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Calthrop

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William Langland, author of the poem Piers Plowman ("an allegory with a complex variety of religious themes") -- a 14th-century figure of whom not much is known for certain -- is thought likely to have been born in Cleobury Mortimer (there are rival claimants for having been his birthplace). He also has links with Shipton-under-Wychwood, Oxfordshire.
 
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Calthrop

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In a battle at Benfleet in the year 894, Alfred the Great's army defeated an army of Danish Vikings. The previous year, 893, saw another engagement in which denizens of Great Britain prevailed over Scandinavian invaders. At Buttington, now in Powys (near Welshpool), a combined Mercian and Welsh army under Aethelred, Lord of the Mercians, besieged a Viking camp. The Vikings escaped with heavy losses, and took their families to safety in East Anglia.
 

DerekC

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Llanymynech is well known for having a pub (The Lion) half in England and half in Wales. Sadly it is now closed. Bicester has a pub of the same name, but it's entirely in England!
 

Calthrop

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Hemel Hempstead has a pub called The Top of the World; thus named at its foundation in 1953, to commemorate Hillary and Tensing's being in that year, the first to climb Everest. Mountaineering feats, pubs, and beer: Alan Hinkes has climbed all of the world's fourteen highest mountains; and is a stalwart of CAMRA. He was born and grew up in Northallerton, North Yorkshire.
 

Calthrop

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An unexpected Denbigh association -- I quote Wiki, whose charming prose is sometimes hard to resist: "Beatrix Potter used to spend summers with her favourite Aunt and Uncle at Gwaenynog Hall near Denbigh between 1895 and 1913; and used their many acres of garden as inspiration for her now infamous [sic] Peter Rabbit." Beatrix Potter based herself from 1905 on, at Near Sawrey (Cumbria); in 1913 she married, at quite a late age, William Heelis of nearby Hawkshead.
 

DerekC

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Hawkshead Brewery's "Windermere" pale ale won first prize at the World Beer Awards 2021. The brewery used to be in Hawkshead but has moved to larger premises in Staveley, Cumbria.
 

Calthrop

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Update: The brewery used to be in Staveley, but has now moved to even larger premises in Flookburgh, Cumbria.

Re Flookburgh: it seems to be a trait of this particular little corner of the north-west, that the supposed attributes of its place-names are actually in another neighbouring place -- not the one named. Thus, Cark airfield hereabouts: is actually in Flookburgh, not Cark. It is at all events, the local venue of the British Parachute Association -- facilitating parachute jumps for enthusiasts for that activity. That organisation's Northern Ireland venue boasts a majestic parade of names: the Wild Geese Parachute Centre at Movenis & Killykergan, near Garvagh, Co. Londonderry.
 

Calthrop

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Aghadowey is a much-favoured angling venue, for the Rivers Agivey and Bann. Similarly well-thought-of in England, is East Wellow, Hampshire -- near Romsey -- re the well-regarded trout streams flowing into Southampton Water.
 

Calthrop

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Close to Over Wallop is Middle Wallop -- a couple of miles from which is Middle Wallop Army Aviation Centre: which includes a training facility for pilots, especially those for helicopters. This venue has some renown for the possibility of observing spectacular helicopter-flying feats.
 

Calthrop

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To complete the triumvirate......

One might say that posts #25,006 to #25,008 truly packed a Wallop...

Nether Wallop in Hampshire was also once under the jurisdiction of the Stockbridge Poor Law Union.

Nether Wallop has featured as St. Mary Mead in the BBC TV adaptations of Agatha Christie's Miss Marple novels. On similar lines, Bampton (Oxfordshire) has represented Downton village in the filming of the TV series Downton Abbey. (Downton and its Abbey are actually supposed to be up north; but "ours not to reason why".)
 

Calthrop

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The name Weald is derived from the Old English for "woodland". It occurs in various English place names: including North Weald alias North Weald Bassett, Essex (near Epping). Long ago, the region of North Weald was one of the most thickly-wooded in Essex.
 

Calthrop

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Dunstable is the third-largest town in Bedfordshire; whereas Scunthorpe is the third-largest town in Lincolnshire. (Poor despised Scunthorpe has to have something going for it !)
 

Calthrop

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Crazy museums: there is in Port Talbot, the Baked Bean Museum of Excellence, owned by a gentleman who has changed his name by deed-poll, to Captain Beany. The museum contains among other relevant material: examples of branded food cans, and advertising and other promotional items, associated with baked beans. Near Knutsford, Cheshire, there is Cuckooland: a museum devoted to cuckoo clocks.
 

D6130

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Knutsford was the home for many years of Victorian novelist Elizabeth Gaskell (aka "Mrs Gaskell") and was the model for the fictitious 'Cranford' in the series of novels with that name. Although she is buried in Knutsford, Mrs Gaskell died at Holybourne, near Alton in Hampshire.
 

Calthrop

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Barnsley is -- like Scunthorpe -- regrettably high on many people's perceived list of "utterly c*** towns up north". The prolific author of "chick-lit" novels Milly Johnson, comes (proudly) from Barnsley, which she resignedly refers to as "joke town" -- a number of her works are set in that area. Ms. Johnson attended university in Exeter, far from her native heath.
 

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