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Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. The City of Bradford metropolitan borough comprises Bradford itself and smaller outlying settlements. Bradford has a population of 293,717, whilst the wider metropolitan borough has a population of 493,100.
Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Bradford rose to prominence during the 19th century as an international centre of textile manufacture, particularly wool.
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Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. The City of Bradford metropolitan borough comprises Bradford itself and smaller outlying settlements. Bradford has a population of 293,717, whilst the wider metropolitan borough has a population of 493,100.
Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Bradford rose to prominence during the 19th century as an international centre of textile manufacture, particularly wool. It was a boomtown of the Industrial Revolution, and amongst the earliest industrialised settlements, rapidly becoming the "wool capital of the world". The area's access to a supply of coal, iron ore and soft water facilitated the growth of Bradford's manufacturing base, which, as textile manufacture grew, led to an explosion in population and was a stimulus to civic investment; Bradford has fine Victorian architecture including the grand Italianate City Hall.
Bradford became a municipal borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897. Following a boundary reform in 1974, city status was bestowed upon the wider metropolitan borough.
The textile sector in Bradford fell into a terminal decline from the mid-20th century. Since this time, Bradford has faced similar challenges to the rest of the post-industrial area of Northern England, including deindustrialisation, economic deprivation and housing problems. Since the 1950s Bradford has experienced significant levels of immigration, particularly from Pakistan, and consequently has the fourth highest proportion of Muslims in England and Wales. Since the decline in heavy industry, Bradford has emerged as a tourist destination with attractions such as the National Media Museum, Cartwright Hall, and Saltaire, a World Heritage Site.
History
The name Bradford is derived from the "broad ford" at Church Bank (below the site of Bradford Cathedral) around which a settlement had begun to appear before the time of the Norman Conquest ("Bradeford" in the Domesday book of 1086). The ford crossed the stream called Bradford Beck.
Bradford, for long a centre of the West Riding wool industry, was one of the many English towns which became prosperous during the Industrial Revolution. Bradford's textile industry dates back as far as the 13th century, but it was not until the 19th century that it became world-famous. Wool was imported in vast quantities for the manufacture of worsted cloth in which Bradford specialised. Other fibres were also processed, including alpaca. Yorkshire had plentiful supplies of soft water, which was needed in the cleaning of raw wool, and locally mined coal provided the power that the industry needed. Sandstone, Bradford's local stone, was an excellent resource for the building of the mills, and the large population of West Yorkshire provided a readily available workforce.
To support the textile mills, a large manufacturing base grew up in the city, providing textile machinery, and this led to diversification with different industries thriving side by side. Bradford's manufacturing history includes the Jowett Motor Company, which had many great achievements during its 50 years of existence. The textile industry started to decline in the 1920s, and Bradford has been cited as an example of deindustrialisation. However, today a spirit of rebirth has taken hold and Bradford is one of the north's important cities, with modern technology, chemicals, engineering, academic and financial sectors replacing the "dark satanic mills" image of the Industrial Revolution.
The grandest of the mills (no longer used for textile production) is Lister Mills, the chimney of which can be seen from most places in Bradford. It has recently become a beacon of regeneration in the city after a £100 million conversion to apartment blocks by property developers Urban Splash.
Salts Mill is another large mill that has an exciting new life in the modern era. The mill is occupied by high-technology companies, contemporary design shops and gallery spaces. It is the hub of the world heritage site of Saltaire, three miles (4.8 km) north of Bradford city centre. The Bradford district also contains the villages of Thornton and Haworth, the birthplace and home of the world famous Brontë sisters.
A culture of innovation was fundamental to Bradford's dominance in the 19th and 20th centuries. New textile technologies were invented in the city, a prime example being the work of Samuel Lister. This innovation culture continues today throughout Bradford's economy, from automotive Kahn Design to electronics Pace Micro Technology.
Wm Morrison Supermarkets was founded by William Morrison in 1899, initially as an egg and butter merchant in Rawson Market, operating under the name of Wm Morrison (Provisions) Limited.
Ever since the Industrial Revolution there have been waves of immigration into the city and today there is a very diverse population (figures for ethnic origin of inhabitants are given in the entry for the City of Bradford). This is reflected in the different places of worship built over the years. Nonconformist chapels were frequently built in the 19th century, and mosques started appearing in the 20th century. The city has been praised for its cultural diversity but on occasion conflict has arisen. In January 1989, copies of Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses were publicly burnt in Bradford, and the city's Muslim community took the lead in the campaign against the book in the UK. In July 2001, ethnic tensions and troubles in other northern towns led to serious rioting in Bradford.
Bradford was one of the contenders for 2008 European Capital Of Culture. Although in the end it lost out to Liverpool, the bid created confidence in the city and has led to new initiatives.
In 2004, the Bradford Urban Regeneration Company commissioned architect Will Alsop to create a vision for the city's future and the role of a "City Centre" in the 21st century. The audacious (yet controversial) Alsop plan envisions four regenerated quarters within the heart of the city — The Bowl, The Channel, The Market and The Valley — each creating new public spaces for commerce, education, leisure and showcasing Bradford's setting within the Pennine region.
Development
In the decade before 2008 many significant developments were completed in the Bradford district and further large schemes were under construction and proposed.
Completed were:
- Centenary Square, city centre, public piazza and retail.
- Connecting the City, £20 million clearance of 1960s structures over several acres of the city centre, in preparation for the Broadway project.
- Lister Mills Silk Warehouse, Manningham, 131 apartments, the first phase of a £100 million project.
- Victoria Mill, Shipley, £70 million conversion and new build, 300 apartments (part complete).
- City termination of M606.
- Leisure Exchange, city centre, multiplex cinemas, bowling, restaurants.
- New Class 333 electric trains (similar to Heathrow Express) from Forster Square railway station to Leeds/Ilkley/Skipton/Shipley/Bingley/Keighley.
- Abbey offices, Yorkshire Building Society offices in the city centre.
- Valley Parade, Manningham, the completion of 25,000 seat covered stands at Bradford City football stadium.
- Manchester Road corridor, a guided bus route with innovative art installation/bus stops.
- Bingley Relief Road, a £49 million project creating a high-speed route through Airedale.
- Rawson Quarter, redevelopment of the former Rawson Market.
- The Gatehaus, Little Germany, a £22 million 11 floor apartment building.
Under construction and proposed were:
- Lister Mills Velvet Mill, 170 apartments.
- Broadway Project, £300 million city centre shops, offices and apartments (proposed, clearance complete).
- Eastbrook Hall, Little Germany, £12 million rebuilding significant structure to create commercial and living space (completion summer 2008).
- Listerhills urban village, £90 million mixed use project, student and key-worker housing, in the city centre Thornton Road/Valley area (commences 2008).
- New Victoria Place, £55 million hotel, public square, offices, retail, Bradford College, 205 apartments, adjacent to the Alhambra Theatre and Centenary Square (proposed, site is under discussion).
- Channel neighbourhood, £350 million waterside project in the city centre Canal Road area, with shops, offices, apartments, includes reopening the Bradford Canal (in planning).
- University campus refurbishment, £75 million project as part of 'Ecoversity' vision (part complete).
- Lister Mills further phases of a £100 million project, Chimney Square, Boiler House, link to Victor Road and Lister Park (proposed).
- Drummonds, Manningham, conversion of mills to apartments and offices (proposed).
- The Bowl, centrepiece of the Alsop Masterplan large pool backed by City Hall, the future gathering place for Bradfordians (purchase of land in progress).
- Citygate project, Manchester Road (City Centre end) hotel, residential and commercial buildings including a 38 storey tower, making it Bradford's tallest building (completion 2012).
- Beehive Mills, Thornton Road, residential apartments and commercial uses on the ground floors including a 22 storey tower (completion 2010).
Governance
During the English Civil War the town was Parliamentarian in sympathy, but changed hands several times as it was difficult to defend.
A life-size statue of Oliver Cromwell decorates the façade of the 19th century City Hall, suggesting a continuing commitment to parliamentary values. However, Bradford did not gain its own MPs until the Reform Act 1832 gave it two.
Other prominent statues of political figures include Robert Peel and Richard Cobden (campaigners for free trade which Bradford at one time saw as key to its commercial success) and W.E. Forster (perhaps Bradford's most famous MP).
Bradford's politicians tended to identify with industrialists in the 19th century, but the city played an important part in the early history of the Labour Party. A mural on the back of the Priestley Centre For The Arts (visible from Leeds Road) commemorates the centenary of the founding of the Independent Labour Party in 1893.
Bradford was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1847, covering the parishes of Bradford, Horton and Manningham. It became a county borough with the passing of the Local Government Act 1888. The county borough was granted city status by Letters Patent in 1897. Bradford was expanded in 1882 to include Allerton, Bolton, Bowling, Heaton, Thornbury and Tyersal. In 1899 it was further expanded by adding North Bierley, Eccleshill, Idle, Thornton, Tong and Wyke. Clayton was added in 1930.
The county borough was merged with the Borough of Keighley, the Urban Districts of Baildon, Bingley, Cullingworth, Denholme, Ilkley, Shipley and Silsden, along with part of Queensbury and Shelf Urban District and part of Skipton Rural District by the Local Government Act 1972. One result of the boundaries of Bradford being widened in this way is that the district is marginal in terms of party political loyalty — at present no group is in overall control of the council.
In 1858 a case of poisoning occurring as a result of sweets sold from Bradford's Green Market being adulterated with arsenic led to legislation such as the Pharmacies Act 1868 and W.E. Gladstone's regulating of the adulteration of foodstuffs. See The Bradford Sweet Poisoning.
Geography
Bradford is located at (53.7500, -1.8333)1. Topographically, it is located in the eastern part of the moorland region called the South Pennines
Unusually for a major city, Bradford is not built on any substantial body of water. The ford from which it takes its name (Broad-Ford) was a crossing of the stream called Bradford Beck. The beck rises in the Pennine hills to the west of the city, and is swelled by tributaries such as Horton Beck, Westbrook, Bowling Beck and Eastbrook. At the site of the original ford, just below the present Bradford Cathedral, it turns north, and flows more or less straight towards the River Aire at Shipley. Bradfordale (or Bradforddale) is a name given by geographers to the valley of Bradford Beck (see for example Firth 1997). It can reasonably be regarded as one of the Yorkshire Dales, though as the site of a big city, it is often not recognised as such.
The beck's course through the city centre is entirely underground, and was mostly so by the middle of the 19th century. On the 1852 Ordnance Survey map of Bradford it is visible as far as Sun Bridge, at the end of Tyrrell Street, and then again from beside the railway station at the bottom of Kirkgate. On the 1906 Ordnance Survey, it disappears at Tumbling Hill Street, off Thornton Road, and first appears again north of Cape Street, off Valley Road, though there are further culverts as far as Queens Road. This is substantially the position today.Bradford Beck is now a central element of the Alsop plan to regenerate the city centre. 'The Bowl' is an ambitious project to open up the beck and create a huge pool to act as the pivotal point of the new city centre.
The Bradford Canal, built in 1774, took its water from Bradford Beck and its tributaries. This supply was often inadequate to feed the locks, and the polluted state of the canal led to its temporary closure in 1866: the canal was closed in the early 20th century as uneconomic. Like the beck, the canal is about to be rejuvenated in the Alsop plan. 'The Channel' envisages the reopening of the canal and the creation of a new canal-side community.
The City of Bradford has an estimated population (2003) of 477,775. About 300,000 of these live within the main city area itself, the rest living in the surrounding towns, villages and countryside.
Economy
Bradford's historical prominence in textile industries has now waned; however, the prevailing low wages and the support of a thriving educational sector continue to create economic success in many areas, notably: Finance (Yorkshire Building Society, Bradford & Bingley, Abbey/Grupo Santander, Provident Financial), Retail (Morrisons supermarkets, Grattan Mail Order), Electronics (Pace Micro, Filtronic), Engineering (NG Bailey, Powell Switchgear), Manufacturing (Denso Marston, CIBA Chemicals, Bailey Offsite). Small businesses owned by the Asian community also thrive. However, Bradford is a relatively poor British city, particularly when compared with its neighbours Leeds and Manchester.
Transport
In past centuries Bradford's location in Bradfordale made communications difficult, except from the north. Nonetheless, Bradford is now well-served by transport systems.
Bradford was first connected to the developing turnpike network in 1734, when the first Yorkshire turnpike was built between Manchester and Leeds via Halifax and Bradford. In 1740, the Selby to Halifax road was constructed through Leeds and Bradford. Several more local and long-distance roads were built through the rest of the century.
Today Bradford lies on several trunk roads:
The M606, a spur off the M62 motorway, connects Bradford with the national motorway network. Although it was originally planned to go directly into the city centre, this has never been built and is unlikely now ever to be, as a hotel has been built across the proposed route.
Bradford's tram system was begun by Bradford Corporation in 1882: at first the vehicles were horse-drawn. They were replaced by steam-driven trams in 1883, and by electric ones in 1898. On 20 June 1911, Britain's first trolleybus service opened in Bradford, between Laisterdyke and Dudley Hill. It was often known as the trackless, in contradistinction to trams. The last trolleybus service in Bradford — and indeed in Britain — ceased operation on 26 March 1972. The Bradford Trolleybus Association bought some of Bradford's trolleybuses but later sold them off to private owners. Ten Bradford trolleybuses are now preserved at the Trolleybus Museum at Sandtoft, Lincolnshire. In 1974 Bradford's municipal buses were taken over by the West Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive. First Bradford are now the main operator of most bus routes in Bradford, and are part of the First Group. Some routes that include Manchester Road use guided buses.
The Bradford Canal was a long spur off the Leeds and Liverpool Canal at Shipley. It was planned and built as part of the original Leeds and Liverpool project, to connect Bradford with the limestone quarries of north Yorkshire, the industrial towns on both sides of the Pennines and the ports on each coast. It opened in 1774, closed in 1866, reopened in 1871, and finally closed in 1922. There are plans to rebuild the canal as a key part of regenerating the city centre (see the main article).
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The Leeds and Bradford Railway opened Bradford's first railway station at the bottom of Kirkgate on 1 July 1846. It offered a service via Shipley to Leeds and through Leeds to other centres, including London. The line was soon absorbed by the Midland Railway, and the station was rebuilt in the early 1850s and again, much larger, in 1890. Today it is a smaller railway station dating from 1990, called Forster Square railway station though it is somewhat distant from the site of its predecessors, and from Forster Square itself. Modern electric trains connect directly to Leeds, Ilkley and Skipton. There is currently a four times daily National Express East Coast service linking Bradford with London King's Cross. A new company Grand Central Railway is proposing to significantly increase this London connection, with additional fast trains via Doncaster/East Coast Mainline and via Manchester/West Coast Mainline.
The Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway opened its station at Drake Street on 9 May 1850, on its line between Manchester and Leeds. The Great Northern Railway opened a third terminus at Adolphus Street in 1854, serving Leeds and other places on its network, but the station was too far from the centre, and the two companies eventually agreed to build a joint station to replace the L&Y's station at Drake Street. This was Bradford Exchange railway station, opened in 1867: Adolphus Street remained as a goods terminal. The Exchange Station was completely rebuilt in 1880, with ten platforms; but by 1973 it was too large and again was rebuilt on a different site. In 1983 that station was renamed Bradford Interchange when a large bus station was built alongside. Bradford Interchange railway station connects directly to Leeds, to Manchester Victoria and to Blackpool. Both stations are under the control of the West Yorkshire Metro as part of the Leeds-Bradford Line routes.
From the 1870s, the Great Northern built several suburban railway lines around Bradford:
There have been many schemes to build a link between Bradford's main railway terminals or otherwise put the city on a through railway line, but none has ever come to fruition. One of the earliest and the most significant of these was the Midland Railway's proposed extension which would have connected the Midland Main Line from the south direct into Forster Square and then onwards into Scotland (see Midland Main Line). The major redevelopment of the city centre in the 1960s then provided the opportunity to connect the two termini but this was also not pursued. Indeed the recent Bradford Masterplan for the city centre regeneration has not addressed this situation (when asked, the writer of the masterplan admitted to not even considering it).
A limitation currently exists with such a connection in that large buildings were constructed on the alignment in the 1990s, comprising a Crown Court near the Interchange Station and a tax office near Forster Square Station. The main practical difficulty in connecting the termini is the great difference in elevation: the Exchange/Interchange station is already at the bottom of a long slope, steep by railway standards, but it is many feet higher than Forster Square Station. However, this gradient is not unprecedented in railway construction terms and the relocation of Forster Square Station further from the city centre has provided additional space in which the transition could be accomplished.
Some bus services, such as the MetroConnect services to Leeds Bradford International Airport, call at both stations, and a free bus service funded by Bradford Council and Metro was launched in September 2008.
The city is served by Leeds Bradford International Airport, to the north east of the city. Bradford and Leeds councils jointly opened the airport in 1931 as Yeadon Aerodrome. There has been rapid expansion in recent years and direct flights are now available to over 70 destinations (October 2006). Around 3 million passengers used the airport in 2006. It is the home base of economy Airline Jet2.com, voted Best European Short Haul Airline 2006. In May 2007 the joint councils sold the airport to Bridgepoint Capital for £145.5 million. Bridgepoint announced that a further £70 million would be invested in airport improvements, to boost passenger figures to over 7 million by 2015. The airport has recently announced a new long-haul route to Islamabad using wide-bodied Airbus A310 aircraft, it is hoped this spurs on new routes from the airport.
Education
The University of Bradford which has over 10,000 students received its Royal Charter in 1966, but traces its history back to the 1860s. It has always been a technical and technological institution, and has no true arts faculties; yet it still covers a wide range of subjects including technology & management science, optometry, pharmacy, medical sciences, nursing studies, archaeology and modern languages. Its Peace Studies Department, founded with Quaker support in 1973, was for long the only such institution in the UK. In terms of nationally recognised leading areas of research there are various departments such as Institute of Pharmaceutical Innovation, Institute of Cancer Therapeutics, Bradford School of Pharmacy, Peace Studies, Archaeology, Engineering, Management, Biochemistry, amongst others. The university balances academic research and teaching quality with a strong tradition of social inclusion.
University of Bradford School of Management located near Lister Park, in 2008, was rated the 11th best business school in the UK by the Financial Times and 21st best by The Economist. Bradford College has around 26,000 students. It developed from the 19th century technical college whose buildings it has inherited. It now offers a wide range of further and higher educational courses, and is an Associate College of Leeds Metropolitan University. It has absorbed the Art School whose most famous alumnus is David Hockney.
Bradford Grammar School, in Frizinghall, dates back to 1548, while The Girls' Grammar School, Bradford is a quite separate establishment dating from 1875 it continues to take only girls except for its Infants' Department.
Culture and recreation
Bradford's oldest building is the cathedral, which for most of its life was a parish church. Few other Medieval buildings have survived apart from Bolling Hall, which has been preserved as a museum.
There are some fine Victorian buildings: apart from the mills mentioned elsewhere in this article, there is the City Hall (with statues of rulers of England unusually including Oliver Cromwell), the former Wool Exchange, and a large Victorian cemetery at Undercliffe. Little Germany is a splendid Victorian commercial district just east of the city centre which takes its name from 19th century immigrants who ran businesses from some of the many listed buildings. Following decades of decay there have been successful conversions to office and residential use. In mid-2005 renovation began on the prominent Eastbrook Hall in Little Germany. Bradford also has a number of architecturally historic hotels that date back to the establishment of the two railway lines into the city centre, back in Victorian times. The Victoria Hotel and the Midland Hotel were built to accommodate business travellers to the city from Scotland, the Midlands, and London, arriving at Forster Square and Bradford Victoria station (later to become Bradford Interchange, during the height of the woollen trade.
Like many cities, Bradford lost a number of notable buildings to developers in the 1960s and 1970s: particularly mourned at the time were the Swan Arcade and the old Kirkgate Market. In recent years some buildings from that era have themselves been demolished and replaced: Provincial House, next to Centenary Square, was demolished by controlled explosion in 2002, and Forster House was pulled down in 2005 as part of the Broadway development.
The city is the location of the most visited museum outside London, the National Media Museum, previously called the National Museum of Photography, Film & Television. It has three cinemas including a gigantic Imax screen. Bradford's main art gallery is housed in the grand Edwardian Cartwright Hall in Lister Park. Salts Mill has the world's largest collection of David Hockney artworks. Bradford Industrial Museum celebrates and explains the significant achievements in Bradford's industrial past, from textiles to the manufacture of motor cars. Colour was important in the development of the textile industry and the educational Bradford Colour Museum is unique in the UK. It is run by the Society of Dyers and Colourists.
The National Media Museum celebrates cinema and movies. It contains an Imax cinema, the Cubby Broccoli Cinema, and the Pictureville Cinema — described by David Puttnam as the best cinema in Britain. The museum has a rich and varied programme of films from around the world. Bradford is bidding to become a UNESCO City of Film.
Traditional cinemas in Bradford have been replaced by new entertainment complexes with multi-screen cinemas. There are two multiplex cinema in Bradford. Cineworld is at the Leisure Exchange in the city centre. The Odeon Leeds-Bradford is at Thornbury, on the outskirts of Bradford. The latter replaced the old Odeon next to the Alhambra which was the recent focus of protests by Bradfordians who didn't wish to see the old building close.
The University of Bradford also has a cinema run by the Students' Union. The Bradford Student Cinema operates from the University's Great Hall.
There are four theatres in Bradford: The Alhambra was built in 1914 for theatre impresario Frank Laidler, and later owned by the Moss Empire group (Oswald Stoll and Edward Moss) and refurbished in 1986; The Studio is a smaller studio theatre in the same complex. Both of these are operated by Bradford Council. The Theatre in the Mill is a small studio theatre in the University of Bradford which presents both student and community shows and small-scale touring professional work. The Priestley Theatre is a privately run venue with a medium-sized proscenium theatre and a small studio.
Among the professional theatre companies based in Bradford are, Kala Sangam, the satirical madcap comedy troop, Komedy Kollective, Lost Dog (based at Theatre In The Mill) and Mind the Gap, one of the longest established, who have always worked with a mixture of disabled and able-bodied performers. Groups and organisations teaching theatre include The Asian Theatre School, Bradford Stage and Theatre School and Stage 84.
Amateur theatre groups include:
- Actors' Community Theatre (ACT)
- Bingley Little Theatre
- Drama Unlimited
- Bradford University Society for Operettas and Musicals (BUSOM)
- Bradford University Theatre Group (BUTG),
- Bradford Youth Players
- Buttershaw (St Paul's) Church Amateur Operatic and Dramatic Society
- Great Horton Amateur Operatic Society
- The Bradford Catholic Players
- The Bradford Players
St George's Hall is a grand concert hall, designed by Lockwood and Mawson, dating from 1853. The Hallé Orchestra have been regular visitors over the years, as have a wide range of popular entertainers including Ken Dodd. It is sometimes used for theatrical productions. Although Bradford was home to composer Frederick Delius, there are no prominent professional music ensembles based in Bradford at present. There are some prominent amateur groups, such as the Bradford Festival Chorus.
Although the university does not have an academic music department, it has a Fellow in Music who organises a range of playing and performing groups, and regular concerts around the university, in venues such as the Tasmin Little Music Centre, and the Yorkshire Craft Centre at Bradford College; there are also occasional concerts further afield, in venues such as Bradford Cathedral.
The Topic Folk Club which currently meets in the Cock and Bottle on Barkerend Road, on Thursday nights, has been in existence since 1956, though it has frequently changed its venue. Jazz at The Priestley is a long-running series of jazz evenings in the Cellar Bar of The Priestley on Friday nights. Mono is a monthly rock fanzine published in Bradford, covering the local alternative/independent rock music scene.The city is the birthplace of rock bands New Model Army, Anti System, Smokie, Dead Eye Decline, Southern Death Cult/The Cult, The Scene, One Minute Silence, Terrorvision, Morbid Humour, Violation, and Asian hip hop group Fun-Da-Mental.
Boar's Head Morris Men were a (mainly Cotswold) morris side in Bradford from the early 1970s until 2006. Persephone Ladies Morris are still active, as are Rainbow Morris in Shipley, and clog side Clogaire.
Each year the city hosts several successful festivals. In June there is the Book Festival and the massive Bradford Mela,, the biggest of its kind outside Asia. The Ilkley Literature Festival in September and October is the largest and most prestigious in the north attracting big names from the arts and entertainment. There are several Continental Markets and Food Fairs throughout the city and district including the Bradford International Market, a four day spectacular in August. The city is also known for its various film festivals hosted by the National Media Museum. These include The Bradford Film Festival in March, Bite The Mango Film Festival (World Cinema) in September, plus the Bradford Animation Festival held each November.
Prior to 2000, Bradford's nightlife was centred around Manor Row and earlier than this the main club run was from Maestros along Manningham Lane to Foster Square. Some of the main clubs of the 1990s in Bradford were Maestros, 0898, Kiss, Cloud 9, JB's, Lingards, Dukes & Silks. Since around 2000, several clubs and theme pubs have opened in the West End of Bradford, around the Alhambra Theatre, turning what was previously a fairly quiet area into one that is often crowded and raucous at night. A myriad of Indian and Pakistani restaurants cater for the most discerning curry tastes around this area.
Within the city district there are 37 parks and gardens. Lister Park with its boating lake and Mughal Water Gardens, was voted Britain's Best Park for 2006. Peel Park is the venue for the annual Mela — a celebration of eastern culture, and Bowling Park in East Bowling is the site where the annual Bradford Carnival takes place, celebrating local African and Caribbean culture. Beauty spot, Chellow Dene, has two Victorian reservoirs set in pleasant woodland. To the west and north of Bradford are picturesque and atmospheric moorlands: the famous Ilkley Moor and moors above Haworth known internationally for its connection with the Brontë sisters.
Bradford was one of the first areas of the UK to get a local commercial radio station Pennine Radio in September 1975. Today this is The Pulse of West Yorkshire and Pulse Classic Gold. Bradford Community Broadcasting based in the city centre has broadcast on full-time Community Radio license around Bradford and the Aire Valley. Bradford's only Television station AAP TV caters for Bradford's large Asian community. This channel also shows programs about the multicultural life in Bradford and the rest of Britain. It broadcasts to nearly 160 countries via satellite. The Telegraph and Argus is Bradford's daily newspaper, published six days each week from Monday to Saturday.
Sport
The city has a long rugby tradition, and Bradford Bulls (formerly Bradford Northern) are one of the most successful rugby league clubs in the world, winning the World Club Championship three times since 2002 and also seven times winners of the Rugby League Championship. The home of the Bulls is Grattan Stadium, Odsal (formerly Odsal Stadium) in the south of the city. The city is also home to a number of rugby union clubs — Bradford and Bingley RFC (The Bees) are based to the north of the city in Bingley; Bradford Salem are based in the Heaton area and Wibsey RFC can be found in that district to the south of the city centre. The Richard Dunn Sports Centre is located close to the Grattan Stadium, Odsal and the sports facilities at the university are also open to the public at certain times.
League football was introduced to West Yorkshire in Bradford, when Bradford City were formed in 1903. James Whyte, a sub-editor of the Bradford Observer had met with Football Association representative John Brunt in January to discuss the plans, and in May, Manningham RFC, a rugby league side decided to change codes to association football. The Football League subsequently elected Bradford City to the league, with a total of 30 votes to replace Doncaster Rovers, because it saw the invitation as a chance to introduce football to the rugby-dominated county. Just eight years after they were elected to the league, City won the FA Cup and recorded the highest league position in their history. The club now plays in the bottom tier of The Football League following two periods of administration, but their ground suffered one of the worst all-time sporting disasters in the world after 56 people died at Valley Parade on 11 May 1985. A second side from the city, Bradford Park Avenue were successful in The Football League until they dropped out of the league in 1974. They now play in the regional league, which means the Bradford derby has not been exercised in years. Their ground hosted county cricket for Yorkshire as well as football.
Bradford was once home to the now-defunct Bradford Dukes speedway team, which raced at Odsal. Speedway was staged at Greenfields Stadium in the pioneer days, when it was known as the Autodrome, and it was used for a couple of seasons in the early 1960s. Odsal opened its doors soon after the war in Europe ended in 1945 and continued in the late 1950s. It entered a team in the 1960 Provincial League then fell dormant until the 1970s when it re-opened and ran for many years. The track staged a number of big meetings including Speedway World Finals.
Religion
The city of Bradford and surrounding districts are home to a wealth of places of worship that contribute to the region's cultural heritage. These include Sikh gurudwaras and Hindu mandirs, Jewish synagogues and Buddhist centres, but mostly Christian churches and Muslim mosques. Due to a significant Pakistani (and to a lesser extent, Bangladeshi) population in the city, Islam has become prominent throughout the city, particularly in inner city areas such as Manningham and Girlington. As well as there being a significant Muslim population, there is also a fairly large Indian immigrant community in Bradford. The area of Leeds Road probably has the largest Sikh population in the city, which is reflected by the number of Gurudwaras in the area. The area also has a significant number of Hindus, having the largest Hindu mandir in the North of England. Furthermore there is also a small Jewish population, despite the fact that over the years many of them have tended to leave Bradford, preferring various parts of Leeds instead, particularly the area of Alwoodley and Moortown. However several synagogues can still be found in the city, such as the one in Manningham.
The district has a tradition of nonconformity which is reflected in the number of chapels erected by Congregationalists, Baptists, Methodists etc. The city was a major centre of the House Church movement in the 1980s, and the Christian charity Christians Against Poverty was founded in the city. Other house churches in the city include El Shaddai International Christian Centre and the World Outreach Church. Bradford is also home to the Abundant Life Church, a large nonconforming Church, that has around 3,000 members.
Two carved stones, probably parts of a Saxon preaching cross, were found on the site of Bradford Cathedral. They indicate that Christians may have worshipped here since Paulinus of York came to the north of England in AD 627 on a mission to convert Northumbria. He preached in Dewsbury and it was from there that Bradford was first evangelised. The vicars of Bradford later paid dues to that parish.
Religious buildings
The most prominent Christian church in Bradford, is Bradford Cathedral, originally the Parish Church of St Peter. The parish of Bradford was in existence by 1283, and there was a stone church on the shelf above Bradford Beck by 1327. The Diocese of Bradford was created from part of the Diocese of Ripon in 1919, and the church became a cathedral at that time.
Since the 1960s Bradford has had a significant Muslim population, and accordingly there are many mosques throughout the city. Some were converted from churches or other buildings, but there are several purpose-built mosques as well. The largest of these mosques is probably Hanfia Masjid in the majority Muslim area of Manningham. Another large mosque in Bradford, would be Madni Jamia Masjid which recently won the Model Mosque (Islam Channel) award. There is ongoing construction of a mosque and college in the area of Horton Grange, for Islamic courses. In 2008 work was completed on a new mosque in Plumpton Street, Girlington, for the city's Dawoodi Bohra Muslims. This community is a sub sect of Ismaili Shia Islam.
There are two Hindu temples (mandirs). The Lakshmi Narayan mandir opened officially on 20 April 2008. This is the largest Hindu temple in Northern England. Also in Bradford is the Hindu Temple and Community Centre on Thornton Lane. There are also smaller house-based mandirs, as shown in the List of Hindu Temples.
There is a prominent Sikh community in Bradford, with six gurudwaras (Sikh place of worship) around the city. The Sikh festival of Vaisakhi (Baisakhi) is also celebrated on 14 April every year, this sees Sikhs from Bradford and the surrounding area travel to each of the gurudwaras in the city in a procession called a nagar kirtan. There are three gurudwaras in the Leeds Road area of Bradford alone, Gobind Singh Gurudwara, on Gobind Marg, being the largest of these. There is a Ramgharia Gurudwara on Bolton Road and Guru Nanak Gurudwara is on Wakefield Road.
The Jewish community in Bradford was strong in the middle to late 19th century, and there is a 19th century Reform synagogue in Bowland Street in the Manningham area. This, "The oldest Reform synagogue
outside London", was established by German Jews who had moved to Bradford for the wool trade. According to historian Shatman Kadish, "The city of Bradford was unique in that it boasted a Reform synagogue before it acquired an Orthodox one".
Public services
There are two major hospitals in Bradford: Bradford Royal Infirmary and St Luke's Hospital. Plus significant local health centres and cottage hospitals. Private health care is also available at the Yorkshire Clinic, Shipley and the Yorkshire Eye Hospital, Greengates.
Bradford is the focus of one of the UK's largest ever birth cohort studies, known as Born in Bradford. Partly supported by European funding, it is the result of close collaboration between the University of Bradford, the NHS and other institutions in West Yorkshire. It will track the lives of all the babies born in the city from 2006 to 2008 and aims to find solutions to some of Bradford's public health problems, such as obesity and a higher than average infant mortality rate.
Crime
Crime has long been a problem in Bradford and is often gang and consequently drug related. The increase in murder rates has been alarming in recent years and this has mainly been due to an increase in gun crime throughout the city. According to a 2006 study by think tank Reform, which ranked urban areas using police data, Bradford is ranked as the worst place for gun crime in the country. Moreover it not only found Bradford topped the chart for gun crime but also had the second highest number of assaults per 1,000 people and had the fifth highest rates of burglary, rape and murder in England and Wales. Bradford has also witnessed two riots in the past decade or so, namely the Bradford Riots of 2001 and the Manningham Riots six years earlier.
Manningham Riots
The Manningham Riot was a short but intense period of rioting which took place from 10 to 12 June 1995, in the district of Manningham in Bradford.
A series of widely publicised riots and racial disturbances have occurred in this part of Bradford since the mid 1990s, which have often been attributed to the segregation that has been identified between the various ethnic groups present in the city. The riot of summer 1995 was limited to a relatively confined area of the city, but was seen as indicative of the circumstances which led to the later and more widespread riot of summer 2001.
Bradford Riots
The Bradford Riots were a short but intense period of rioting which began on 7 July 2001, in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. It occurred as a result of heightened tension between ethnic minority communities and the city's white majority, stoked by confrontation between the Anti-Nazi League and far right groups such as the National Front. Similar race riots had occurred a few days earlier in other parts of northern England.
More than 300 police officers were hurt during the riot. There were 297 arrests in total; 187 people were charged with riot, 45 with violent disorder and 200 jail sentences totalling 604 years were handed down, the most ever handed out for public disturbance by some margin. The last rioter was sentenced six-and-a-half years after the events; the number of convictions for riot was unprecedented in English legal history. In fact, the next highest amount was 5 for an investigation in London. The estimated damage was put at £7 million. The government subsequently commissioned the Cantle report which made 67 recommendations. In 2006 Channel 4 produced a TV fictional drama based loosely on the riots from the perspective of an Asian family.
Notable Bradfordians
Only a few particularly notable names are listed here. See :Category:People from Bradford for a fuller list
The people in this list were either born or brought up in Bradford (not necessarily both), or had a significant connection with the city later in life.
Those marked with an asterisk ('*') are described in Lister, 2004.
- Sir Edward Appleton – discoverer of the ionosphere and Nobel Prize winner
- The Brontë sisters, Anne, Emily*, and Charlotte* – born in Thornton on the outskirts of Bradford, but later lived in Haworth.
- Frederick Delius – Composer
- W.E. Forster MP for Bradford – commemorated by statue, and is the namesake of Forster Square
- Gareth Gates – singer
- David Hockney – artist
- Samuel Lister – industrialist and inventor, commemorated by a statue
- Aasif Mandvi – popular comedian on The Daily Show
- Richard Oastler – social reformer; statue in Northgate
- Albert Pierrepoint – Britain's last hangman
- J. B. Priestley – writer, commemorated by a statue
- Michael Rennie – actor
- Kimberley Walsh – member of Girls Aloud
- Richard Whiteley – television presenter
- Junior Witter – boxer, former WBC World Light Welterweight champion
- Joel York, member of alternative rock band, Gramsci Melodic
- Allan Holdsworth – musician, composer, guitar virtuoso
- James Sammon aka Pianoman – musician, composer,
In popular culture
In the BBC political satire The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, the Prime Minister considers a proposal to move Parliament to Bradford, as it is closer to the geographic centre of the country than London. The Buttershaw area of the city featured in the 1986 film Rita, Sue and Bob Too, in which two 16-year-old girls were involved in a love triangle with a wealthy married man (played by George Costigan). The film was created by Andrea Dunbar, who died four years after it was made. It was initially unpopular with local residents due to its negative image of the area, but has since earned itself a good reputation in the local community as Buttershaw's claim to fame.
Bradford features in the 1983 film Monty Python's The Meaning of Life with footage filmed in Lister Park. It is also the home to the hosts of Yog Radio, a podcast devoted to the Call of Cthulhu, the Cthulhu Mythos, and the writings of H. P. Lovecraft. The new Spooks spin-off for BBC Three, Spooks: Code 9 was filmed in Bradford.
Twin towns
Bradford's current twin towns and cities are listed at http://www.bradford.gov.uk/life_in_the_community/twin_towns_and_villages:
See also
- Bradford City stadium fire
- Bradford Riots
Bibliography
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- The map itself is a reproduction of the Plan of the Town of Bradford ... revised and corrected to the present time by Dixon & Hindle, 1871.
External links
- : Maps and statistics Bradford Metropolitan District
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