100 years ago

BANKS in Skipton were to be asked to receive subscriptions to help relieve the stress being caused in Ireland by the failure of the potato crop. The town's urban district council had been asked to help, and members felt this would be the best way.

Meanwhile, a deputation of members from the council's slaughterhouse committee was to visit abattoirs in Blackburn, Accrington and Burnley. The council had entered into a provisional contract to build a slaughterhouse on the Old Grammar School estate in Skipton.

On the sporting front, the Yorkshire Fishery Board made its annual distribution of trout into the various streams under its jurisdiction. Of the 4,000 distributed, 550 were put into the River Wharfe. The trout season had already commenced, noted the Herald, and a report predicted it would be a good one: "Owing to the exceptionally open winter and consequent abundance of fish food, the trout are in most cases as fit as a fiddle."

50 years ago

A 21-year-old German Prisoner of War due for repatriation pleaded guilty at Skipton Magistrates' Court to having an illicit "still" in a plantation near the POW camp at West Marton. The defendant was caught out when a customs and excise surveyor, alerted by two policemen, found a milk churn in the process of rapid fermentation. The contents were found to be 13 per cent proof spirit. The defendant was liable for a fine of £1,000, but the magistrates let him off with a nominal penalty of £1. The chairman emphasised that the illegal distilling of spirits was looked on seriously, but owing to the unusual circumstances they were treating him leniently. "We want you to go back to your own country and be a free man," he added.

The division's MP, Burnaby Drayson, spoke out about the manpower shortage confronting agriculture and the limestone quarrying industry in view of the withdrawal of POW labour. Speaking at the Divisional Conservative Association's annual meeting, he said it would be a serious blow to the country's food production unless some way could be found to deal with the situation. While the Conservatives wanted the POWs to be given the chance to go home, no repatriation scheme should proclude those who were prepared to stay on a voluntary basis, he said.

Glusburn Park was described as a "white elephant" and a "burden on the tax payers" at the village's annual parish meeting. During a discussion on the precept, one man asked how many people actually enjoyed the park. Very few, he believed. And another asked why the park brought in such a small income. It was a white elephant, he said, and was "out in the wilds" when it should be in the centre of the community. The chairman of the parish council said if the residents wanted rid of the park, it was up to them as it was theirs.

25 years ago

THINGS seemed so civilised in local government back in those days. The Government asked councils to reduce their expenditure. Asked, mark you, no compulsion was involved said the report. And, lo!, Skipton Rural found £17,000 worth of savings. These days such savings still means a hefty increase in council tax but back in 1973 when the council found £17,000 worth of savings, it was able to make a cut in the rates. Oh happy days!

Building work in Skipton's Red Lion uncovered a 20 feet deep well behind the inn. There was 10 feet of water in the well and licensee John Moran was wondering whether to make it a feature.

Sutton pinnacle, with its spiral staircase, was to be repaired in the summer by Cross Hills Naturalists Society. We know it as Lund's Tower but back then it was called it Ethel's Tower and variations on Eden, Aden and Maydin Tower. Back in the 1930s, said the report, it had been a popular destination for villagers when Mrs Atkins, of New Bridge Farm, sold sweets and jugs of tea for anyone who reached the top.

10 years ago

ANOTHER piece of old Skipton was buried as the last tangible evidence of Gylnwed Foundry disappeared. The keys to the old foundry were buried under the name stone of the Carleton Park housing development which had been built upon the site.

Regulars at the Craven Heifer in Stainforth were exhausted after a sponsored barrel roll. Twelve teams in fancy dress pushed full 36 gallons of beer round the village and raised £400 for the Multiple Sclerosis Society and village hall fund.

Fred Bullough, of the cleaning firm, produced a book based on his skills called "Housemaid's Needs - or How to Clean Everything", which sounds like a must for our editor's household. There was an A-Z of cleaning but where, the Herald mused, was Zebo, and did they make it anymore? Zebo was, as any older reader could tell you, used for black-leading the old fireplaces.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.