Economy
North Petherton used to be a market town, with the right to hold a market having been granted in 1318, along with the right to an annual fair.
In the past the town hosted a Starkey Knight and Ford brewery on Fore Street (demolished in the late 1960s), several maltings, a light engineering works (Trig Engineering, since moved to the Huntworth Business Park adjacent to the nearby Junction 24 of the M5 motorway), and in earlier times at least 7 watermills.
Basket making and the manufacture of associated products including wicker furniture, was also a significant industry, at one time employing over 100 people in small factories and homes, until its decline in the second half of the 20th century. The products were distributed nationally via the railway station at Bridgwater. Nearby King's Cliff formerly provided a source of building stone for the town dating from at least Medieval times. The production of cloth and leather goods also used to take place in the town, the former being commemorated in the name of the road known as Dyer's Green.
The extensive cider orchards that used to surround much of the town in the 19th century had largely disappeared by the end of the 20th, by which time local employment was largely restricted to service businesses and farming. Folly Foot fishery is based on a lake which is stocked with Koi, Mirror, Common and Ghost Carp.
A new £100 m Regional Agricultural Business Centre, including an extensive Cattle Market and Dairy opened just beyond the outskirts of the town in 2007, following construction which began in 2006. This replaced the cattle markets in both Taunton and Bridgwater.
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Famous quotes containing the word economy:
“Quidquid luce fuit tenebris agit: but also the other way around. What we experience in dreams, so long as we experience it frequently, is in the end just as much a part of the total economy of our soul as anything we “really” experience: because of it we are richer or poorer, are sensitive to one need more or less, and are eventually guided a little by our dream-habits in broad daylight and even in the most cheerful moments occupying our waking spirit.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Everyone is always in favour of general economy and particular expenditure.”
—Anthony, Sir Eden (1897–1977)
“Wise men read very sharply all your private history in your look and gait and behavior. The whole economy of nature is bent on expression. The tell-tale body is all tongues. Men are like Geneva watches with crystal faces which expose the whole movement.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)