History of Bedfordshire than fifty places in the county. Following the enactment of the Municipal Corporations Act 1835, Bedford was the only borough in the county. Charters of incorporation were granted to Dunstable in 1864 and Luton in 1876. In 1837 the county was divided into poor law unions, each consisting of a town and surrounding rural parishes: Ampthill, Bedford, Biggleswade, Leighton Buzzard, Luton and Woburn. In addition, a handful of parishes near the boundaries of Bedfordshire were included in PLUs based in other counties, namely Hitchin in Hertfordshire, St Neots in Huntingdonshire and Wellingborough in Northamptonshire. In 1875, the county was divided
Leighton Buzzard Light Railway the steam locomotives were sold in 1921. From that point the railway was run using internal combustion, almost exclusively the products of the Motor Rail company. It was one of the first railways in Britain entirely operated by internal combustion. After the Second World War sand traffic returned to the roads. In 1953 a strike on mainline railways pushed more traffic onto the roads. By the mid-1960s only one sand quarry, Arnold's, still used the light railway. The BR line to Dunstable was closed in 1965, apart from a short stretch from Leighton Buzzard to Grovebury interchange sidings, which survived