Little Thurrock

Hangman's Wood and Deneholes is a 3-hectare (7.4-acre) biological Site of Special Scientific Interest in Little Thurrock in Essex. The deneholes, which were created by medieval chalk mining, are a Scheduled Monument.The name Hangmans Wood dates back to at least the mid-17th century, when it was recorded on an estate map. Trees in the wood include oak, ash, sycamore and wild cherry. The wood contains a number of deneholes which were investigated by the Essex Field Club at the end of the 19th century. There is normally no access to the deneholes, but permission can be obtained from the council. The deneholes are the most important underground hibernation sites for bats in Essex, with three species; brown long-eared bat, Natterer's bat and Daubenton's bat. The oak woodland is ancient, and it provides a feeding habitat for the bats.The deneholes in the wood, which were sometimes known as Cunobeline's gold mines, are described by English Heritage as medieval or post-medieval and were used for chalk or flint mining. The origin of these deneholes is discussed by Tony Benton. There appears to have been more than 70 holes in the wood at one time, concentrated to the north of the wood. Most only survive now as shallow dips in the ground. The bridlepath which crosses Grangewood Avenue and runs beside Woodside School to connect Hangman's Wood with nearby Terrel's Heath is part of an ancient route from Coalhouse Point in East Tilbury to the bridge or causeway at Aveley.

Baker Street is an area of Orsett in the unitary authority of Thurrock. It is in the ceremonial county of Essex, England. In 2019 it had an estimated population of 598.

The Dell is a house in Grays, Thurrock, Essex, built in concrete—one of the earliest houses in Britain to be built in this material. It was built on the instructions of Alfred Russel Wallace, who lived in Grays from 1872 until 1876.

The Orsett Heath Academy is a coeducational secondary free school academy in Grays, Essex, England. It is the newest member of the South West Essex Community Education Trust and was built under the leadership of nearby William Edwards School. Plans to build the new school were approved in April 2017 and it opened in September 2020. Simon Bell of William Edwards is the executive headteacher and the head of school is Sian Rawson. The school models William Edwards' curriculum and specialism in sports. It also originally had an additional specialism in the arts.

The Hathaway Academy, formerly the Grays School Media Arts College (TGSMAC or Grays School), is a coeducational, non-selective secondary school with academy status that is located in Grays, Essex, England. It is currently part of the Academy Transformation Trust. A school has existed on the Hathaway Road site since 1931, when the John Henry Burrows Central Council School moved from nearby Bridge Road. The school became a secondary technical in 1945 and a comprehensive school in 1971. In 1993, it was given grant-maintained status and was renamed the Grays School. In 2004, it specialised and became the Grays School Media Arts College, which closed in June 2013 with the subsequent opening of the current academy-status school. The academy school has since retained TGSMAC's specialisms, which are digital media and performing arts.Since 2015, the school has held an OFSTED rating of "good"; from 2009 it was rated "satisfactory/requires improvement", and between 2007 and 2009, it was rated "special measures". The pupil demography is mostly White British, with a large Eastern European population. Around 30% of the pupils speak English as an additional language, a higher proportion than the national average. As of 2021, 64.2% of pupils were boys and 35.8% were girls, and there were 782 pupils on the roll.

Globe Pit is a 0.4-hectare (0.99-acre) geological Site of Special Scientific Interest in Little Thurrock in Essex. It is a Geological Conservation Review site.Natural England describes Globe Pit as "an important site for the interrelationship of archaeology with geology since it is vital in the correlation of the Lower Palaeolithic chronology with the Pleistocene Thames Terrace sequence". Interpretation of the site is controversial, and it is therefore important for future research. There is a considerable quantity of Clactonian flint tools, dated by Paul Pettit and Mark White to MIS 10 to 9, around 350,000 years ago. The site is on private land with no public access.

Grays Convent High School is a voluntary aided girls' Roman Catholic secondary school in Grays, Essex, England. It is under the jurisdiction of the Diocese of Brentwood's South Essex deanery, and is a specialist language college. The school was originally founded in 1899 as the Convent Day School by the Sisters of La Sainte Union des Sacrés-Coeurs and was located on Orsett Road. In 1906 the school relocated to the convent situated in nearby College Avenue, which was located at the current school site. In 1969 it became a voluntary aided comprehensive, being expanded in 1972 with a student population of 666 by 1977. By 2003 it was a Beacon school and was providing a "very good" MFL curriculum, with students' results in French and Spanish being "well above average" according to Ofsted. This likely led to the school's specialisation into a language college, which it had achieved by 2008.Since 2013 the school has a good Ofsted grade, previously being outstanding since 2008. The school's population has grown dramatically from its founding, originally only having three students on roll. Currently the school is oversubscribed with a capacity of 620 and a total population of 656 students as of 2021. All of these students are girls, with boys being excluded from the school's education. 21% of students are eligible for free school meals and 24.2% speak English as a second language.

Orsett Rural District was the local government district centred on Orsett in south Essex, England from 1894 to 1936; a little of its far west is in modern Greater London. Likewise in modern terms the area is mostly east of the M25 motorway and north of the Thames Estuary. It was formed in 1894. Housing quite a few residents, it gradually fell from 62.4 to 49.6 square miles. Its notable omission was Grays or Great Thurrock; Thurrock was the main successor district. From 1835 until 1894, its parishes fell in the Orsett Poor Law Union (see the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834). For sewerage purposes from 1875 (with Grays Thurrock until 1886) they formed the Orsett Rural Sanitary District, and during the latter's currency the divorce of Civil parishes in England from ecclesiastical parishes finalised nationally.

Thurrock was a local government district and civil parish in south Essex, England from 1936 to 1974. The parish and urban district was formed from the former area of the following civil parishes which had been abolished in 1936: From Grays Thurrock Urban District: Grays Thurrock From Orsett Rural District: Bulphan Corringham East Tilbury Fobbing Horndon-on-the-Hill Langdon Hills Little Thurrock Mucking North Ockendon (part) Orsett Stanford-le-Hope Stifford West Tilbury From Purfleet Urban District: Aveley South Ockendon West Thurrock From Tilbury Urban District: Chadwell St MaryThe district was enlarged in 1938 by gaining part of the former Little Burstead parish from Billericay Urban District. The district was abolished in 1974. The part within Basildon New Town became part of Basildon District, while the remainder became the present-day Borough of Thurrock. It has since become a unitary authority with largely the same boundaries.

William Edwards School (formerly William Edwards School and Sports College), commonly referred to by locals and students as Willy Eds, is a coeducational secondary comprehensive school with academy status, in Grays, Essex, England. It is a founding member of the South West Essex Community Education Trust (SWECET) and is its leading member. The current headteacher of the school is Simon Bell. The school first opened on 11 September 1962, gained specialist sports college status in 2002 and in 2004 also became a training school. The school achieved outstanding in its Ofsted inspection of December 2010 after which it closed to make way for the current academy status school, reopening on 1 August 2011. In March 2017 the school was inspected and retained outstanding status. As of 2019 it requires improvement.The school claims to offer a wide range of GCSE options for students and to have adequate resources to support the students' learning. It has also retained specialist sports college status and claims to offer a "strong approach to the arts." The 2012-2013 academic year marked the 50th anniversary of the school’s opening and it had been serving the local community for 55 years. During this time, the school had achieved Platinum Artsmark status and received many sporting awards.

Treetops School is an all-through special school with academy status in Grays, Essex, England. Students are from 5 to 19 with moderate learning difficulties and many are on the autistic spectrum, with speech and language problems. The school was first established in 1930 as the Grays Thurrock Open-Air School For 60 Delicate Children and became a special school in 1960. In 1998 it gained SEN specialisms and in 2017 it became an academy. Ofsted rated the school as outstanding in all categories, saying "Teaching is outstanding because teachers have exceptionally high expectations of what pupils can achieve and use practical activities to make learning interesting."

Thurrock and Basildon College was a further education college in Grays, Essex, England (Woodview Campus) and Basildon, Essex, England (Nethermayne Campus). It was formed by the merger of Thurrock Technical College and Basildon College. The college merged with South East Essex College of Arts and Technology on 1 January 2010 to form South Essex College.The Nethermayne Campus of Basildon college opened on 13 September 1971.