Tadley

Long before any of the housing, Tadley was woodland and heath on the Hampshire and Berkshire border, and it lived off both. This was a centre of woodland craft, with rake makers, hurdle makers, turners and besom makers all working within a few miles of each other.

Besom broom making here goes back to at least the fourteenth century. The trade grew after the Black Death, when London changed its laws on waste in the street and every household suddenly needed something to sweep with. The men who made them were known as broom squires. Ten of them were still working in the area in 1953 and two by 1965, and the last firm was Arthur Nash of Mulfords Hill, who supplied the royal palaces and held a Royal Warrant in 1999.

The town as it looks now dates from the 1950s and 1960s, when the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston became the area's largest employer and houses went up to put its workers in. Tadley grew several times over inside twenty years.

It also carries a nickname. For miles around, people call it Tadley God Help Us, and the story goes that a balloon came down in a clearing in Pamber Forest, the crew asked the forest workers where they were, and the workers, taking the whole thing for a visitation, answered with the name of the place and a plea for help. A separate local legend has treacle mines under the town, which the Loddon Valley Lions honour every June with the Treacle Fair.

The ancient parish church, St Peter's, is twelfth century and stands about half a mile from the main part of the town. It is usually called Tadley Old Church.