Thurcroft

infobox UK place
country = England
latitude= 53.391000000
longitude= -1.252000000
map_type= South Yorkshire
official_name= Thurcroft
metropolitan_borough= Rotherham
metropolitan_county = South Yorkshire
population=
region= Yorkshire and the Humber
constituency_westminster= Rother Valley
post_town= ROTHERHAM
postcode_district = S66
postcode_area= S
dial_code= 01709
os_grid_reference= SK5089

Thurcroft is a village situated southeast of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England. From 1902 to 1991, it was a close-knit, mining community.

The village has seen great changes and re-generation since the pit closed down. It had a devastating effect on the community as a whole and since a lot of families have moved out of the village. Recent re-generation has taken place from the local council and now the housing has increased with new housing estates being built on the old pit site.

The old colliery site and the pit tips still remain, as they do in Dinnington and Kiveton, although as in those places there are plans to landscape and reclaim the land.

Facilities

Thurcroft has a number of schools, pubs, a snooker club, five take-a-ways, car spares shop, a garage, a DIY shop, a charity shop, the Gordon Bennett Memorial Hall, a pharmacy, a bookmakers, an off licence, a Halifax Bank, a butchers, a beauty parlour, four hairdressers, a traditional sweet shop, a Deli, a Kitchen shop, two newsagents, and two medium sized supermarkets, the SPAR, and the Co-Op. There is also a gymnasium,in the old chapel and an auction hall, which used to be a cinema many years ago. Also in Thurcroft is a large shoe shopping centre, Wyndsor World of Shoes.

History

The name Thurcroft has Norse (Viking) roots as 'thorr' means thunder in old Norse, so is probably at least 1,000 plus years old.

However, until the 20th century Thurcroft consisted of Thurcroft Hall, the longtime holding of the Mirfin family, and three farms and was nothing like its present incarnation. It was 20th century coal mining that has shaped Thurcroft.

Coal mining

The land on which the village would one day stand was bought in the 1800s (along with the Hall) by a Sheffield brewer (Thomas Marrian), whose son, Thomas Marrian Jr, leased the coal mining rights to Rother Vale Collieries in 1902. Modern Thurcroft only really came into being with the sinking of the coal mine in around 1909 which is when many of the terraced houses so characteristic of coal mining the last quarter of the 19th century and first quarter of the 20th century on the area of this site. The population grew from next to nothing in 1900 to around 2,000 in 1923: Shortly after which the village saw hard times in the 1926 coal strike, when 250,000 free meals were given out between May and September. By 1947 the mine employed over 2,000 men, and in the 1984/85 miners' strike was once again in the thick of the action.

The coal mine was closed in Thurcroft in 1991 despite attempts by the workforce to buy it out.

Church and parish

Before 1995 Thurcroft was within the parish of Laughton-en-le-Morthen and a permanent stone church was only built in 1937, making it one of the newest on this site (although there was a Methodist chapel built in 1917, and a village cemetery was established in the 1920s). Thurcroft parish became separate from Laughton in 1995.

External links

* [http://www.thurcroftweb.co.uk/history/timeline.htm History of Thurcroft, Timeline, Thurcroftweb]