Twyford

The village's toponym is Anglo-Saxon in origin, and means double ford. It is a common name in England. Twyford had two fords over two branches of the River Loddon, on the Old Bath Road to the west of the centre. According to the chronicler Geoffrey Gaimar, after King Æthelred of Wessex and his brother, the future King Alfred the Great, were defeated by the Vikings at the Battle of Reading in 871, they escaped by a ford over the River Loddon at Twyford which was not known to their pursuers. William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania, who was a well known philanthropist who donated his life savings to Loddon Village Hall, spent the final years of his life in Ruscombe Fields, a property close to…

The population of Twyford in the 2011 Census was 6,618. Of this, 20.84% were aged 0–15, while 19.96% were aged 65+, leaving a relatively small working age population compared to the rest of Wokingham Borough. There are 2,611 individual dwellings in the ward of Twyford, the majority of which are detached. In 2011, 72.31% of residents aged 16–74 were in employment, the majority of whom held Managerial, Professional or Technical positions. Only 0.5% were registered as actively seeking employment. The average life expectancy at birth is 80.1 years for males and 84.7 years for females. Twyford is also home to the global headquarters of the international construction and services company,…