Keighley
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Keighley

Keighley (/ˈkθli/ KEETH-lee) is a market town and a civil parish in the City of Bradford Borough of West Yorkshire, England. It is the second-largest settlement in the borough, after Bradford.

Keighley is 8 miles (13 kilometres) north-west of Bradford, 4 mi (6.5 km) north-west of Bingley, 11 mi (18 km) north of Halifax and 8 mi (13 km) south-east of Skipton. It is governed by Keighley Town Council and Bradford City Council. Keighley is in West Yorkshire, close to the borders of North Yorkshire and Lancashire. Historically in the West Riding of Yorkshire, it lies between Airedale and Keighley Moors. At the 2011 census, Keighley had a population of 56,348.

The name Keighley, which has gone through many changes of spelling throughout its history, means "Cyhha's farm or clearing", and was mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086: "In Cichhelai, Ulchel, and Thole, and Ravensuar, and William had six carucates to be taxed."

Henry de Keighley, a Lancashire knight, was granted a charter to hold a market in Keighley on 17 October 1305 by King Edward I. The poll tax records of 1379 show that the population of Keighley, in the wapentake of Staincliffe in the West Riding of Yorkshire, was 109 (47 couples and 15 single people).

From 1753, the Union stage coach departed on the Keighley and Kendal Turnpike from what was the Devonshire Arms coaching inn on the corner of Church Street and High Street. Rebuilt about 1789, this public house has a classical style pedimented doorcase with engaged Tuscan columns in the high fashion of that age. The original route towards Skipton was Spring Gardens Lane – Hollins Lane – Hollins Bank Lane. Keighley was to become an intersection with other turnpikes, including the Two-Laws to Keighley branch of the Toller Lane – Blue Bell turnpike (1755) from Bradford to Colne, the Bradford to Keighley turnpike (1814), and the Keighley—Halifax turnpike.

The 1842 Leeds Directory description of Keighley reads, "Its parish had no dependent townships though it is about six miles [10 km] long and four miles [6 km] broad, and comprises 10,160 acres [4,110 ha] of land (including a peaty moor of about 2,000 acres or 800 ha) and a population which amounted, in the year 1801, to 5,745."

Utley Cemetery contains the grave of Christopher Ingham, a veteran of the conflict against Napoleon. He was a member of the Duke of Wellington's elite 95th Rifle Regiment and fought in ten battles against the French in Spain, France and Belgium, including the Spanish Peninsula War and the Battle of Waterloo, for which he was awarded several medals, including the Peninsula Medal. He died in 1866. Some local historians believe Mr Ingham's heroism may have inspired the author Bernard Cornwell's saga about Major Richard Sharpe. The TV series episode Sharpe's Justice, which focuses on the roots of the title character, is set in and around Keighley.

On 22 May 1936, the Zeppelin Hindenburg crossed Yorkshire in a diversion of her normal route between the United States and Germany. As the airship passed over the town, a parcel was dropped and landed in the High Street, where two boys, Jack Gerrard and Alfred Butler, picked it up. The parcel contained a bunch of carnations, a small silver and jet crucifix, some postage stamps, a picture postcard and some Hindenburg notepaper.

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