Municipal Borough of Heywood

Heywood is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Rochdale, Greater Manchester, England, in the historic county of Lancashire. It had a population of 28,205 at the 2011 Census. The town lies on the south bank of the River Roch, 2 miles (3.2 km) east of Bury, 4 miles (6.4 km) southwest of Rochdale, and 8 miles (12.9 km) north of Manchester. Middleton lies to the south, whilst to the north is the Cheesden Valley, open moorland, and the Pennines. Heywood's nickname is Monkey Town. The Anglo-Saxons cleared the densely wooded area, dividing it into heys or fenced clearings. In the Middle Ages, Heywood formed a chapelry in the township, around Heywood Hall, a manor house owned by a family with that surname. Farming was the main industry of a sparsely populated rural area. The population supplemented their incomes by hand-loom woollen weaving in the domestic system.The factory system in the town can be traced to a spinning mill in the late 18th century. Following the introduction of textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution, Heywood developed into a mill town and coal mining district. A period of "extraordinary growth of the cotton-trade" in the mid 19th century was so quick and profound that there was "an influx of strangers causing a very dense population". The town became a municipal borough in 1881. Imports of foreign cotton goods in the mid-20th century precipitated the decline of Heywood's textile and mining industries, resulting in a more diverse industrial base. The town was well respected for the quality of its cotton goods. The Queen mother once visited Heywood in the very early 1900s to admire the cotton in its factories. Cotton from Heywood cotton mills was used to create the dress that she wore for her 50th birthday celebration speech.Heywood is close to junction 19 of the M62 motorway, which provides transport links for the large distribution parks in the south of the town. The 1860s-built 188-foot (57 m) tall Parish Church of St Luke the Evangelist dominates the town centre and skyline. Heywood was the birthplace of Peter Heywood, the magistrate who aided the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, whose family seat was Heywood Hall. Heywood has a station on the East Lancashire heritage railway.

Holy Family RC & CE College (formerly St Joseph's RC High School) is a coeducational secondary school located in Heywood in the English county of Greater Manchester.It is a voluntary aided school administered by Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Salford and the Church of England Diocese of Manchester. It was previously known as St Joseph's RC High School serving the Catholic population of the local area, however it became a joint-faith Catholic/Church of England school in 2007 and was renamed Holy Family RC & CE College.Holy Family RC & CE College offers GCSEs and BTECs as programmes of study for pupils.

Newhouse Academy is a coeducational secondary school located in Heywood, Greater Manchester, England.

Broadfield railway station served the district of Broadfield in Heywood in Greater Manchester, England from 1869 until October 1970, when the station was closed and passenger services between Bolton & Rochdale were withdrawn by British Rail. The line through the station has since been reopened by the heritage East Lancashire Railway, although the station itself remains disused.

Queen's Park is a public park in Heywood, in the Metropolitan Borough of Rochdale, Greater Manchester, England.

Heywood railway station serves the town of Heywood in Greater Manchester, England. The original station was opened in 1841 (by the Manchester and Leeds Railway). It was resited in 1848 when the line was extended to Bury. It closed on 5 October 1970. It re-opened on 6 September 2003 as an extension of the East Lancashire Railway from Bury Bolton Street. The boundary between the ELR and the national rail network is located a short distance east of the station, at Hopwood. £300 million had been pledged to link Heywood back to the National Rail Network in 2009, which would have seen services direct to Manchester via Castleton, but this scheme was subsequently shelved due to lack of funding. The ELR still has ambitions to run trains through to Castleton though to allow direct interchange with National Rail services there. This would form part of a larger scheme to regenerate the area and create additional tourist attractions such as a proposed Heywood Culture Park. The original station was situated immediately opposite the terminal wharf of the Heywood Branch Canal. The East Lancashire Railway station is situated slightly further to the east, nearer to the former Heywood railway wagon works.

Wrigley Brook is a culverted watercourse in Greater Manchester which flows through Heywood and is a tributary of the River Roch. Originating in the Hareshill area to the South of Heywood, it flows northwards and joins the River Roch at Bottom O' th' Brow.

Millers Brook is a watercourse in Greater Manchester and tributary of the River Roch. It originates in Heywood and flows through Queens Park to join the River Roch.

Naden Brook is a watercourse in northwest England. It rises in the hills above Norden, near the boundary of Lancashire and Greater Manchester. From here it flows south to Heywood, where it merges with the River Roch.

Tack Lee Brook is a watercourse in Greater Manchester and a tributary of the River Roch. Birtle Brook is one of its tributaries.

Hopwood is a suburb of Heywood, a town within the Metropolitan Borough of Rochdale, in Greater Manchester, England. It is north of the M62 motorway. During the Middle Ages, Hopwood formed a township within the Middleton ecclesiastical parish of the Salfordshire hundred of Lancashire.John Rhodes was one of the victims of the Peterloo Massacre of 1819. He died several weeks after the event and his body was dissected by order of magistrates wishing to prove his death was not a result of Peterloo.Hopwood has a primary school and a fire station for the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service. It also has a dentist, petrol station/shop and a cafe.

Heywood and Middleton is a constituency in Greater Manchester represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2019 by Chris Clarkson of the Conservative Party. The 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies proposes that two of the Middleton wards will be included in a new constituency named Blackley and Middleton South and this seat will be renamed Heywood and Middleton North, to be first contested at the next general election.