Caswell, Northamptonshire

Caswell is a lost settlement in Northamptonshire approximately 2 miles (3.2 km) from Towcester, 8 miles (12.9 km) from Northampton and 12 miles (19 km) from Milton Keynes. It is close to Greens Norton village and now consists almost entirely of Caswell House, a former family farmhouse built for the 4th Duke of Grafton in 1839. Another similar house is at Field Burcote, a hamlet 0.5 miles (0.80 km) north of Green's Norton. Both have three widely spaced bays with low-pitched hipped slate roofs and lower wings and are formally arranged[1] The building and stables are Grade II listed.

Caswell, Northamptonshire

Allen Clark Research Centre, From the Knightley Way footpath. Looking north across the lake
Caswell, Northamptonshire
Location within Northamptonshire
OS grid referenceSP651511
• London65 miles (105 km)
Civil parish
  • Greens Norton
District
Shire county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townTowcester
Postcode districtNN12 8EQ
Dialling code01327
PoliceNorthamptonshire
FireNorthamptonshire
AmbulanceEast Midlands
UK Parliament

Research establishment

Foundation

The concept of a research lab covering the Plessey company's interests in materials germinated in 1934 when its founders Allen George Clark and William Heynes were in charge.[2] Another leading member of staff at this time was Geoffrey Charles Gaut who joined the Plessey company from Oxford University where he was awarded a degree in chemistry. He joined as Chief Chemist at Ilford where he began a lifelong involvement with electronic materials and devices. At the beginning of the Second World War in 1939 he volunteered for the RAF having qualified as a pilot with the University Air Squadron at Oxford. However, to his chagrin, his commission was cancelled through the influence of Allen Clark who believed that Gaut would have a special role to play in the war effort to develop electronics and radar.

1940s and 50s

With bombing in the Ilford area in 1940, Gaut was told to relocate his laboratory in a quieter country environment where research could proceed undisturbed. Thus was founded Plessey's laboratory at Caswell, in Northamptonshire, which, as Gaut said, also kept his young scientific team concentrating and well away from any interference by senior management.[3][4]

Post-war the distance between Ilford and Caswell forced the introduction of local pre-production units. Over the next 20 years or so this led to the establishment of at least a further eight independent businesses locally in the Towcester area especially around Wood Burcote, just south of the town.[2]

1960s to 1990s

For the next 50 or so years the farmhouse became the home of the Allen Clark Research Centre for the now defunct company which later became part of the British GEC in 1989. The centre was officially opened under Clark's name (Clark had died in 1962[5]) by the Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh on 20 March 1964 where the Duke unveiled a plaque by Scottish sculptor David McFall.[5][6] Research was carried out there for a number of areas in which Plessey was involved including semiconductors, LED's, other solid-state devices and integrated circuits (ICs) and was the birthplace of self scanned C-MOS light sensor arrays (PJW Noble) for their company Plessey Semiconductors (also known for a time as Plessey Microelectronics) based at Cheney Manor, Swindon, (the building was demolished in c.2015). The site also had a scanning electron microscope useful for checking the surface topology of ICs under static and charged conditions. At peak, the centre employed several hundred people. After the GEC/Siemens takeover of Plessey, the Caswell site was taken over by GEC and subsequently GEC Marconi. Marconi problems later led to the sale of the site to Bookham Technology in 2002.[4] A talented German engineer, William Oscar Heyne was employed by the company. Heyne later became the managing director and Chairman of Plessey and was one of the key figures in the development of Plessey during the 1920s and 1930s.[4]

Caswell's devices

The gallium arsenide field effect transistor and monolithic ic were invented and developed at Caswell, but what is probably less well known is that scientists on the site were working on silicon integrated circuit technology almost 18 months before Jack Kilby demonstrated the first working ic at Texas Instruments in Dallas. Caswell technologists also developed the first multilayer ceramic capacitor and a host of other inventions that enabled many of the electronic products we rely on today – including mobile phones, satellite TV and WiFi.[7]

Post 20th century

In 2009 a campus-style business park opened on the site, with the potential to be occupied by up to 500 people and to be known as Caswell Science & Technology Park and operated by regional technology parks operator Fasset, which is marketing and letting vacant space for on-site client Oclaro, formerly known as Bookham, a multi-national specialising in optical components for telecommunications and the internet. The site has an area of 22 acres (8.9 ha) site with 170,000 sq ft (16,000 m2) mixed-used office, manufacturing and laboratory space, with 160 people working for 10 different companies at the time of opening. Occupiers in 2009 include Diamond Hard Surfaces, IT Systems UK, Solutions Research, Nemisys, Definition Media and Finch Business Solutions.[8]

References
  1. Pevsner, Nikolaus (1961). The Buildings of England – Northamptonshire. London and New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 240. ISBN 978-0-300-09632-3.
  2. "Solid-State Research at Caswell: J Phys Technol Vol 17 (1986) includes pictures of the site and some early IC's". Retrieved 7 October 2009.
  3. Bass, John (3 September 1992). "Obituary: Geoffrey Gaut, Director of Research, Plessey : The Independent (3 September 1992)". London. Retrieved 8 October 2009.
  4. "A résumé of the history of Plessey, compiled by Hugh Culverhouse, a nephew of Sir Allen Clark". Retrieved 9 April 2012.
  5. "David McFall Website" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 14 August 2011. Retrieved 8 October 2009.
  6. "Ear to the Ground: Aircraft Eng & Aerospace Technol, 1964, Vol 36, Issue 5, Pp148". Retrieved 8 October 2009.
  7. "This is Your Life, Caswell – the cradle of the semiconductor industry: New Electronics, 9 March 2009". Retrieved 13 September 2015.
  8. "Caswell Science and Technology Park main website". Retrieved 10 August 2011.
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