Daventry
Daventry is a historic market town in Northamptonshire, England with a population of 24,000. The town is the centre of the Daventry district of western Northamptonshire - a large rural district which has a combined population of 71,838.
It is located roughly 25 miles (40 km) west of Northampton. The town comprises a historic market centre surrounded by much modern housing and light industrial development.
Daventry's amenities include a popular country park and reservoir, located just outside the town centre.
On the 653 foot (199 metre) high 'Borough Hill' overlooking the town, remains have been found of an iron age hill fort - one of the largest found in Britain. Remains have also been found on the hill, of later Roman buildings.
Daventy town was incorporated under a royal charter in 1606, and a new Royal charter was granted in 1674. During the English Civil War Daventry was the headquarters of king Charles I before the Battle of Naseby which occurred nearby in 1645 between Royalist and Parliamentarian forces.
Until the 1950s Daventry was a small rural town, with a population of around 6,000. Real growth started in the town in 1954 when the ball bearing manufacturer British Timken located a large factory in the town.
In the early 1960s the town was chosen as an overspill for people displaced by slum clearances in Birmingham. The town grew rapidly as a result: between 1955 and 1975 Daventry's population tripled to around 20,000.
In 1923 a BBC broadcasting station was built on the Borough Hill outside the town, which once had a large antenna farm. In 1935 the radio station at Daventry was used for the first ever practical demonstration of radar, by it's inventor Robert Watson-Watt. The station closed in 1992 and only one of the radio masts now remains and is used as a radio beacon for aircraft.
Due to it's good transport links, Daventry is now a distribution centre.
The town is near the M1 motorway and on the A45 main road, but lost its rail links in the 1960s.
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