In The U.K. the biggest difference between a hamlet and a village is that many villages have a church.
The word "village" is not used in most states. However, in twenty US states, a "village" is a sort of local government, similar to a city but with less power and for a smaller place. But this is not so in all the United States. In many states, there are villages which are bigger than the smallest cities in the state. The difference is not the population, it is how much power the different sorts of places have, and what they do for people living there.
In New York state, a village is a place which is usually called a town.
In many states, a "village" is only a place where people live, with no legal power, similar to a hamlet in New York state. The name for these is "unincorporated villages".
Chelmsford
Chelmsford is the only city in the county of Essex, England. It is 32 miles northeast of London, about halfway to Colchester. It is nearly in the centre of the county and it is the county town of Essex, but it is not the biggest or the oldest town in the county. It is the centre of the "borough" of Chelmsford, which is a bigger place than the city.
Chelmsford has the smallest cathedral in England. John Dee, who wrote the English version of "Euclid", went to the Cathedral school in the sixteenth century. Chelmsford is also home to some of the Anglia Ruskin University campuses.
The number of people living in the borough is about 170,000; about 115,000 of those live in the city.
About 20,000 people from Chelmsford travel to London every weekday. Another 20,000 people work in Chelmsford who live outside the city. This makes Chelmsford the busiest "ordinary" railway station in England (not including junctions and terminuses). (The busiest of all is Clapham Junction railway station).
The A12 road from London, which the Romans first built between London and Colchester, went through the town, but now goes around the east, so the number of cars in the town is smaller.
Chelmsford has been an important centre for industry since the 19th century. It became home to the UK's first electrical engineering works (in 1878), and its first ball bearing factory (in 1898).
In 1898, Guglielmo Marconi, the "father of radio" opened the World's first radio factory in Hall Street, with about 50 workers. In 1920 the factory was also the home of the first official sound (radio) broadcasts (radio people could listen to from a long way) in the United Kingdom. In 1922 the world's first "regular" radio broadcasts started at the Marconi Research Centre at Writtle near Chelmsford.
Places of interest in and near Chelmsford are for example Writtle, where Robert I of Scotland was perhaps born, and Pleshey, where the ruins of a castle in William Shakespeare's play "Richard II" are.
Hylands House and Park, west of the town, is an old country house. People can visit it, and in the last years it has been the place for a popular yearly music festival, the V Festival.
The old Palace of Beaulieu is also nearby.
Chelmsford is also famous for being the birthplace of radio, Marconi was an Italian man who invented the radio and had his first factory in Chelmsford.
In 1199 the Bishop of London gave a Royal Charter (a special paper) for the town to have a market. But there have been people living here since pre-historic times. The Romans also lived in Chelmsford. An octagonal temple is under the Odeon roundabout.
In World War II bombs hit Chelmsford a number of times. The worst single loss of life happened on Tuesday December 19, 1944. The 367th V-2 rocket which hit England fell near the Hoffmans' ball bearing factory. 39 people were killed and 138 hurt, 47 of them badly. A lot of buildings were destroyed and hundreds more were damaged.
From over 600,000 years ago, the early River Thames went through the place where Chelmsford is now, from Harlow to Colchester. Then it went over today's North Sea and went into the Rhine.
Chelmsford is twinned with these:
Gangnihessou
Do-Aklin or Gangnihessou (Ganye Hessou) or Dogbari was the first of twelve kings of Dahomey in Africa. Gangnihessou might have been the king around the year 1620. One of his symbols was a bird called "gangnihessou" after his name. His other symbols were a drum, and sticks used for throwing or hunting. He had a younger brother called Dakodonou, who was a king. Some historians think Gangnihessou was not actually a king. Instead, Gangnihessou might have led people by giving advice to his brother.
Contract bridge
Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game which is played by two pairs of players, one pair against the other pair. Partners sit opposite each other at a table.
Millions of people play bridge worldwide in clubs, tournaments, online and with friends at home. It is one of the world's most popular card games. The World Bridge Federation is the governing body for international competitive bridge.
The game consists of a number of "deals". Each deal goes through four phases: dealing the cards, the auction (also referred to as bidding), playing the cards, and scoring the results. Most club and tournament play uses duplicate bridge, where the cards are not re-dealt during a session. The same deals are played by most or all players. This allows comparative scoring.
It is played with the standard 52 cards in four suits. The game developed out of whist, which is a relatively old card game. Bridge developed in a series of stages from about 1890 to about 1930. The stages included bridge-whist and auction bridge, and the developments took place mostly in New York and London. The origin of the word "bridge" in this context is not really known. One possibility is that it is taken from an 1886 book, "Biritch, or Russian Whist" by John Collinson.
Whist is played with the trump suit chosen by chance, whereas in bridge it is chosen by a process called "bidding". A trump is a card which can beat any card from the other three suits.
In whist, the winners had to get most of the tricks (a trick is a round of four cards), that is, seven or more tricks. However, in bridge the players bid in sequence to decide what the "contract" shall be. The contract is decided by the last bid, and will be in one of the four suits, or in "no trumps", without a trump suit.
The scoring rules and the bidding process evolved through stages between 1890 and about 1930. Bids at the one level are offers to make at least seven tricks. Bids at the seven level are offers to make all thirteen tricks. The lowest bid one can make is "one club" and the highest bid is "seven no trumps".
The scoring system for bridge is very much more complicated than it is for whist. Fundamentally, it depends on whether or not declarer makes his contract or not. If he does not, the defending side collect penalty points. If he does make the contract his side wins points. How many points are won or lost depends on the scoring system (not discussed here). Harold S. Vanderbilt played a key role in designing the scoring system, and in 1927 the Whist Club of New York produced a code for contract bridge. They and the Portland Club of London became the authorities who guided the later minor changes to the rules.
The set-up for playing the cards is also different from whist. The side which wins the bidding sequence plays with only one partner ("declarer") controlling both hands. His or her partner is called "dummy", and that hand is played face up on the table so all players can see it.