Editing Yorkshire (section)

====Twentieth century to present====
During the [[Second World War]], Yorkshire became an important base for [[RAF Bomber Command]] and brought the county and its productive industries into the cutting edge of the war, and thus in the targets of [[Luftwaffe]] [[Hull Blitz|bombers]] during the [[Battle of Britain]].<ref>{{cite book | first= Bruce Barrymore |last=Halpenny |author-link=Bruce Barrymore Halpenny| title = Action Stations: Military Airfields of Yorkshire v. 4 | year = 1982 | publisher = PSL | isbn = 978-0-85059-532-1 }}</ref>

From the late 20th century onwards there have been a number of significant reforms of the local government structures covering Yorkshire, notably in 1968, 1974, 1986, 1996 and 2023, discussed in the [[#Governance|governance]] section below. For most administrative purposes the county had been divided since the Middle Ages; the last county-wide administrative role was the [[Sheriff of Yorkshire]]. The sheriff had been a powerful position in the Middle Ages but gradually lost most of its functions, and by the twentieth century was a largely ceremonial role. It was abolished as part of the 1974 reforms to local government, which established instead [[high sheriff]]s for each modern county.<ref name=1972act/>