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Leavesden is a residential and commercial area in Hertfordshire, England, contiguous with the northern suburbs of Watford. It lies within the M25 Motorway. On its eastern side it is bounded by the M1 Motorway. Leavesden is part of Abbots Langley civil parish and is also the name of a district council ward in Three Rivers District. Leavesden Green is an adjoining residential community which lies partly in Three Rivers and partly in the Borough of Watford. Leavesden is the location of Leavesden Studios, built on the site of RAF Leavesden a former World War II airfield and wartime aircraft factory, and where the James Bond and Harry Potter film franchises were produced. ==History== In the period before the Norman Conquest the hamlet of Leavesden was in the hundred of Dacorum, and was historically an exclave of the ecclesiastical parish of Watford, which was in the hundred of Casio. In the 12th century Leavesden became part of the parish of Bushey.〔(British History Online Hertfordshire Hundreds ), Accessed 21 January 2013〕 In 1853 it became an ecclesiastical parish, and the church of All Saints and St Hilda was built in the Victorian gothic style by the architect Sir George Gilbert Scott.〔(The Parish of Leavesden ), Accessed 21 January 2013〕 In 1870 the Metropolitan Asylum for Imbeciles was founded by the Metropolitan Asylums Board. Later known as Leavesden Hospital, it closed in 1997 and is now the site of Leavesden Country Park.〔(British History Online, Watford ), Accessed 21 January 2013〕 Before the First World War Leavesden was an agricultural community. During the 1930s several housing estates were built. In the 1950s major road network developments commenced with the building of the North Orbital Road and North Western Avenue.〔 Shortly after the outbreak of World War II in 1940, RAF Leavesden was established. In addition to a runway suitable for heavy bombers, and associated aircraft hangars, the de Havilland company, which had plants at Hatfield, built two factories for Halifax bombers and Mosquitoes. After the war de Havillands gradually converted the factories into a gas turbine design and manufacturing facility which was subsequently transferred to the de Havilland Engine Company who operated the factories until about 1963. Together with the large scale contraction and reorganisation of the British Aircraft Industry at that time, the site was taken into ownership by Armstrong Siddeley, Hawker Siddeley, and finally Bristol Siddeley, and in the same hectic year consolidated the gas turbine businesses of Blackburn Engines and Napiers. Bristol Siddeley Engines then operated the site together with a factory at Stag Lane Edgeware and a test facility at the old Hatfield site until 1968 when Bristol Siddeley Engines (by then a very profitable company) was forced to merge with Rolls Royce by government pressure. The site continued under the Rolls Royce name until closed by that company in 1991. Notable achievements by the engineering team were the world's first full authority electronically controlled helicopter engine and initial development of the first pedestal cooled turbine blade, now common throughout the industry. The site manufactured well over 3000 helicopter engines and designed and developed the RTM322 engine used for the UK Apache, Merlin and French NH90 aircraft. Rolls Royce has now sold the rights to this engine to a French company, and with that transfer all helicopter engine development in the UK has effectively ceased.〔(Leavesden Studios ), Accessed 21 January 2013〕 Eon Productions took over the site in 1995 for the production of the James Bond film GoldenEye. Leavesden Studios were developed and acquired by Warner Bros. and parts of the former airfield were sold for housing development.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Leavesden, Hertfordshire」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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