This is a large Parish, attaining 500 ft elevation and bordered on the north-east by the wooded Dover Beck. The stocking frame, the first knitting machine, was invented here in 1589 by the Rev. William Lee, and for many years the village was a handframe knitting centre; many old cottages have the wide windows designed to give the necessary light for the frame that stood behind them. The Nottinghamshire Building Preservation Trust has acquired and restored a group of these cottages at Windles Square near the Gleaners Inn. There is a small museum on Main Street which shows examples of hand frames and other antiquities. The old village, much of which is a conservation area, has been extended northwards with housing estates, schools and factories, and a shopping centre at St Wilfrid Square has been built, which provides doctors surgeries, a County Health Centre and a Library. Calverton now has a partially developed Industrial Estate which provides local employment. Further development is available for light industry. 

To the south of the Library is a plaque commemorating the twinning of Calverton on 16 May 1974 with the French township of Longue-Jumelles in the Loire Valley.

Calverton is recorded in the Domesday Survey of 1086. Calverton House is a dignified Georgian residence of three bays with projecting two-bay wings and an Ionic colonnaded font.

Partly rebuilt in 1763, the Parish Church retains Norman responds to its chancel arch (that to the north has a small relief of St Wilfrid baptising a convert. This forms the central motif of the badge of the Chairman of the Parish Council.) In the tower are preserved a number of stones sculptured by Norman masons to represent seasonal occupations throughout the months of the year. The Church plate includes an alms dish of 1683 and a chalice and paten made in 1726.

A memorial is situated in Watchwood Plantation to the three crew from the Polish No 300 (Mosovian) Squadron, based at RAF Swinderby near Newark, who were killed in October 1940 whilst returning from an operational bomber raid. The memorial cross is sited about fifty yards north of the actual crash site.

On Main Street is a restored Pinfold, circa 1700, where stray farm animals were enclosed until on payment of a fine they could be retrieved by their owner.

Leisure facilities in the village include two golf courses, Patchings Farm Art Centre, Leisure Centre and Youth Club.


September 2001

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