BRADFORD, England, manufacturing city and municipal, county and parliamentary in the West Riding of Yorkshire, eight miles west of Leeds, on the Bradford Canal and the Midland, Northeastern, Great Northern and Lancashire & Yorkshire railways. It is pleasantly situated on a feeder of the Aire, at the junction of three extensive valleys, and consists of an ancient and a more modern portion, the latter with spacious, well-built streets. The appearance of the town has been almost completely changed since 1861, the cor poration having, at a great expenditure of money, effected most extensive street improve ments, widening the principal thoroughfares, improving the gradients and opening up new streets. Spacious covered markets have been erected at a great cost. Among the public buildings are the town hall (1873), in French Gothic style; the parish church of Saint Peter, in the Perpendicular style, dating from 1485; the Cartwright Memorial Hall, containing an art gallery and museum, opened in 1904, to commemorate the inventor of the power-loom and combing machine; Saint George's Hall, erected in 1853, and capable of accommodating about 4,000 persons; an exchange, containing a statue of Cobden; a temperance hall, the first of the kind in England, erected in 1837; a mechanics' hall, with lecture-rooms and library; a technical college, opened in 1882; free library (1872). The schools include the free grammar school, endowed by Charles II, the girls' grarn mar school and the board schools. In Airedale College young men are trained for the minis try among the Independents and there is also a United Independent college (1888). Among the charitable institutions may be noticed the infirmary, the eye and ear hospital the chil dren's hospital, Saint Catharine's dome, an institution for the blind, and almshouses.
There is a fever hospital, to which patients are admitted at moderate charges, and when per sons are too poor to pay, the corporation bears the cost. There is also a smallpox hospital. Bradford has several public parks, some of them finely laid out, besides Baildon Moor (600 acres) reserved for recreation purposes. There is an extensive system of waterworks representing an outlay of more $18,000,000, and water, gas and electric supply undertakings are owned by the munici pality. In 1907 a municipal railway was opened, extending into the Nidd Valley, from whence the main water supply of the city is obtained. Bradford is the headquarters in England of the worsted yarn and stuff trade, which is the principal industry, the alpaca and mohair manufactures (with which Sir Titus Sales name is connected), having been transferred to the village of Saltaire, near Shipley. There are also manufactures of silk and velvet (the Manningham Mills of Lister & Company), mixed cotton and silk goods; and some cotton factories. In 1916 goods to the amount of $14,452,210 were shipped from Bradford to the United States, the largest items being woolen dress goods, $1,067,108, and piece-dyed cotton cloth, $4,754,972. In the neighborhood are quarries and ironworks. The town was incorporated in 1847 and its affairs are managed by a lord mayor (dignity conferred in 1907), 21 aldermen and 63 coun cillors. It was accorded the rank of a city in 1897. A United States consulate is established here. Pop. 288,505. Consult Ogden, 'Brad ford' (London 1910) and The Bradford tiquary, journal of the Bradford Historical and Antiquarian Society (Bradford 1:/./ to date).