Worksop

Statistics
Population:	39,072
Ordnance Survey
OS grid reference:	SK585795
Administration
District:	Bassetlaw
Shire county:	Nottinghamshire
Region:	East Midlands
Country:	England
Other
Ceremonial county:	Nottinghamshire
Historic county:	Nottinghamshire
Services
Police force:	Nottinghamshire Police
Post office and telephone
Post town:	WORKSOP
Postal district:	S80/S81
Dialling code:	01909
Politics
UK Parliament:	Bassetlaw
European Parliament:	East Midlands

Worksop is a town in the Bassetlaw district of Nottinghamshire, England on the River Ryton at the northern edge of Sherwood Forest. It is about 19 miles ESE of the City of Sheffield and its population is estimated (mid-2004) to be 39,800.

Worksop is known as the "Gateway to the Dukeries", so called for the number of ducal residences in the area. Clumber Park is a Large National Trust park open to the public. An important manufacturer in the town is Batchelors UK, which produces products such as Campbells Soup and Oxo. Wilkinsons Distribution Centre is also an important employer as well as the recenlty opened B&Q Distribuition Centre. The town is also home to Worksop College a co-educational day and boarding school. The local football team, Worksop Town F.C. play in the Conference North.

Famous people born in Worksop include Bruce Dickinson (singer in the heavy metal band Iron Maiden), John Parr, who wrote the rock anthem St Elmo's Fire, Donald Pleasence (actor), Graham Taylor (football manager), Lee Westwood (golfer) and Dave Bishop (comedian). Also born in Worksop was Neil Entwistle, a computer engineer accused of shooting dead his wife Rachel and their nine-month-old daughter Lillian at their home in Massachusetts in January 2006. Former footballer Tony Currie currently lives in Worksop.

History

Evidence that Worksop existed before the Norman Conquest of England in 1066 is provided by the Domesday Book of 1086:

"In Werchesope, (Worksop) Elsi (son of Caschin) had three carucates of land to be taxed. Land to eight ploughs. Roger has one plough in the demesne there, and twenty-two sokemen who hold twelve oxgangs of this land, and twenty-four villanes and eight bordars having twenty-two ploughs, and seven acres of meadow. Wood pasture two miles long, and three quarentens broad."^[1]

This early period of the town's history was humorously depicted in the children's television show, Maid Marian and her Merry Men, where it was largely portrayed as a mass of mud.

After the conquest, in about 1103, William de Lovetot established a castle and Augustinian priory at Worksop. Subsequently Worksop grew into a market town. The building of the Chesterfield Canal in 1777, and the subsequent construction of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway in 1849, both of which passed through the settlement, led to a degree of growth. Discovery of sizable coal seams further increased interest in the area. In recent years Worksop has been recognised as having a serious drugs problem attributed to the decline of coal mining in the early 1990s during the government of John Major. The member of parliament for Bassetlaw, John Mann, has fought a high-profile campaign to tackle the problem, once described as being at levels seen in inner cities.

Worksop currently has two radio stations Trax Fm which is broadcast from mainly Doncaster and has taken much critism for this factor over recent years. The other radio station is TrustAM which is the Bassetlaw Hospital Radio station which can be found on 1278mw around the Hospital grounds.

Places of Interest

Clumber Park

Clumber Park, just south of Worksop is a country park owned by the National Trust and is open to the public.

Mr Straw's House

Worksop is home to Mr Straw's House, the family home of the Straw family, which was left by the Straw brothers, William and Walter Straw when their parents passed away in the 1930s. The house remained completely unaltered until the National Trust was given the house in the 1990s and opened it to the public.^[2]

References and notes

1. ^ White, Robert (1875) Worksop, The Dukery, and Sherwood Forest. Transcription at Nicholson, AP: Nottinghamshire History
2. ^ Mr Straw's House by The National Trust.

County of Nottinghamshire
Unitary authorities:	Nottingham
Boroughs/Districts:	Ashfield • Bassetlaw • Broxtowe • Gedling • Mansfield • Newark and Sherwood • Rushcliffe
Cities/Towns:	Arnold • Beeston • Blidworth • Carlton • Cotgrave • Eastwood • Hucknall • Kimberley • Kirkby-in-Ashfield • Mansfield • Mansfield Woodhouse • Newark • Nottingham • Rainworth • Retford • Ruddington • Stapleford • Southwell • Sutton-in-Ashfield • West Bridgford • Worksop