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Medway Watermills
The Medway and its tributaries and sub-tributaries have been used for over 1,150 years as a source of power. There are over two hundred sites where the use of water power is known. These uses included corn milling, fulling, paper making, iron smelting, pumping water, making gunpowder, vegetable oil extraction, and electricity generation. Today, there is just one watermill working for trade. Those that remain have mostly been converted. Such conversions include a garage, dwellings, restaurants, museums and a wedding venue. Some watermills are mere derelict shells, lower walls or lesser remains. Of the majority, there is nothing to be seen. Watermills The River Medway powered a number of watermills. From source to mouth they were: Fen Place (Bishes) Mill, Worth TQ 361 366 The mill building survives in part, incorporated into a dwelling and retaining the waterwheel. The site may have been a hammer mill, witnessed by ''Ironmasters Cottage Wing'' mentioned in recent property sale pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
River Medway
The River Medway is a river in South East England. It rises in the High Weald AONB, High Weald, East Sussex and flows through Tonbridge, Maidstone and the Medway conurbation in Kent, before emptying into the Thames Estuary near Sheerness, a total distance of . About of the river lies in East Sussex, with the remainder being in Kent. It has a Drainage basin, catchment area of , the second largest in southern England after the River Thames, Thames. The map opposite shows only the major tributaries: a more detailed map shows the extensive network of smaller streams feeding into the main river. Those tributaries rise from points along the North Downs, the Weald and Ashdown Forest. Tributaries The major tributaries are: * River Eden, Kent, River Eden * River Bourne, Kent, River Bourne, known in the past as the Shode or Busty * River Teise, major sub-tributary River Bewl * River Beult * Loose Stream * River Len Minor tributaries include: * Wateringbury Stream * East Malling St ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jamaica
Jamaica (; ) is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean (after Cuba and Hispaniola). Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola (the island containing the countries of Haiti and the Dominican Republic); the British Overseas Territory of the Cayman Islands lies some to the north-west. Originally inhabited by the indigenous Taíno peoples, the island came under Spanish rule following the arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1494. Many of the indigenous people either were killed or died of diseases, after which the Spanish brought large numbers of African slaves to Jamaica as labourers. The island remained a possession of Spain until 1655, when England (later Great Britain) conquered it, renaming it ''Jamaica''. Under British colonial rule Jamaica became a leading sugar exporter, with a plantation economy dependent on the African slaves and later their des ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Glaxo Smith Kline
GSK plc, formerly GlaxoSmithKline plc, is a British Multinational corporation, multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology company with global headquarters in London, England. Established in 2000 by a Mergers and acquisitions, merger of Glaxo Wellcome and SmithKline Beecham. GSK is the tenth largest pharmaceutical company and #294 on the 2022 Fortune Global 500, ''Fortune'' Global 500, ranked behind other pharmaceutical companies China Resources, Sinopharm (company), Sinopharm, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Roche, AbbVie, Novartis, Bayer, and Merck Group, Merck. The company has a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. , it had a market capitalisation of £70 billion, the eighth largest on the London Stock Exchange. It has a secondary listing on the New York Stock Exchange. The company developed the first malaria vaccine, RTS,S, which it said in 2014 it would make available for five percent above cost. Legacy products develope ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ardeer, Scotland
Ardeer was a small town now officially incorporated into Stevenston on the Ardeer peninsula, in the parish of Stevenston, North Ayrshire, originally an island and later its extensive sand dune system became the site of Nobel Explosives, a dominant global supplier of explosives to the mining and quarrying industries and a major player in the design and development of products for the chemical and defence industries during the 20th century. The peninsula is now part of North Ayrshire's most important area for Biodiversity. Geography Ardeer Island Ardeer was once an island with a sea channel running along to exit in the vicinity of Auchenharvie Academy. Blaeu's map of 1654, based on Timothy Pont’s map of circa 1600 clearly shows a small island with the settlements of Ardeer, Dubbs, Bogend, Longford, Snodgrass, Lugton Mill and Bartonholm all being on or near the coastline. The island was small and extended no further than Bartonholm, nowhere near the size of the present-day A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Imperial Chemical Industries
Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) was a British chemical company. It was, for much of its history, the largest manufacturer in Britain. It was formed by the merger of four leading British chemical companies in 1926. Its headquarters were at Millbank in London. ICI was a constituent of the FT 30 and later the FTSE 100 indices. ICI made general chemicals, plastics, paints, pharmaceuticals and speciality products, including food ingredients, speciality polymers, electronic materials, fragrances and flavourings. In 2008, it was acquired by AkzoNobel, which immediately sold parts of ICI to Henkel and integrated ICI's remaining operations within its existing organisation. History Development of the business (1926–1944) The company was founded in December 1926 from the merger of four companies: Brunner Mond, Nobel Explosives, the United Alkali Company, and British Dyestuffs Corporation. It established its head office at Millbank in London in 1928. Competing with DuPont a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cordite
Cordite is a family of smokeless propellants developed and produced in the United Kingdom since 1889 to replace black powder as a military propellant. Like modern gunpowder, cordite is classified as a low explosive because of its slow burning rates and consequently low brisance. These produce a subsonic deflagration wave rather than the supersonic detonation wave produced by brisants, or high explosives. The hot gases produced by burning gunpowder or cordite generate sufficient pressure to propel a bullet or shell to its target, but not so quickly as to routinely destroy the barrel of the gun. Cordite was used initially in the .303 British, Mark I and II, standard rifle cartridge between 1891 and 1915; shortages of cordite in World War I led to the creation of the "Devil's Porridge" munitions factory (HM Factory, Gretna) on the English-Scottish border, which produced 800 tonnes of cordite per annum. The UK also imported some United States–developed smokeless powders for us ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maidstone
Maidstone is the largest Town status in the United Kingdom, town in Kent, England, of which it is the county town. Maidstone is historically important and lies 32 miles (51 km) east-south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the centre of the town, linking it with Rochester, Kent, Rochester and the Thames Estuary. Historically, the river carried much of the town's trade as the centre of the agricultural county of Kent, known as the Garden of England. There is evidence of settlement in the area dating back before the Stone Age. The town, part of the borough of Maidstone, had an approximate population of 100,000 in 2019. Since World War II, the town's economy has shifted from heavy industry towards light industry and services. Toponymy Anglo-Saxon period of English history, Saxon charters dating back to ca. 975 show the first recorded instances of the town's name, ''de maeides stana'' and ''maegdan stane'', possibly meaning ''stone of the maidens'' or ''stone of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Humphry Davy
Sir Humphry Davy, 1st Baronet, (17 December 177829 May 1829) was a British chemist and inventor who invented the Davy lamp and a very early form of arc lamp. He is also remembered for isolating, by using electricity, several elements for the first time: potassium and sodium in 1807 and calcium, strontium, barium, magnesium and boron the following year, as well as for discovering the elemental nature of chlorine and iodine. Davy also studied the forces involved in these separations, inventing the new field of electrochemistry. Davy is also credited to have been the first to discover clathrate hydrates in his lab. In 1799 he experimented with nitrous oxide and was astonished at how it made him laugh, so he nicknamed it "laughing gas" and wrote about its potential anaesthetic properties in relieving pain during surgery. Davy was a baronet, President of the Royal Society (PRS), Member of the Royal Irish Academy (MRIA), Fellow of the Geological Society (FGS), and a member ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Decimus Burton
Decimus Burton (30 September 1800 – 14 December 1881) was one of the foremost English architects and landscapers of the 19th century. He was the foremost Victorian architect in the Roman revival, Greek revival, Georgian neoclassical and Regency styles. He was a founding fellow and vice-president of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and from 1840 architect to the Royal Botanic Society, and an early member of the Athenaeum Club, London, whose clubhouse he designed and which the company of his father, James Burton, the pre-eminent Georgian London property developer, built. Burton's works are Hyde Park, London (including the gate or screen of Hyde Park Corner, and the Wellington Arch, and the Gates); Green Park and St James's Park; Regent's Park (including Cornwall Terrace, York Terrace, Clarence Terrace, Chester Terrace, and the villas of the Inner Circle which include his own mansion, The Holme, and the original Winfield House); the enclosure of the forecourt of Bu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tonbridge
Tonbridge ( ) is a market town in Kent, England, on the River Medway, north of Royal Tunbridge Wells, south west of Maidstone and south east of London. In the administrative borough of Tonbridge and Malling, it had an estimated population of 41,293 in 2018. History The town was recorded in the Domesday Book 1087 as ''Tonebrige'', which may indicate a bridge belonging to the estate or manor (from the Old English tun), or alternatively a bridge belonging to Tunna, a common Anglo-Saxons, Anglo-Saxon man's name. Another theory suggests that the name is a contraction of "town of bridges", due to the large number of streams the High Street originally crossed. Until 1870, the town's name was spelt ''Tunbridge'', as shown on old maps including the 1871 Ordnance Survey map and contemporary issues of the George Bradshaw, Bradshaw railway guide. In 1870, this was changed to ''Tonbridge'' by the General Post Office, GPO due to confusion with nearby Tunbridge Wells, despite Tonbridge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Children
John George Children FRS FRSE FLS PRES (18 May 1777 – 1 January 1852 in Halstead, Kent) was a British chemist, mineralogist and zoologist. He invented a method to extract silver from ore without the need for mercury. He was a friend of Sir Humphry Davy, who helped him secure a controversial appointment to a post in the British Museum. Children was also the founding president of the Royal Entomological Society. Personal life John George was born on 18 May 1777 at Ferox Hall, Tonbridge, Kent. His father George Children, FRS (1742–1818), a banker, belonged to a family that lived at the home, "Childrens", near Nether Street in Hildenborough and his mother Susanna, who was the daughter of Rev. Thomas Marshall Jordan of West Farleigh died six days after he was born. Children studied at Tonbridge School, Eton College and Queens' College, Cambridge. In 1798 he married Hester Anna Holwell, granddaughter of John Zephaniah Holwell in 1798. After her death in 1800, he began to travel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gunpowder
Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate (saltpeter). The sulfur and carbon act as fuels while the saltpeter is an oxidizer. Gunpowder has been widely used as a propellant in firearms, artillery, rocketry, and pyrotechnics, including use as a blasting agent for explosives in quarrying, mining, building pipelines and road building. Gunpowder is classified as a low explosive because of its relatively slow decomposition rate and consequently low brisance. Low explosives deflagrate (i.e., burn at subsonic speeds), whereas high explosives detonate, producing a supersonic shockwave. Ignition of gunpowder packed behind a projectile generates enough pressure to force the shot from the muzzle at high speed, but usually not enough force to rupture the gun barrel. It thus makes a good propellan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
