Reading is 41 miles west of central London, 30 miles  southeast of Oxford, 70 miles east of Bristol, and 50 miles north of the English south coast. The centre of Reading is on a low ridge between the Rivers Thames and Kennet close to their confluence, reflecting the town’s history as a river port. It has served as the county town since 1867.

Today Reading is a bustling commercial centre, with strong links to international businesses and technologies. Reading also hosts two universities, a large student population, and is home to one of Europe’s biggest music festivals.

History

The settlement was founded at the confluence of the River Thames and River Kennet in the 8th century as Readingum. The name probably comes from the Readingas, an Anglo-Saxon tribe whose name means “Reada’s People” in Old English, or (less probably) the Celtic Rhydd-Inge, “Ford over the River”. The name of the settlement was derived from an earlier folk, or tribal, name. Anglo-Saxon names ending in -ingas originally referred not to a place but to a people, in this case specifically the descendants or followers of a man named Reada, literally “The Red One.”

In late 870 an army of Danes invaded the then kingdom of Wessex and set up camp at Reading. On 4 January 871, the first Battle of Reading took place, when an army lead by King Ethelred and his brother Alfred the Great attempted unsuccessfully to breach the Dane’s defences. The battle is described in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and this account provides the earliest known written record of the existence of the town of Reading. The Danes remained in Reading until late in 871, when they retreated to winter quarters in London.

By the time of its 1086 Domesday Book listing, the town had grown to contain around 600 people and was a designated borough.

The foundation of Reading Abbey by Henry I in 1121 led to the town becoming a place of pilgrimage. Already acknowledged as a borough by this time, the relationship between the town’s burgesses and the Abbey was to prove strained at times. In 1253 Reading’s Merchant Guild successfully petitioned for the grant of a charter from the King and negotiated a division of authority with the Abbey. However disputes continued over the Abbey’s powers to raise taxes and appoint the Guild’s officers. Even the title of the Guild’s first officer was open to dispute, with the Guild and, on occasion, the King referring to him as the Mayor, whilst the Abbey continued to call him the Guild Warden.

It is not known exactly how badly Reading was affected by the Black Death that swept through England in the 14th century. But it is known that the abbot of Reading Abbey, Henry of Appleford, was one of its victims in 1361, and that nearby Henley lost 60% of its population.

In 1487, Henry VII granted a further charter that went further than previous charters, although still leaving the appointment of the Mayor/Warden in the hands of the Abbey. This charter, and a subsequent judicial arbitration in 1499, confirmed the Guild as a body corporate in perpetuity.

The Abbey was largely destroyed in 1538 during Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries. The last abbot, Hugh Cook Faringdon, was subsequently tried and convicted of high treason and hanged, drawn and quartered in front of the Abbey Church. The dissolution initially saw the Mayor appointed by the King’s officers administering the dismemberment of the abbey properties. However in 1542 Henry VIII granted the Guild a new charter that permitted the burgesses to elect the Mayor.

By 1525, Reading was the largest town in Berkshire, and tax returns show that Reading was the 10th largest town in England, based on taxable wealth. By 1611, Reading had a population of over 5000 and had grown rich on its trade in cloth, as instanced by the fortune made by local merchant John Kendrick.

At this time, Reading had mostly traditional timber framed houses, a few examples of which still exist in Castle Street, Market Place and other places.

The town played an important role during the English Civil War; it changed hands a number of times. Despite its fortifications, it had a Royalist garrison imposed on it in 1642. The subsequent Siege of Reading by the Parliamentary forces succeeded in April 1643. However, the taxes levied on the town by the garrison badly damaged its cloth trade, and it did not recover.

Reading was also the only site of significant fighting in England during the Revolution of 1688, with the second Battle of Reading.

The 18th century saw the beginning of a major iron works in the town and the growth of the brewing trade for which Reading was later to become famous. Agricultural products from the surrounding area still used Reading as a market place, especially at the famous Reading cheese fair but now trade was coming in from a wider area.

Reading’s trade benefited from better designed turnpike roads which helped it establish its location on the major coaching routes from London to Oxford and the west country. It also gained from increasing river traffic on both the Thames and Kennet. In 1723, despite considerable local opposition, the Kennet Navigation opened the River Kennet to boats as far as Newbury. This opposition stopped when it became apparent the new route benefited the town. The opening of the Kennet and Avon Canal in 1810 made it possible to go by barge from Reading to the Bristol Channel.

Towards the end of the century, Henry Addington, 1st Viscount Sidmouth, lived at Bulmershe Court, in what is now the Reading suburb of Woodley. Although he moved to Richmond when he was appointed prime minister, he retained his local connections. He donated to the town of Reading the four acres (16,000 m²) of land that is today the Royal Berkshire Hospital, and his name is commemorated in the town’s Sidmouth Street and Addington Road.

In 1801, the population of Reading was about 9,400. During the 19th century, the town grew rapidly as a manufacturing centre. Reading maintained its representation by two Members of Parliament with the Reform Act 1832, and the borough was one of the ones reformed as a municipal borough by the Municipal Corporations Act 1835. In 1836 the Reading Borough Police were founded. The Great Western Railway arrived in 1841, followed by the South Eastern Railway, in 1849, and the London and South Western Railway, in 1856. The Reading Establishment, an early commercial photographic studio, operated in Reading from 1844 to 1847 and was managed by Nicholaas Henneman, a Dutchman and former valet of William Henry Fox Talbot (a pioneer of photography). Many of the images for The Pencil of Nature by Fox Talbot, the first book to be illustrated with photographic prints, were printed in Reading.

In 1851 the population was 21,500. The town became the County Town (superseding Abingdon) in 1867 and became a county borough under the Local Government Act 1888. By 1900, the population was 59,000—large sections of the housing in Reading are terraced, reflecting its 19th century growth. The town has been famous for the “Three Bs” of…
Beer (from 1785 dominated by the Simonds’ Brewery—India Pale Ale was invented in Reading)
Bulbs (1807–1976, Suttons Seeds) and
Biscuits (1822–1977, Huntley and Palmers).

In the 19th century the town also made ‘Reading Sauce’, described as a sharp sauce flavoured with onions, spices, and herbs, very much like Worcestershire Sauce.

The town continued to expand in the 20th century, annexing Caversham across the River Thames in Oxfordshire in 1911. This expansion can be seen in the number of 1920s built semi-detached properties, and the 1950s expansion that joined Woodley, Earley and Tilehurst into Reading. Miles Aircraft in Woodley was an important local firm from the 1930s to 1950s. The Lower Earley development, started in the 1970s, was the largest private housing development in Europe. This extended the urban area of Reading up to the M4 motorway, which acts as the southern boundary to the town. Further housing developments have increased the number of modern commuter houses in the surrounding parts of Reading, and ‘out-of-town’ shopping hypermarkets.

At the end of 1966 the Yield Hall multi-storey car park was opened, providing covered space for 522 cars. It was noted that the ramps were arranged to segregate up-traffic from down-traffic, with “one-way circulation” through most of the building.

The Oracle shopping centre, built in 1999, is named after the 17th century workhouse founded by John Kendrick which previously occupied the site. It provides three storeys of shopping and boosted the local economy by providing 4,000 jobs. Reading has pedestrianised Broad Street.

Since 1887, the borough has included the former villages of Southcote and Whitley and small parts of Earley and Tilehurst.  By 1911, it also encompassed the Oxfordshire village of Caversham and still more of Tilehurst. A small area of Mapledurham parish was added in 1977.

Reading is twinned with the following:

* Germany: Düsseldorf, Germany (since 1947, officially since 1988)
* Republic of Ireland: Clonmel, Ireland (since 1994)
* Nicaragua: San Francisco Libre, Nicaragua (since 1994)
* Barbados: Speightstown, Barbados (since 2003)

As Reading has grown, its suburbs have spread in three directions:

* to the west between the two rivers into the foothills of the Berkshire Downs,
* to the south and south-east on the south side of the Kennet, and
* to the north of the Thames into the Chiltern Hills.

Reading has its own subregional catchment area, incorporating the suburban districts of Earley and Woodley and the surrounding towns of Wokingham, Bracknell, Henley-on-Thames and Twyford, plus large villages such as Pangbourne, Theale, Winnersh, Burghfield and Shiplake.

The borough has a population of 144,000 in an area of 40.40 km², while the Office for National Statistics’ definition of the urban area of Reading is significantly larger at 232,662 people in an area of 55.35 km². This latter area – sometimes referred to as Greater Reading – incorporates the town’s eastern and western suburbs outside the borough, in the civil parishes of Earley, Woodley, Purley-on-Thames and Tilehurst. This urban area is itself a component of the Reading/Wokingham Urban Area. Reading is the 17th largest settlement in England, based on the population of the urban area. Furthermore, except for London boroughs, it is the most populous settlement that does not have city status.

Suburbs

Besides the town centre, Reading comprises a number of suburbs and other districts, both within the borough itself and within the surrounding urban area.

Religion

Reading Abbey
St Laurence’s Church

Reading Minster, or the Minster Church of St Mary the Virgin as it is more properly known, is Reading’s oldest ecclesiastical foundation, known to have been founded by the 9th century and possibly earlier. Although eclipsed in importance by the later Abbey, Reading Minster has regained its importance since the destruction of the Abbey.

Reading Abbey was founded by Henry I in 1121. He was buried there, as were parts of Empress Matilda, William of Poitiers, Constance of York, and Princess Isabella of Cornwall, among others. The abbey was one of the pilgrimage centres of medieval England, it held over 230 relics including the hand of St. James. The abbey was largely destroyed in 1538 during the dissolution of the monasteries and Henry VIII had the abbot, Hugh Cook Faringdon, hanged.

The mediaeval borough of Reading was served by three parish churches. Besides Reading Minster, these were St Giles’ and St Laurence’s churches, both of which are still in use as Anglican churches. The Franciscan friars built a friary in the town in 1311 and after the friars were expelled in 1538, the building was used as a hospital, a poorhouse and a jail, before being restored as the Anglican parish church of Greyfriars Church in 1863. There are several other Anglican parish churches in areas that are now part of suburban Reading.

St James’ Church was built on a portion of the site of the abbey between 1837 and 1840, and marked the return of the Roman Catholic faith to Reading. Reading was also the site of the death of Blessed Dominic Barberi, the Catholic missionary to England in the 19th century who received John Henry Newman into the Catholic faith.

The Central Reading Mosque is a mosque in Waylen Street close to the town centre.

Education

Reading School, founded in 1125, is the tenth oldest school in England. It is based in Victorian buildings designed by Alfred Waterhouse on Erleigh Road. There are six other state secondary schools and 37 state primary schools within the borough, together with a number of private and independent schools and nurseries. Besides mainstream schools the Reading area has a Steiner-Waldorf school and an active Education Otherwise home schooling network.

The University of Reading was established in 1892 as an affiliate of Oxford University, and moved to its London Road Campus in 1904. Reading was chartered as an independent university in 1926 and moved onto its new Whiteknights Campus in 1947. It took over the Bulmershe teacher training college in 1982, becoming Bulmershe Court Campus. The Henley Management College, situated in Buckinghamshire and about 10 miles  from Reading, was taken over in 2008, becoming Greenlands Campus. All four campuses are still in use, although Whiteknights is by far the largest.

The more recent Thames Valley University, which also has campuses in Slough and Ealing, now runs what was previously Reading College and School of Arts and Design on two sites in east Reading.

Libraries and museums

The Reading Borough Public Library service dates back to 1877. The Central Library which was opened in 1985 contains the Reading Local Studies Library which provides books, maps, and illustrations of the history of the town and Berkshire.

The Museum of Reading opened in 1883 in the Town Hall, parts of which date back to 1786. The museum contains galleries relating to the history of Reading and its related industries and to the excavations of Calleva Atrebatum (Silchester Roman Town), together with a copy of the Bayeux Tapestry, an art collection, and galleries relating to Huntley and Palmers.

The Museum of English Rural Life, in Redlands Road, is a museum dedicated to recording the changing face of farming and the countryside in England. It houses designated collections of national importance that span the full range of objects, archives, photographs, film and books. It is owned and run by the University of Reading.

On the University of Reading’s Whiteknights Campus can be found the Ure Museum of Greek Archaeology and Cole Museum of Zoology, together with the Harris Botanic Gardens. In the suburb of Woodley, the Museum of Berkshire Aviation has a collection of aircraft and other artifacts relating to the aircraft industry in the town.

Healthcare

The principal National Health Service (NHS) hospital in Reading is the Royal Berkshire Hospital, founded in 1839 and much enlarged and rebuilt since. There was a second major NHS general hospital, the Battle Hospital, but this closed in 2005 with the patients and most staff moved to the Royal Berkshire Hospital. Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust runs a NHS hospital, Prospect Park Hospital, that specialises in the provision of care for people with mental health and learning disabilities.

Reading has two private hospitals, the Berkshire Independent Hospital in Coley Park and the Dunedin Hospital situated on the main A4 Bath Road.

Economy

Reading is an important commercial centre in Southern England and is often referred to as the commercial capital of the Thames Valley. The town hosts the headquarters of British companies and the UK offices of foreign multinationals, as well as being a major retail centre.

Industry

Reading has a significant historical involvement in the information technology industry, largely as a result of the early presence in the town of sites of International Computers Limited and Digital. Whilst both these companies have been swallowed by other groups, their respective descendents in Fujitsu and Hewlett-Packard both still have local operations. More recently Microsoft and Oracle have established multi-building campuses in the town. Other technology companies with a significant presence in the town include Agilent Technologies, Audio & Design (Recording) Ltd, Bang & Olufsen, Cisco, Comptel, Harris Corporation, Intel, Nvidia, Sage, Sagem Orga, SGI, Symantec, Symbol Technologies, Verizon Business, Virgin Media, Websense, Xansa (now Steria), and Xerox.

The financial company ING Direct has its headquarters in Reading, as does the directories company Yell Group and the natural gas major BG Group. The insurance company Prudential has an administration centre in the town, whilst PepsiCo and Holiday Inn have offices. As with most major cities, Reading also has offices of the big 4 accounting firms Deloitte, KPMG, Ernst and Young, and PricewaterhouseCoopers.

These companies are distributed around Reading, including in business parks just inside or outside the borough boundary. Prudential and Yell, together with most of the accountancy companies, have their offices in central Reading. Thames Valley Business Park is home to the Microsoft and Oracle campuses, as well as BG Group and ING Direct. GreenPark Business Park is home to Symantec and Cisco, whilst the nearby Reading International Business Park is home to Verizon Business. Winnersh Triangle Business Park is home to technology companies, whilst Arlington Business Park is home to KPMG, Nvidia and PepsiCo.

Retail

Reading town centre is a major shopping centre. The primary catchment area for the town centre (the area for which the centre attracts the largest single flow of generated expenditure) for non-bulky comparison goods extends as far as Goring-on-Thames, Henley-on-Thames, Pangbourne and Wokingham. The secondary catchment area (the area where the centre attracts 10% or more of generated expenditure) also includes Ascot, Bracknell, Camberley, Didcot, Farnborough, Fleet, High Wycombe, Maidenhead, Newbury, Slough, Tadley, Thatcham, Wallingford and Windsor. In 2007 an independent poll placed Reading as one of the top ten retail destinations in the UK.

The principal town centre shopping area is around Broad Street, which was pedestrianised in 1995. Broad Street is anchored at its east and west ends respectively by The Oracle and Broad Street Mall enclosed shopping centres.

There are three major department stores in Reading: John Lewis Reading (formerly known as Heelas), Debenhams and House of Fraser. There are also branches of chain stores, including Bhs, Boots, fcuk, H&M, Marks and Spencers, Next, Primark and W H Smith. The booksellers Waterstone’s have two branches in Reading. Their Broad Street branch is of interest, as it is a conversion of a nonconformist chapel dating from 1707.

Besides the two major shopping malls, Reading has three smaller shopping arcades, the Bristol and West Arcade, Harris Arcade and The Walk, which contain smaller specialist stores. An older form of retail facility is represented by Union Street, popularly known as Smelly Alley, due to the former presence of many open-fronted fishmongers and butchers. The occupancy has shifted towards major retail chains, although a few of independent shops, including a fishmonger and butcher remain.

Unlike many English cities, Reading has no indoor market hall. There is a street market at Hosier Street in the town centre, open from Wednesday to Saturday, with 60 stalls selling a mixture of food, flowers and plants, cultural goods, and household goods. A farmers’ market operates on two Saturdays a month at the cattle market.

Other than the markets, Marks and Spencers, a few small supermarket branches, and a few speciality shops, food retail has largely deserted the town centre. Large branches of Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda, Morrisons, Iceland and Waitrose supermarket chains can be found in suburban and edge of town locations.

Utilities

Mains water and sewerage services are supplied by Thames Water plc, a private sector water supply company. Water abstraction and disposal is regulated by the Environment Agency. Reading’s water supply is largely derived from underground aquifers, and as a consequence the water is hard.

The commercial energy supplier for electricity and gas is at the consumer’s choice. Southern Electric runs the local electricity distribution network, while Scotia Gas Networks runs the gas distribution network. One notable part of the local energy infrastructure is the presence of a 2 megawatt (peak) Enercon wind turbine at GreenPark, which is wired to the local sub-grid. It was constructed in November 2005 just outside the borders of the borough in the civil parish of Shinfield and is owned by Ecotricity. This turbine can be seen from a large part of Reading, as well as from junction 11 of the M4. The turbine has the potential to produce 3.5 million units of electricity a year, enough to power over a thousand homes.

BT provides fixed-line telephone coverage throughout the town, and ADSL broadband internet connection to most areas. Parts of Reading are cabled by Virgin Media, supplying cable television, telephone and broadband internet connections. The dialling code for fixed-line telephones is 0118.

Mobile phone service is available throughout the town, from all the UK licensed network operators and using the GSM and UMTS standards.

Transport

Reading’s location in the Thames Valley to the west of London has made the town an important location in the nation’s transport system.

The town grew up as a river port at the confluence of the Thames and Kennet. Both of these rivers are navigable, and the locks of Caversham Lock, Blake’s Lock, County Lock, Fobney Lock and Southcote Lock are all within the borough. Today navigation is exclusively leisure oriented, with private and hire boats dominating traffic.

Scheduled boat services operate on the Thames, operating from wharves on the Reading side of the river near Caversham Bridge. Salters Steamers operate a summer daily service from just downstream of the bridge to Henley-on-Thames, taking around two hours in each direction and calling at the riverside villages of Sonning and Shiplake. Thames River Cruises operate trips from just upstream of the bridge, including a service on summer weekends and bank holidays to Mapledurham, taking 45 minutes in each direction and allowing two hours ashore for visits to Mapledurham Watermill and Mapledurham House.

Reading was a major staging point on the old Bath Road (A4) from London to Bath and Bristol. This road still carries local traffic, but has now been replaced for long distance traffic by the M4 motorway, which closely skirts the borough and serves it with three junctions (J10,J11,J12).

The A329(M), A33 and A4 national routes link the town with junctions 10, 11 and 12 of the M4 motorway respectively. The IDR is linked with the M4 by the A33 relief road, which runs past the Madejski Stadium and Green Park Business complex. National Express Coaches run out of Calcot, just off the M4 at junction 12.

The Thames is crossed by both Reading and Caversham road bridges, while several road bridges cross the Kennet.

Rail transport

Reading is a major junction point on the national rail system, and as a consequence Reading station is a major transfer point as well as serving heavy originating and terminating traffic.

Railway lines link Reading to both Paddington and Waterloo stations in London. The route to Paddington offers both non-stop (taking around 30 minutes) and stopping services, whilst that to Waterloo offers only a stopping service. Inter-city services also link Reading to Swindon, Bristol, Cardiff and South Wales, Exeter, Plymouth and South West England, Birmingham and the North of England, and Southampton and Bournemouth. Local services link Reading to Oxford, Newbury, Basingstoke, Guildford and Gatwick Airport.

Today Reading is within reach of several international airports. The nearest airport is London Heathrow, which is 30 miles away by road. An express bus service named RailAir links Reading with Heathrow, or the airport can be accessed by changing at Hayes and Harlington railway station from the local rail service to Paddington to the Heathrow Connect rail service.

London Gatwick is 60 miles away by road and is served by direct trains from Reading. London Luton is also 60 miles away by road, whilst London Stansted is 90 miles away; both can be reached by rail by changing stations in central London. The airport at London City can also be reached by a combination of rail services.

Away from London, Southampton Airport and Birmingham Airport are both served by direct trains from Reading and can be faster to reach than the more distant of the London airports. Southampton is 45 miles (72 km) away by road, whilst Birmingham is 92 miles (148 km) distant.

A frequent local bus network within the borough, and a less frequent network in the surrounding area, are provided by Reading Buses. Other bus operators include:

* First: Reading – Winnersh – Wokingham – Bracknell services
* Thames Travel: Reading – Arborfield – Wokingham; Reading – Wallingford – Oxford services
* Arriva: Reading – High Wycombe services
* Newbury Buses: Reading – Newbury services
* Fleet Buzz: Reading – Fleet – Aldershot service[56]
* Motts Travel: Reading – Nettlebed – Watlington – Stokenchurch service[57]

Culture

Every year Reading hosts the Reading Festival, which has been running since 1971. The festival takes place on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday of the August bank holiday weekend. Since 1999, Reading has been twinned with a simultaneous festival in Leeds, with the same acts appearing at both festivals on different days. In 2005, the main festival spawned the Reading Fringe Festival. Set up by a group of musicians, promoters, film-makers and artists, and now in its 6th year, to help showcase acts and performers in the towns venues in the runnup to the main festival.

For some twenty years up until 2006, Reading was also known for its WOMAD festival. However the event eventually outgrew its Rivermead site. As of 2007, amid much controversy, the event relocated to Wiltshire in the form of Womad Charlton Park. The Head of Culture, Chris Smith – tasked with keeping WOMAD in Reading – was on holiday at the time of the announcement that WOMAD was to move. He later took a senior job with WOMAD.

Perhaps the most notable home-grown artist is Mike Oldfield of Tubular Bells fame. Slowdive, The Cooper Temple Clause, Stuart Price, Morning Runner, My Luminaries, Does It Offend You, Yeah?, OK Tokyo, Dan Le Sac Vs. Scroobius Pip, Pete and The Pirates, SixNationState, Pure Reason Revolution, Exit Ten, Bennet and Mr Fogg have had some degree of success. David Byron, first and most famous singer of hard rock band Uriah Heep lived his last years in Reading before he died in 1985. The Chemical Brothers attended Reading Blue Coat school. Lead singer of ‘odd-pop’ group The Hoosiers Irwin Sparkes is from Woodley.

Reading plays host to semi-professional and amateur choirs and choral societies. Reading Festival Chorus has celebrated its 60th anniversary. RFC sings a diverse music programme, with works like Mozart’s Requiem, Karl Jenkins’ The Armed Man in 2005 to Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and a summer programme of English and American Folk songs by Tippett and Aaron Copland.

Reading has several orchestras. The long-established Reading Symphony Orchestra (RSO) is one of the town’s amateur orchestras, led by a professional conductor and leader. It presents four main concerts a year, and is often engaged to work in collaboration with other musical organisations and for private functions. The Aldworth Philharmonic Orchestra (APO), founded in 2002 and named after Richard Aldworth, the founder of Reading Blue Coat School, rehearses and plays most of its concerts at the school. APO’s remit is to be as innovative as possible, giving local people the chance to play by rehearsing exclusively at weekends, attracting a wider audience to classical music (especially younger people) through its ‘Concert Virgin Scheme’ and education projects, and championing the music of talented young composers. Reading Youth Orchestra (RYO) provides an opportunity for younger musicians.

Reading theatre venues include The Hexagon and 21 South Street, which are professional venues supported by Reading Borough Council. The Hexagon is a multi-purpose venue in the heart of Reading that provides rock, pop, comedy, classical music and dance as well as theatre. Recent performances have included Reel Big Fish and their mix of ska-punk as well as comedy from Russell Howard. South Street presents performing arts from both the professional and community sectors, including fringe theatre, comedy, music, dance and live literature.

Amateur theatre venues in Reading include Progress Theatre, a self-governing, self-funding theatre group and registered charity founded in 1947 that operates and maintains its own 97-seat theatre. Progress Theatre produces a yearly open air Shakespeare production in the Reading Abbey Ruins that has come to represent a highlight of Reading’s cultural calendar.

Reading has a history of grassroots arts movements. 21 South Street, previously an unemployment (dole) office, was temporarily occupied by artists in the late 1980s, and this action eventually led to its becoming a Council run Art Centre. Similarly, an occupation of the condemned former Huntley and Palmer’s building in 1989 took place by a collective of artists, calling it the Biscuit Base, in an attempt to put pressure on Reading Borough Council to provide more art space. This action did not secure it as art space, but did eventually lead to it being recognised by the council as a historic building. The facade was reprieved from demolition and converted to housing. in 1990, participants in the failed Biscuit Base action occupied a former temperance house in Silver Street which became the town’s independent art centre The Rising Sun.

Media

Reading has three local newspapers.

* The Reading Chronicle is published weekly, on Thursdays.
* The Reading Midweek is published weekly, on Wednesdays.
* The Reading Evening Post is a newspaper published on Wednesday and Fridays.

Three local radio stations broadcast from Reading: BBC Radio Berkshire, Reading 107 FM and Heart Berkshire. Other local radio stations, such as London’s 95.8 Capital FM, Basingstoke’s 107.6 Kestrel FM and Slough’s Star 106.6 can also be received.

Local television news programmes are the BBC’s South Today and ITV’s Meridian Tonight.

The local Blah Blah magazine provides free monthly arts and entertainment listings.

Sports

The Reading Half Marathon is held on the streets of Reading in March of each year, with as many as 13,000 competitors from elite to fun runners.

Reading is the home of Reading Football Club, an association football club nicknamed The Royals, who were formed in 1871. Formerly based at Elm Park, the club plays at the 24,500 capacity Madejski Stadium in the south of the town near the M4 motorway. The stadium is named after chairman John Madejski, who has owned the club since 1991. Reading FC won promotion to the top flight for the first time in 2006 as Football League Championship champions with a national record of 106 points. They finished eighth in their first season as a top division club (just missing out on a UEFA Cup place) but were relegated the following season. The club’s current manager in Brendan Rodgers.

Reading is a centre for rugby union football in the area, with the Guinness Premiership team London Irish as tenants at the Madejski Stadium. Reading is also home to another three senior semi-professional rugby clubs; Reading Abbey R.F.C., Redingensians R.F.C. and Reading R.F.C. The town hosts several other football variants, such as Gaelic football’s St. Anthony’s GAA, Australian rules football team Reading Kangaroos, and American football team Berkshire Renegades.

The sport of field hockey is represented by Reading Hockey Club, who play in the Men’s Premier Division and the Women’s Division One of English Hockey League. The Reading Rockets are a basketball club that play in the English Basketball League.

Like many Thames-side towns, Reading has rowing clubs, representing both town and university. The local Redgrave-Pinsent Rowing Lake provides training facilities, although much rowing is also conducted on the river itself. Dorney Lake, some 17 miles to the east of Reading, provides a full international competition venue and will host the rowing events of the 2012 Summer Olympics. There are also several sailing lakes to the south and southwest of the town, the largest being Theale Lake (home of Burghfield Sailing Club) close to junction 12 of the M4. These lakes are also popular with water-skiing and jet-skiing enthusiasts.

From 1984 to 1994, The Hexagon theatre was home to snooker’s Grand Prix tournament, one of the sport’s ‘big four’ Grand Slam events.

Britain’s first-ever triathlon was held outside Reading at Kirtons’s Farm in Pingewood in June 1983. The Reading International Triathlon was revived by Banana Leisure in 1994 and 1995. Thames Valley Triathletes, based in the town, is Britain’s oldest triathlon club, with origins in the 1984 event at nearby Heckfield. The British Triathlon Association was also formed at the town’s former “Mall” health club in 1982.

Reading’s Palmer Park also hosted the UK’s first-ever outdoor Aerobics display; pre-dating the more famous Hyde Park (London) event by a year.

Reading-born Richard Burns became the first Englishman to win the World Rally Championship, in 2001.

The town is home to Reading Greyhound Racing and there is a velodrome at Palmer Park where many of Britain’s junior champions train and race.

The town is home to the Reading Racers speedway team. The sport came to Reading in 1968 at Tilehurst Stadium but this closed and the site was redeveloped. The team took a year off whilst the current venue was built. This venue is also due to close at the end of 2008 and another year off is anticipated as another new venue is built.

Literature

Reading’s best known literary connection is with Oscar Wilde, who was imprisoned in Reading Gaol from 1895 to 1897. While he was there he wrote De Profundis, which was published in 1905. After his release he lived in exile in France and wrote The Ballad of Reading Gaol, based on his experience of an execution carried out in Reading Gaol whilst he was imprisoned there. This was first published in 1898 under the pseudonym C.3.3, Wilde’s erstwhile cell number.

Several authors have written about Reading. Thomas Hardy painted a rather disparaging picture of the town, lightly disguised as Aldbrickham, in his 1895 novel Jude the Obscure. Jerome K. Jerome also did not warm to the town on his famous journey up the Thames in Three Men in a Boat (1888). He does, however, recognise the historical significance of Reading. Jasper Fforde set his series of Jack Spratt literary crime novels in this town. The comic novel A Melon for Ecstasy by John Fortune and John Wells is set in and around Reading.

Other authors lived in and around Reading. Jane Austen attended Reading Ladies Boarding School, based in the Abbey Gateway, in 1784-86. Mary Russell Mitford lived in Reading for a number of years and then spent the rest of her life just outside the town at Three Mile Cross and Swallowfield. Thomas Noon Talfourd, the judge and dramatist was born in Reading and later became MP for the town.

T. E. Lawrence lost the first draft of his Seven Pillars of Wisdom at Reading railway station. Charles Dickens was asked to stand as MP for Reading, but declined. He became president of the Reading Athenaeum. In his novel Bleak House, Esther Summerson goes to school in Reading. His great-granddaughter Monica Dickens died in Reading in 1992.

Reading is not yet officially a city, having missed out during the millennium celebrations when the Queen instead granted Brighton and Hove city status in 2000.

The roadside chain of restaurants Little Chef began in the town back in 1958. Its first branch was a small eleven-seater venue.

When Ricky Gervais (who comes from Reading) used to perform a stand-up comedy segment on the British TV show The 11 O’Clock Show, he would often (comically) describe the residents of the Reading suburb Whitley as the lowest members of society. This turned Whitley into a household name for the duration of the series. His film Cemetery Junction is based in 1970s Reading and is named after a busy junction in East Reading.