'"}.mw-parser-output code.cs1-code{color:inherit;background:inherit;border:inherit;padding:inherit}.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-free a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Lock-green.svg/9px-Lock-green.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-registration a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-gray-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-subscription a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-red-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration{color:#555}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription span,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration span{border-bottom:1px dotted;cursor:help}.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error{display:none;font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error{font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration,.mw-parser-output .cs1-format{font-size:95%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-left{padding-left:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-right{padding-right:0.2em}


  4. ^ "Our Building – All Saints Leighton Buzzard". allsaintslb.org.uk. Retrieved 13 February 2015.


  5. ^ Train site retrieved 7 August 2007


  6. ^ Theatre Site retrieved 7 August 2007


  7. ^ "Leighton Buzzard Hockey Club". www.pitchero.com.


  8. ^ "South Hockey League - Welcome". www.south-league.com.


  9. ^ Administrator. "Welcome to the 5 Counties Women's Hockey League". www.5counties.co.uk.


  10. ^ "Leighton Buzzard Hockey Club". www.pitchero.com.


  11. ^ [1][dead link]


  12. ^ "LBRCC". Members.lbrcc.co.uk. Archived from the original on 18 April 2013. Retrieved 4 April 2013.


  13. ^ "Averages for Leighton Buzzard".


  14. ^ "Ofsted – Leighton Middle School". ofsted.gov.uk. Retrieved 13 February 2015.


  15. ^ "Routes & Timetables". Busway. Luton Borough Council. Retrieved 7 July 2017.


  16. ^ "Bus timetables and bus routes". centralbedfordshire.gov.uk. Central Bedfordshire Council. Retrieved 7 July 2017.


  17. ^ "Craft Beer | Bedfordshire | Leighton Buzzard Brewing Company". Leighton Buzzard Brewery. Retrieved 2018-02-04.


  18. ^ Office for National Statistics, 2001 Census Parish Headcounts for Leighton-Linslade.


  19. ^ Bedfordshire County Council, Urban Area Profile for Leighton Linslade Archived 12 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine..


  20. ^ Central Bedfordshire Council, Population of Central Bedfordshire Archived 10 December 2010 at the Wayback Machine..


  21. ^ "Southern Leighton Buzzard -". www.slb.uk.com.


  22. ^ 546000, Customer services, Town Hall, George Street, Luton, Bedfordshire, LU1 2BQ. Tel: 01582. "CMIS > Home". agendas.luton.gov.uk.


  23. ^ Kennedy, Maev (26 July 2012). "Simon's Cat: from ballpoint doodle to Cartoon Museum star". the Guardian.


  24. ^
    "Frank Bruno – The official website". Archived from the original on 26 March 2010. Retrieved 17 April 2010.



  25. ^ Dunn, Matthew. "Charlotte Dujardin's lost days at school". Express.co.uk. Retrieved 11 August 2012.


  26. ^ "Trusty Rusty".




References


  • Kevin Quick (2005). Leighton-Linslade Past Times. Retrieved 17 May 2005


External links








  • Wikisource "Leighton Buzzard". Encyclopædia Britannica. 16 (11th ed.). 1911.

  • Bedfordshire Library Service Leighton Buzzard Timeline











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