Upton, Slough

"Upton, Berkshire" redirects here. For the village in Berkshire before 1974, see Upton, Oxfordshire.
Upton

St. Laurence in Upton, Slough
Upton
 Upton shown within Berkshire
OS grid referenceSU979792
Unitary authoritySlough
Ceremonial countyBerkshire
RegionSouth East
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post town SLOUGH
Postcode district SL1
Dialling code 01753
Police Thames Valley
Fire Royal Berkshire
Ambulance South Central
EU Parliament South East England
UK ParliamentSlough
List of places
UK
England
Berkshire

Coordinates: 51°30′13″N 0°35′27″W / 51.50361°N 0.59086°W / 51.50361; -0.59086

Upton is a suburb of Slough in Berkshire, England. Until the local government reforms of 1974 it was in Buckinghamshire. It was one of the villages that developed into the town.

History

The Domesday Survey of 1086 refers to Upton, and a wood for 200 pigs, worth £15. Upton took its name from its situation at the top of the slope from the river terrace — the various levels in the area having been formed in the Ice-Age.

The ancient parish, and the civil parish until 1894, included Chalvey and Slough, originally hamlets, and was formally known as Upton cum Chalvey. In 1894 the new civil parish of Slough was formed from the parish. In 1895 a detached part of the parish was transferred to Gerrards Cross, and in 1900 and 1901 the rump of the parish was divided between the neighbouring parishes of Eton, Langley Marish, Slough and Wexham.[1] The ecclesiastical parish is still known as Upton cum Chalvey.[2]

Church

Upton's Norman Church, St Laurence's Church, is around 900 years old. It was the marriage place (7 May 1788) and burial place (1822) of Sir William Herschel (in whose memory there stands a newly erected stained-glass window depicting Uranus, which he discovered, and other planets), and the burial place of Charles Hatchett who discovered niobium.

Other buildings

Upton Court is the name of the original manorial buildings for the parish of Upton. Parts of Upton Court were built in 1325. In the 19th century, it was a seat of the Burton family and was, up until March 2010, home to the Slough Observer newspaper. The nearby Slough Grammar School changed its name in 2013 to Upton Court Grammar School.

The Mere is a 19th-century half-timbered building, built in 1887 by the grandson of Richard Bentley, is now the head office of the National Foundation for Educational Research. Long Close School was established in the area in 1940.

Upton Park

Upton Park forms one of Slough's earliest planned estates. Laid out in 1842, the grounds (a public park as Herschel Park since 1949) are believed to have been designed by Joseph Paxton.[3]

In 2011, the 3.5-hectare (8.6-acre) Grade II listed park and nature reserve underwent a restoration project to re-establish the area to its former Victorian glory with a lottery grant of £2.7m from the Heritage Lottery Fund.[4] Friends of Herschel Park, a local conservation group, was created to manage the restoration, as well as to oversee the design and maintenance of the area.[5] The park regularly holds events for adults and children throughout the year. [6]

References

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 11/23/2014. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.