Swanscombe
Swanscombe is a small town in the Borough of Dartford in Kent, England. It lies east of Dartford and north-west of Gravesend, in the civil parish of Swanscombe and Greenhithe. At the 2001 UK census, the Swanscombe selecting ward had a population of 6,418. Swanscombe was necessary in the early history of cement. The initial concrete manufacturing works near Swanscombe were opened at Northfleet by James Parker, around 1792, making "Roman cement" from concrete stone brought from the Isle of Sheppey. James Frost opened up an operate at Swanscombe in 1825, using chalk from Galley Hill, having patented a new concrete called British Cement. The Swanscombe plant was subsequently acquired by John Bazley White & Co, which became the largest part of Blue Circle Industries when it developed in 1900. It lastly shut down in 1990. In between 1840 as well as 1930 it was the biggest cement plant in Britain. By 1882 a number of cement makers were operating throughout the north Kent region, however the resulting dust pollution drove the people of Swanscombe to take lawsuit versus the neighborhood cement jobs. Regardless of numerous technological developments, the issue persisted right into the 1950s, with telegraph lines over an inch thick in white dirt. Modern cement kilns in Kent making use of smokeshafts 170 m (550 feet) in elevation are now claimed to be the cleanest worldwide. Nevertheless, the adjoining Medway communities are reported to be one of the most contaminated inhabited area in the UK, and the cement industry adds to acid rain in Scandinavia.
