at Mile House and then to the A168/A19 junction. Paradise Beck lies wholly within the parish and joins Cod Beck near Sowerby Parks Farm. The centre of the village has an avenue of English lime trees on Front Street, planted to celebrate the jubilee of Queen Victoria in 1887. To the east of the village is a publicly owned open pasture and recreation area known as the Sowerby Flatts. The fields show rig and furrow cultivation marks (i.e. dug with a spade rather than a plough) and the river shows signs of the abandoned project (started c. 1768) to build a canal from the centre of Thirsk to connect with the River Swale. Demography The 1881 UK Census recorded the population as 1,743. The 2001 UK Census recorded the population as 3,699 in 1,529 households. Of the total population, 48.3% were male and 51.7% were female with 2,851 being more than sixteen years old. There were 1,585 dwellings of which 493 were detached. The 2011 UK Census recorded the population as 4,249 in 1,808 households. Amenities Education The primary schools in the village are Sowerby Primary Academy and All Saints Roman Catholic Primary School. Sowerby Primary Academy was originally opened as a National School in 1872 in a building on Front Street but that building has now been converted into private housing. Its current premises on Topcliffe Road were opened in 1919 to house Thirsk Grammar School. When the Grammar School moved out in 1957 the premises were taken over by Sowerby Junior School. In 1980, following the closure of Sowerby Infants School, which was still located in the former National School on Front Street, the Junior and Infants Schools were merged on the Topcliffe Road site to form Sowerby County Primary School. Thirsk School and Sixth Form College, the secondary school for the town and the surrounding rural area, is located in Sowerby and has around 1,100 pupils. Its catchment area covers Alanbrooke, All Saints RC, Baldersby St James CE, Carlton Miniott, Dishforth CE, Pickhill CE, Sessay CE, South Kilvington CE, Sowerby, Thirsk and Topcliffe CE Primary Schools and includes some areas served by Knayton CE Primary School. The school was established in 1957 by the then North Riding County Council, as Thirsk Grammar and Modern School, to provide secondary education in Thirsk, Sowerby and the surrounding district. It became Thirsk School in 1970 and is now organised as