Corn Exchange, Reading
The Corn Exchange is a former commercial building in Reading, Berkshire, England. The structure, which was commissioned as a corn exchange and the frontage of which is now used as an entrance to a modern shopping complex, is a Grade II listed building. History Until the mid-19th century, the corn merchants of Reading traded at open air stalls in the Market Place. The initiative to commission a purpose-built corn exchange arose, unusually, from the members of Reading Corporation rather than a group of businessmen and required an act of parliament to empower the corporation accordingly. The foundation stone for the new building was laid in September 1854. It was designed by John Clacy and Francis Hawkes in the Renaissance style, built in ashlar stone and was officially opened on 23 June 1855. The opening was supported by a concert given by the band of the Royal Berkshire Militia. The design involved a three-stage entrance tower facing onto the Market Place. The first stage wa ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Reading, Berkshire
Reading ( ) is a town and borough in Berkshire, southeast England. Located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the rivers Thames and Kennet, the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway serve the town. Reading is east of Swindon, south of Oxford, west of London and north of Basingstoke. Reading is a major commercial centre, especially for information technology and insurance. It is also a regional retail centre, serving a large area of the Thames Valley with its shopping centre, the Oracle. It is home to the University of Reading. Every year it hosts the Reading Festival, one of England's biggest music festivals. Reading has a professional association football team, Reading F.C., and participates in many other sports. Reading dates from the 8th century. It was an important trading and ecclesiastical centre in the Middle Ages, the site of Reading Abbey, one of the largest and richest monasteries of medieval England with strong royal connection ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Cornice
In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a pedestal, or along the top of an interior wall. A simple cornice may be formed just with a crown, as in crown moulding atop an interior wall or above kitchen cabinets or a bookcase. A projecting cornice on a building has the function of throwing rainwater free of its walls. In residential building practice, this function is handled by projecting gable ends, roof eaves and gutters. However, house eaves may also be called "cornices" if they are finished with decorative moulding. In this sense, while most cornices are also eaves (overhanging the sides of the building), not all eaves are usually considered cornices. Eaves are primarily functional and not necessarily decorative, while cornices have a decorative aspect. A building's project ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Commercial Buildings Completed In 1855
Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and services ** (adjective for:) trade, the trading of something of economic value such as goods, services, information or money * Two functional constituencies in elections for the Legislative Council of Hong Kong: **Commercial (First) **Commercial (Second) * ''Commercial'' (album), a 2009 album by Los Amigos Invisibles * Commercial broadcasting * Commercial style or early Chicago school, an American architectural style * Commercial Drive, Vancouver, a road in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada * Commercial Township, New Jersey, in Cumberland County, New Jersey See also * * Comercial (other), Spanish and Portuguese word for the same thing * Commercialism Commercialism is the application of both manufacturing and consumption towar ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Corn Exchanges In England
Corn exchanges are distinct buildings which were originally created as a venue for corn merchants to meet and arrange pricing with farmers for the sale of wheat, barley, and other corn crops. The word "corn" in British English denotes all cereal grains, such as wheat and barley. With the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846, a large number of corn exchanges were built in England, particularly in the corn-growing areas of Eastern England. However, with the fall in price of English corn as a result of cheap imports, corn exchanges mostly ceased to be built after the 1870s. Increasingly they were put to other uses, particularly as meeting and concert halls. Many found a new lease of life in the early 20th century as cinemas. Following the Second World War, many could not be maintained, and they were demolished. In the 1970s their architectural importance came to be appreciated, and most of the surviving examples are listed buildings. Most of the surviving corn exchanges have now been rest ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sainsbury's
J Sainsbury plc, trading as Sainsbury's, is the second largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, with a 14.6% share of UK supermarket sales. Founded in 1869 by John James Sainsbury with a shop in Drury Lane, London, the company was the largest UK retailer of groceries for most of the 20th century. In 1995, Tesco became the market leader when it overtook Sainsbury's, which has since been ranked second or third: it was overtaken by Asda from 2003 to 2014, and again in 2019. In 2018, a planned merger with Asda was blocked by the Competition and Markets Authority over concerns of increased prices for consumers. The holding company, J Sainsbury plc, is split into three divisions: Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd ( including convenience shops), Sainsbury's Bank, and Argos. As of 2021, the largest overall shareholder is the sovereign wealth fund of Qatar, the Qatar Investment Authority, which holds 14.99% of the company. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Reading Museum
Reading Museum (run by the Reading Museum Service) is a museum of the history of the town of Reading, in the English county of Berkshire, and the surrounding area. It is accommodated within Reading Town Hall, and contains galleries describing the history of Reading and its related industries, a gallery of artefacts discovered during the excavations of Calleva Atrebatum (Silchester Roman Town), a copy of the Bayeux Tapestry, finds relating to Reading Abbey and an art collection. History of the museum Reading Town Hall was built in several phases between 1786 and 1897, although the principal facade was designed by Alfred Waterhouse in 1875. In 1879, the foundation stone was laid for a new wing containing a library and museum, and the museum duly opened in 1883. The museum displayed a large eclectic collection from the late Horatio Bland. Three art galleries were added in further extension in 1897. In 1975, the civic offices moved out of the Town Hall to Reading Civic Centre. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Luftwaffe
The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German '' Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the '' Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabteilung'' of the Imperial Navy, had been disbanded in May 1920 in accordance with the terms of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles which banned Germany from having any air force. During the interwar period, German pilots were trained secretly in violation of the treaty at Lipetsk Air Base in the Soviet Union. With the rise of the Nazi Party and the repudiation of the Versailles Treaty, the ''Luftwaffe''s existence was publicly acknowledged on 26 February 1935, just over two weeks before open defiance of the Versailles Treaty through German rearmament and conscription would be announced on 16 March. The Condor Legion, a ''Luftwaffe'' detachment sent to aid Nationalist forces in the Spanish Civil War, provided the force with a valuable testing ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II was a total war that directly involved more than 100 million Military personnel, personnel from more than 30 countries. The major participants in the war threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. Air warfare of World War II, Aircraft played a major role in the conflict, enabling the strategic bombing of population centres and deploying the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, only two nuclear weapons ever used in war. World War II was by far the List of wars by death toll, deadliest conflict in hu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Great Depression Of British Agriculture
The Great Depression of British Agriculture occurred during the late nineteenth century and is usually dated from 1873 to 1896. Contemporaneous with the global Long Depression, Britain's agricultural depression was caused by the dramatic fall in grain prices that followed the opening up of the American prairies to cultivation in the 1870s and the advent of cheap transportation with the rise of steamships. British agriculture did not recover from this depression until after the Second World War. Other countries in Western Europe such as the Netherlands experienced the same agricultural crisis (1878–1895) as a result of the market being flooded by cheap grain from the United States and Canada.Encarta-encyclopedie Winkler Prins (1993–2002) s.v. "landbouwpolitiek § geschiedenis", "Leeuwarden §3. geschiedenis". Microsoft Corporation/Het Spectrum. Background In 1846 Parliament repealed the Corn Laws, which had imposed a tariff on imported grain, and thereby ''de facto'' inst ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Cast Iron
Cast iron is a class of iron– carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impurities which allow cracks to pass straight through, grey cast iron has graphite flakes which deflect a passing crack and initiate countless new cracks as the material breaks, and ductile cast iron has spherical graphite "nodules" which stop the crack from further progressing. Carbon (C), ranging from 1.8 to 4 wt%, and silicon (Si), 1–3 wt%, are the main alloying elements of cast iron. Iron alloys with lower carbon content are known as steel. Cast iron tends to be brittle, except for malleable cast irons. With its relatively low melting point, good fluidity, castability, excellent machinability, resistance to deformation and wear resistance, cast irons have become an engineering material with a wide range of applicatio ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Weather Vane
A wind vane, weather vane, or weathercock is an instrument used for showing the direction of the wind. It is typically used as an architectural ornament to the highest point of a building. The word ''vane'' comes from the Old English word , meaning "flag". Although partly functional, wind vanes are generally decorative, often featuring the traditional cockerel design with letters indicating the points of the compass. Other common motifs include ships, arrows, and horses. Not all wind vanes have pointers. In a sufficiently strong wind, the head of the arrow or cockerel (or equivalent) will indicate the direction from which the wind is blowing. Wind vanes are also found on small wind turbines to keep the wind turbine pointing into the wind. History The oldest textual reference in China to a weather vane comes from the '' Huainanzi'' dating from around 139 BC, which mentions a thread or streamer that another commentator interprets as "wind-observing fan" (, ). The Tower of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Turret (architecture)
In architecture, a turret is a small tower that projects vertically from the wall of a building such as a medieval castle. Turrets were used to provide a projecting defensive position allowing covering fire to the adjacent wall in the days of military fortification. As their military use faded, turrets were used for decorative purposes, as in the Scottish baronial style. A turret can have a circular top with crenellations as seen in the picture at right, a pointed roof, or other kind of apex. It might contain a staircase if it projects higher than the building; however, a turret is not necessarily higher than the rest of the building; in this case, it is typically part of a room, that can be simply walked into – see the turret of Chateau de Chaumont on the collection of turrets, which also illustrates a turret on a modern skyscraper. A building may have both towers and turrets; towers might be smaller or higher, but turrets instead project from the edge of a buildin ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |