High Wycombe ( /ˌhaɪ ˈwɪkəm/), commonly known as Wycombe and formally called Chepping Wycombe or Chipping Wycombe until 1946, is a large town in Buckinghamshire, England. It is 29 miles (47 km) west-north-west of Charing Cross in London; this information is also engraved on the Corn Market building in the centre of the town. According to the 2001 census High Wycombe had a population of 92,300, making it the largest town in the non-metropolitan county of Buckinghamshire now that the Borough of Milton Keynes is a unitary authority area, and the second largest in the ceremonial county. The High Wycombe Urban Area, the conurbation of which the town is the largest component has a population of 118,219.
High Wycombe is mostly an unparished area in the Wycombe district. Part of the urban area constitutes a civil parish of Chepping Wycombe, which had a population of 14,455 according to the 2001 census – this parish represents that part of the ancient parish of Chepping Wycombe which was outside the former municipal borough of Wycombe.
Wycombe is a combination of industrial and market town, with a traditional emphasis on furniture production. There has been a market held in the High Street since at least medieval times. The town has always had a presence of industry, which in the 17th century exceeded the market town and now Wycombe remains more industrial in character.
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“She gave high counsels. It was the privilege of certain boys to have this immeasurably high standard indicated to their childhood; a blessing which nothing else in education could supply.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)