Tring
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Template:GBdot Tring is a small market town in the Chiltern Hills in Hertfordshire, England with a population 13,000. Situated 30 miles (50km) north west of London and linked to London by the old Roman road of Akeman Street, by the modern A41, by the Grand Union Canal and by rail lines to Euston Station, Tring is now largely a commuter town in the London commuter belt. It forms part of the larger borough of Dacorum.
Tring is positioned at a low point in the Chiltern hills range, which has been utilised by communications links since ancient times as a point of easy crossing. It is located at the summit level and there has been extensive excavation of cuttings for both the canal and railway as they pass the vicinity.
The four Tring reservoirs:- Wilstone, Tringford, Startops End, and Marsworth were built to supply water for the canal. They have been a national nature reserve since 1955, and a Site of Special Scientific Interest since 1987. Tring railway cutting is 2.5 miles in length and an average of 40 feet deep and is celebrated in an 1839 coloured lithograph by John Cooke Bourne in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
Important features in Tring include the Parish Church of St. Peter and St. Paul and the mansion of Tring Park built by Sir Christopher Wren and radically altered by the architect George Devey for Nathan Mayer Rothschild, 1st Baron Rothschild as his country residence which is now the home of The Arts Educational School, Tring Park. The former livestock market in Tring is also believed to be the only remaining example of an intact market town marketplace in the UK.
Nathan Mayer Rothschild's son Lionel Walter Rothschild (2nd Lord Rothschild) built a private zoological museum in Tring which, as The Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum, has been part of the Natural History Museum since 1937. The 2nd Lord Rothschild also released edible dormice (Glis glis) into Tring Park. He is remembered for riding around the town in a zebra-drawn carriage. The town's symbol has been the head of a zebra ever since.
Nearby, within the Chilterns Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, is the Ashridge Estate, part of the National Trust and home to Ashridge Business School.
Gerald Massey, poet, egyptologist and mystic, was born nearby at Marsworth, on the Grand Union Canal.
Tring railway station is about two miles from the town and is in fact closer to Aldbury.
External links
- Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum www.nhm.ac.uk/museum/tring/
- Horse-runs at Tring Cutting, Hertfordshire, 19 June 1837 (http://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10300712&wwwflag=2&imagepos=3) by John Cooke Bourne which is on display at the National Portrait Gallery, London.
- The Arts Educational School, Tring Park [1] (http://www.aes-tring.com)