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Stewkley | |
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![]() St Michael & All Angels parish church | |
Location withinBuckinghamshire | |
Population | 1,840 (2011 Census)[1] |
OS grid reference | SP853261 |
Civil parish |
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Unitary authority | |
Ceremonial county | |
Region | |
Country | England |
Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
Post town | LEIGHTON BUZZARD |
Postcode district | LU7 |
Dialling code | 01525 |
Police | Thames Valley |
Fire | Buckinghamshire |
Ambulance | South Central |
UK Parliament | |
Website | Stewkley Parish Council |
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Stewkley is a village andcivil parish inBuckinghamshire, England. The village is about 5 miles (8 km) east ofWinslow and about 4 miles (6 km) west ofLeighton Buzzard. The civil parish includes thehamlets of North End and Stewkley Dean.
Thetoponym Stewkley is derived from theOld English forwoodland clearing with tree stumps.[citation needed] TheDomesday Book of 1086 records it asStiuclai.[citation needed]
The principal manor in Stewkley was once held by the son ofGeoffrey Chaucer, who was an occasional visitor to the village. TheChurch of England parish church ofSt Michael and All Angels is one of the least-altered of England's 6,000Norman churches.[citation needed] There is aMethodist chapel in High Street South. St Michael's Church of England Combined School teaches children aged 4–11.
Stewkley has one of, if not, the longest village high streets in Britain at 2 miles long,[2] a title also claimed byCombe Martin in Devon, whose 1.5 mile (previously thought to be 2 miles) long high street is not as continuously populated as Stewkley's high street. Southeast of the village is Aylesbury Vale Golf Club.
In World War 2, the village was a popular destination for personnel serving at nearbyRAF Wing.
In 1968 the Roskill Commission was charged with looking into finding a site forLondon's third airport. The report was published in 1970, with the proposal that Stewkley would be destroyed along with some other nearby villages. However two local residents, Desmond Fennell and Bill Manning, set up the Wing Airport Resistance Association (WARA), which successfully campaigned against the proposal.[3] A Monument, known as the Airport Monument and Spinney was erected in Stewkley to mark the successful campaign.[4]