1.
Gateshead
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Gateshead is a large town in Tyne and Wear, England, and the main settlement in the Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead. The local authority of Gateshead is also the Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead, Gateshead lay in County Durham, in 1835 the town became part of Gateshead County Borough. After the Local Government Act 1972, in 1974, Gateshead became part of the Gateshead Metropolitan Borough local authority, the town lies on the southern bank of the River Tyne opposite Newcastle upon Tyne. Gateshead and Newcastle are joined by seven bridges across the Tyne, the town is known for its architecture, including the Sage Gateshead, the Angel of the North and the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art. Residents of Gateshead, like the rest of Tyneside, are referred to as Geordies, Gatesheads population in 2011 was 120,046. Gateshead is first mentioned in Latin translation in Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People as ad caput caprae at the goats head, although other derivations have been mooted, it is this that is given by the standard authorities. There has been a settlement on the Gateshead side of the River Tyne, around the old river crossing where the Swing Bridge now stands, the first recorded mention of Gateshead is in the writings of the Venerable Bede who referred to an Abbot of Gateshead called Utta in 623. In 1068 William the Conqueror defeated the forces of Edgar the Ætheling, during medieval times Gateshead was under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Durham. At this time the area was largely forest with agricultural land. The forest was the subject of Gatesheads first charter, granted in the 12th century by Hugh du Puiset, an alternative spelling may be Gatishevede, as seen in a legal record, dated 1430. The earliest recorded coal mining in the Gateshead area is dated to 1344, as trade on the Tyne prospered there were several attempts by the burghers of Newcastle to annex Gateshead. In 1576 a small group of Newcastle merchants acquired the Grand Lease of the manors of Gateshead, in the hundred years from 1574 coal shipments from Newcastle increased elevenfold while the population of Gateshead doubled to approximately 5,500. However, the lease and the abundant coal supplies ended in 1680, the pits were shallow as problems of ventilation and flooding defeated attempts to mine coal from the deeper seams. William Hawks originally a blacksmith, started business in Gateshead in 1747, Hawks and Co. eventually became one of the biggest iron businesses in the North, producing anchors, chains and so on to meet a growing demand. There was keen rivalry between Hawks Blacks and Crowleys Crew. The famous Hawks men including Ned White, went on to be celebrated in Geordie song, throughout the Industrial Revolution the population of Gateshead expanded rapidly, between 1801 and 1901 the increase was over 100,000. This expansion resulted in the spread southwards of the town, in 1854, a catastrophic explosion on the quayside destroyed most of Gatesheads medieval heritage, and caused widespread damage on the Newcastle side of the river. Robert Stirling Newall took out a patent on the manufacture of ropes in 1840
2.
United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
3.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
4.
Tyne and Wear
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Tyne and Wear is a metropolitan county in the North East region of England around the mouths of the rivers Tyne and Wear. It came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972 and it consists of the five metropolitan boroughs of South Tyneside, North Tyneside, City of Newcastle upon Tyne, Gateshead and City of Sunderland. It is bounded on the east by the North Sea, and has borders with Northumberland to the north, Tyne and Wear County Council was abolished in 1986, and so its districts are now unitary authorities. However, the county continues to exist in law and as a geographic frame of reference. The Local Government Act 1888 constituted Newcastle upon Tyne, Gateshead, between the county boroughs, various other settlements also formed part of the administrative counties of Durham and of Northumberland. The need to reform local government on Tyneside was recognised by the government as early as 1935, the second-tier units would form by amalgamating the various existing boroughs and districts. The county boroughs in the area would lose their status, within this area, a single municipality would be formed covering the four county boroughs of Newcastle, Gateshead, Tynemouth, South Shields and other urban districts and boroughs. A minority report proposed amalgamation of Newcastle, Gateshead, Wallsend, Jarrow, Felling, Gosforth, the 1937 proposals never came into operation, local authorities could not agree on a scheme and the legislation of the time did not allow central government to compel one. Tyneside was a Special Review Area under the Local Government Act 1958, the Local Government Commission for England came back with a recommendation to create a new county of Tyneside based on the review area, divided into four separate boroughs. The Redcliffe-Maud Report proposed a Tyneside unitary authority, again excluding Sunderland, the Bill as presented in November 1971 pruned back the southern edge of the area, and gave it the name Tyneside. The name Tyneside proved controversial on Wearside, and a government amendment changed the name to Tyne, although the metropolitan county council was abolished in 1986, several joint bodies exist to run certain services on a county-wide basis. Most notable is the Tyne and Wear Passenger Transport Authority, which co-ordinates transport policy, also through Nexus, the authority subsidises socially necessary transport services and operates a concessionary fares scheme for the elderly and disabled. The Passenger Transport Authority is an authority, raising funds by imposing a levy on the Council Tax of the five constituent authorities of Tyne. In April 2014 Nexus became a body of the new North East Combined Authority. These joint bodies are administered by representatives of all five of the constituent councils, in addition the Northumbria Police force, which covers the whole of Northumberland and Tyne and Wear, is one of several joint forces in England spanning two or more counties. The force was created in 1974, and so is not a by-product of the abolition of the county council, Tyne and Wear either has or closely borders two official Met Office stations, neither located in one of the major urban centres. The locations for those are in marine Tynemouth where Tyne meets the North Sea east of Newcastle, there are some clear differences between the stations temperature and precipitation patterns even though both have a cool-summer and mild-winter oceanic climate. Tyne and Wear is divided into 13 Parliamentary constituencies, at the level of local government, three of the regions five unitary authorities were controlled by Labour in 2005, the exceptions being Newcastle City Council and North Tyneside Council
5.
County Durham
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County Durham is a county in North East England. The county town is Durham, a cathedral city, the largest settlement is Darlington, closely followed by Hartlepool and Stockton-on-Tees. It borders Tyne and Wear to the north east, Northumberland to the north, Cumbria to the west, historically, the county included southern Tyne and Wear, including Gateshead and Sunderland. The county has a mixture of mining and farming heritage, as well as a railway industry. Its economy was based on coal and iron mining. It is an area of regeneration and promoted as a tourist destination, in the centre of the city of Durham, Durham Castle and Durham Cathedral are a UNESCO-designated World Heritage Site. Many counties are named after their town, and the expected form here would be Durhamshire. Thus County Durham is a form of County of Durham. The situation regarding the name with regards to present-day local government is less clear. The structural change legislation which in 2009 created the present unitary council refers to the county of County Durham, the former postal county was named County Durham to distinguish it from the post town of Durham. The ceremonial county of Durham is administered by four unitary authorities, the ceremonial county has no administrative function, but remains the area to which the Lord Lieutenant of Durham and the High Sheriff of Durham are appointed. The Borough of Hartlepool, until 1 April 1996 the borough was one of four districts in the relatively short-lived county of Cleveland, the part of the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees that is north of the centre of the River Tees. Stockton was also part of Cleveland until that countys abolition in 1996, the remainder of the borough is part of the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire. Durham Constabulary operate in the area of the two districts of County Durham and Darlington. Ron Hogg was first elected the Durham Police and Crime Commissioner for the force on 15 November 2012, the other areas in the ceremonial county fall within the police area of the Cleveland Police. Air Ambulance services are provided by the Great North Air Ambulance, the charity operates 3 helicopters including one at Durham Tees Valley Airport covering the County Durham area. Teesdale and Weardale Search and Mountain Rescue Team, based at the Durham Constabulary base in Barnard Castle, respond to search, Cuthbert between Tyne and Tees or the Liberty of Haliwerfolc. The bishops special jurisdiction rested on claims that King Ecgfrith of Northumbria had granted a substantial territory to St Cuthbert on his election to the see of Lindisfarne in 684
6.
River Tyne
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The River Tyne /ˈtaɪn/ is a river in North East England and its length is 73 miles. It is formed by the confluence of two rivers, the North Tyne and the South Tyne and these two rivers converge at Warden Rock near Hexham in Northumberland at a place dubbed The Meeting of the Waters. The North Tyne rises on the Scottish border, north of Kielder Water and it flows through Kielder Forest, and passes through the village of Bellingham before reaching Hexham. The South Tyne rises on Alston Moor, Cumbria and flows through the towns of Haltwhistle and Haydon Bridge, hadrians Wall lies to the north of the Tyne Gap. Coincidentally the source of the South Tyne is very close to the sources of the two great rivers of the industrial north east namely the Tees and the Wear. The South Tyne Valley falls within the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty - the second largest of the 40 AONBs in England, to the east of Gateshead and Newcastle, the Tyne divides Hebburn and Jarrow on the south bank from Walker and Wallsend on the north bank. Jarrow and Wallsend are linked underneath the river by the Tyne Tunnel, finally it flows between South Shields and Tynemouth into the North Sea. The Tyne Rivers Trust measure the whole Tyne catchment as 2,936 square kilometres, the River Tyne is believed to be around 30 million years old. The largest coal staithes were located at Dunston in Gateshead, Hebburn and Tyne Dock, the dramatic wooden staithes at Dunston, built in 1890, have been preserved, although they were partially destroyed by fire in 2006. And to this day in 2016 Tyne Dock, South Shields is still involved with coal, the tidal river is now managed by the Port of Tyne Authority. Nothing definite is known of the origin of the designation Tyne, nor is the known by that name until the Saxon period. There is a theory that Tīn was a word that meant river in the local Celtic language or in a language spoken in England before the Celts came, there is also a river Tyne that rises in Midlothian in Scotland and flows through East Lothian into the North Sea. The River Vedra on the Roman map of Britain may be the Tyne, the late Thomas John Taylor supposed that the main course of the river anciently flowed through what is now Team Valley, its outlet into the tidal river being by a waterfall at Bill Point. His theory is not far from the truth, as there is evidence that prior to the last Ice Age, Ice diverted the course of the Wear to its current location, flowing east the course of the Tyne) and joining the North Sea at Sunderland. Sculpted by David Wynne, the bronze figure incorporates flowing water into its design. The Environment Agency is currently working with architects and cultural consultancy xsite, in collaboration with Commissions North, the Tyne Salmon Trail will serve as a celebration of the river, its heritage and its increasingly diverse ecosystem. FINS, REFLECTION and JOURNEY were the first 3 cubes to be launched in December 2007 from a family of 10, each cube is inspired by the textures, changing colours, movement and journey of the salmon. With each offering a modern day keepsake to take away, in the form of a designed Bluetooth message, for three days, between 18–20 July 2008, a temporary bamboo artwork was installed over the Tyne close to the Gateshead Millennium Bridge
7.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
8.
Tributary
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A tributary or affluent is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean, tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage basin of its surface water and groundwater, leading the water out into an ocean. A confluence, where two or more bodies of water together, usually refers to the joining of tributaries. The opposite to a tributary is a distributary, a river or stream that branches off from, distributaries are most often found in river deltas. Right tributary and left tributary are terms stating the orientation of the relative to the flow of the main stem river. These terms are defined from the perspective of looking downstream, where tributaries have the same name as the river into which they feed, they are called forks. These are typically designated by compass direction, for example, the American River receives flow from its North, Middle, and South forks. The Chicago Rivers North Branch has the East, West, and Middle Fork, the South Branch has its South Fork, forks are sometimes designated as right or left. Here, the handedness is from the point of view of an observer facing upstream, for instance, Steer Creek has a left tributary which is called Right Fork Steer Creek. Tributaries are sometimes listed starting with those nearest to the source of the river, the Strahler Stream Order examines the arrangement of tributaries in a hierarchy of first, second, third, and higher orders, with the first-order tributary being typically the least in size. For example, a second-order tributary would be the result of two or more first-order tributaries combining to form the second-order tributary, another method is to list tributaries from mouth to source, in the form of a tree structure, stored as a tree data structure
9.
Annfield Plain
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Annfield Plain is a village in County Durham, in England. It is situated on a plateau between the towns of Stanley,4 km to the north-east, and Consett,8 km to the west, according to the 2001 census, Annfield Plain has a population of 3,569. By the time of the 2011 Census Annfield Plain had become a ward of Stanley parish, the ward had a population of 7,774. Along with much of the area, Annfield Plains history lies in coal mining. While the industry collapsed in the 1980s and 90s, its effects are apparent both in the landscape and in folk memory. Much of the landscape is rough moorland, dominated by the nearby Pontop Pike television mast. Not far from semi-rural Derwentside, however, is the Tyneside–Wearside conurbation, with Newcastle 20 km away, the cathedral city of Durham is 16 km away and offers quite a contrast to the former pit villages in the area of Annfield Plain. Anfield, as the name was originally appears to derive from the fields of An, referring to a man who lived before the Norman Conquest. The Plain part of the name was originally Plane and appears to refer not to the plateau on which the village stands but to the inclined plane on the Stanhope. The engine used by the plane was known as the Anfield Engine because of its proximity to Anfield House, the spelling changed to Annfield Plain around 1856, when houses were built for miners on the nearby plateau. The earliest hard evidence of habitation in the area comes from the 16th century, the villages association with mining begins in the late 17th century when many shallow mines were dug. The Stanhope and Tyne Railway, laid in 1834, assisted the transportation of coal, several limekilns were built at this time and were fuelled by local coal, with limestone being brought in by rail. Demand for coal increased with the advent of the Industrial Revolution, in the 19th century Annfield Plain was the scene of a murder, when a man named William Thompson killed his wife. He was hanged at Durham prison on 5 January 1874. ³ Annfield Plain Golf Club was founded in 1907, while there is some light industry, most of Annfield Plain is made up of housing, village shops and several pubs. The local Tesco Co-op supermarket was commonly known as the Disco, an allusion to its former name, the supermarket was converted to a Tesco store in October 2007. The original Annfield Plain co-operative store was dismantled and rebuilt at the nearby Beamish Open Air Museum in the late 1980s, the site of the villages main pit, the Busty, is now a privately owned coach garage. Its proximity to the centres of the North East of England has in recent years attracted residents from Newcastle. This has had the consequence of pushing up prices, long among the cheapest in Britain
10.
Causey Arch
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The Causey Arch is a bridge near Stanley in County Durham, northern England. It is the oldest surviving railway bridge in the world. It was built in 1725–26 by stonemason Ralph Wood, funded by a conglomeration of coal-owners known as the Grand Allies at a cost of £12,000. Two tracks crossed the Arch, one to take coal to the River Tyne, over 900 horse-drawn wagons crossed the arch each day using the Tanfield Railway. After he designed the bridge, Ralph Wood was so afraid that his arch would collapse that he committed suicide, an inscription on a sundial at the site reads Ra. Use of the Arch declined when Tanfield Colliery was destroyed by fire in 1739, the Arch was restored and reinforced in the 1980s. There are a series of public paths around the area. The quarry near the bridge is a spot for local rock climbers. Causey Burn itself flows into Beamish Burn which then flows into the River Team eventually discharging into the River Tyne, biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers in Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Volume 1, 1500–1830, p 791–792. Industrial archaeology Waggonway Research Circle Causey Arch Picnic Area, a leaflet produced by Durham County Council Durham Mining Museum Archives Causey Arch at structurae
