Shropshire

Shropshire is a county of western England, on the border with Wales; it is bounded to the north by Cheshire and the Welsh county of Wrexham, to the west by the Welsh counties of Denbighshire and Powys; to the south by Herefordshire and Worcestershire, and to the east by West Midlands and Staffordshire. It is largely agricultural. The county town is the historic city of Shrewsbury; other major towns include Ludlow, Oswestry and Whitchurch. The New Town of Telford lies within the historic and ceremonial county of Shropshire but for administrative purposes became a Unitary Authority in the late 1990s. Telford includes within its boundaries the settlement of Ironbridge, location of the first iron bridge in the world and symbolic birthplace of the Industrial Revolution.