|
|
|
|
Rowley Regis
|
| |
|
| |
Rowley Regis is a town in the Sandwell metropolitan borough of the West Midlands county, and a part of the Black Country in the United Kingdom. Being part of the Black Country, locals speak with the traditional dialect, though in a form which is regarded by many as the quickest and the hardest to understand.
ey Regis started centuries ago as a small village surrounding the parish church of St Giles.
Discussion
Ask a question about 'Rowley Regis' Start a new discussion about 'Rowley Regis' Answer questions from other users |
Encyclopedia
Rowley Regis is a town in the Sandwell metropolitan borough of the West Midlands county, and a part of the Black Country in the United Kingdom. Being part of the Black Country, locals speak with the traditional dialect, though in a form which is regarded by many as the quickest and the hardest to understand.
History
Rowley Regis started centuries ago as a small village surrounding the parish church of St Giles. It began to develop as a town between the two world wars, when thousands of privately owned and local authority houses were built in the surrounding area. During that time, Rowley Regis expanded to coalesce with Blackheath, Old Hill and Cradley Heath. These places were all within the ancient parish of Rowley Regis, which (despite being in Staffordshire) was in the diocese of Worcester. The parish contained the manors of Rowley Regis and Rowley Somery, the latter being part of the barony of Dudley, but the extents of these manors and the relationship between them are not clear.
The village sits on Rowley Hill, which makes up part of the Rowley Hills famed for the quarrying of Rowley Rag Stone.
The present St Giles Church on Church Road is not the first church. It was designed by Holland W. Hobbiss and A. S. Dixon and was built in 1923. The previous church, built in 1904, was burned down in 1913 by arsonists. Prior to that, the second church, built in 1840, was found to be unsafe and condemned in 1900.
In 1966, Rowley Regis borough merged with the borough of Oldbury and Smethwick county borough to form Warley County Borough and became part of Worcestershire. Eight years later, in 1974, on the formation of the West Midlands Metropolitan county, Warley merged with West Bromwich County Borough to form Sandwell Metropolitan Borough. It is now right in the core of the West Midlands conurbation.
Rowley Regis railway station opened in 1867.
The town's grammar school was opened on Hawes Lane in September 1962. The school's well-known former pupils include Pete Williams (original bass player with Dexy's Midnight Runners) and actress Josie (born Wendy) Lawrence. In 1974 the site continued to function as Rowley Regis Sixth Form College, the last intake of grammar school pupils having been inducted the previous year. The building itself closed in 2003 to become part of Dudley College, which used it as a campus until 2004. The building was demolished over the winter of 2007/2008 and the site is to be redeveloped as the new Rowley Learning Campus under Sandwell's Building Schools for the Future programme , comprising St Michael's Church of England High School A Business and Enterprise College, Westminster Special School and Whiteheath Education Centre, which is set to open in 2011.
Neighbourhoods
- Rowley Village
- Blackheath
- Whiteheath
- Lion Farm
- Portway
- Ross
- Brickhouse Farm
- Lodgefields
- The Green
Famous residents
External links
|
| |
|
|
