Portal:Dorset

Dorset is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north and the north-east, Hampshire to the east, the Isle of Wight across the Solent to the south-east, the English Channel to the south, and Devon to the west. The largest settlement is Bournemouth, and the county town is Dorchester. Other towns include Poole, Weymouth and Christchurch.

Dorset has a varied landscape of chalk downs, steep limestone ridges, and low-lying clay valleys. The majority of its coastline is part of the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site due to its geological and palaeontologic significance, and features notable landforms such as Lulworth Cove, the Isle of Portland, Chesil Beach and Durdle Door. The north of the county contains part of Cranborne Chase, a chalk downland. The highest point in Dorset is Lewesdon Hill in the southwest.

Historically Dorset is known for Black Death, the English Civil War, the Tolpuddle Martyrs, and the invasion of Normandy.

Kinson is a former village which has been absorbed by the town of Bournemouth, in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole district, in the ceremonial county of Dorset, England. The area became part of Bournemouth district on 1 April 1931. There were two electoral wards containing the name Kinson (North & South). Their joint population at the 2011 census was 19,824.

The village has a shopping centre and a pub, Gulliver’s Tavern, known for much of the 19th and 20th centuries as 'The Dolphin Inn', after the boat named Dolphin owned by Isaac Gulliver. Kinson nearly became part of Poole in 1931; however, a vigorous campaign by the residents saw the parish added to Bournemouth instead, necessitating an adjustment to the Hampshire/Dorset county boundary, which had separated the two areas.

The area centres on Kinson village green which is on the Wimborne Road (at this point the A341) next to Kinson Library (now part of The Kinson Hub). The present green, which features a set of stocks, was once the site of the village school. The 1887 Ordnance Survey map for Kinson shows the school, which is now on a site to the south off Kinson Road. By the time of the 1949 survey maps, a library had taken the place of the old school. It was only when the library moved to a new location nearby that the old school/library site was combined with the village pound to form a new village green. A commemorative stone bench was officially unveiled by Mayor Benwell and his wife. The older village green, where cricket matches were played, has now become a development of bungalows, with the name Wicket Road surviving to mark its older use. (Full article...)

See List of places in Dorset for more information