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Todwick (Tateuuic=Tata's dairy farm?), population c 2,000 (1991) |
Todwick still has the sleepy feel of a small village. This is partly because this village is essentially a pub free zone without really having a social focus such as a pub, and even the medieval church is tucked away around a corner (unless you count a kebab shop and a newsagent as a focus!); the Red Lion pub is right on the fringes of Todwick alongside the A57, and is in any case essentially a restauraunt/hotel with a bar. The rest of the village is a largish collection of mostly private houses, mostly built since the 1960s.
It also has an air of affluence that places like Kiveton and Dinnington lack, probably because it never had a coal mine/pit tip, and row upon row of terraced housing. Like Harthill it has the sophorific feel of a dormitory village for the local towns and cities. It has a village infants and primary school but the older pupils attend Wales High School (the confusingly named comprehensive school in Kiveton just a mile away) and a short walk across the meadows bridleway.
At the time of the Norman conquest Todwick was held by the Saxon Lord Ragnaldr, who had to give it to the Norman Earl of Mortain.Back then it had 11 villeins (peasants), 2 freemen, and 5 smallholders, plus their families. The poll tax of 1379 recorded 50 or so tax payers (plus families), and in 1801 the population hadn't risen that much as it was still only 177. In 1961 it was 311 but massive housebuilding occurred in the 1960s that shot the population up to 1,600 or so in 1971, a level it has maintained.