With 56 stage hits under his belt, Sir Alan Ayckbourn is one of the most successful playwrights this country has known. But he still remembers what it was like as a struggling newcomer. And next week the writer and director will be in Bradford to lend
DRINKERS could be banned from their favourite watering holes if they are caught wandering from pub to pub carrying bottles or glasses. Licensees say they are ready to bar revellers who do not sup up before leaving the premises - and say those who sneak
MORE than 7,500 donor trees are to be planted in the Valley of Desolation at Bolton Abbey by the Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust. The Valley of Desolation was so called after a storm in 1826 devastated the area. An education trail and related information
A GARGRAVE woman is to appear in a television documentary about a mother's right to choose whether or not to go out to work. Bernice Jervis, 46, of Neville Road, will appear on Yorkshire Television's current affairs series Q & A at the beginning of
ALTERATIONS to a proposed development plan at a former mental health hospital have helped put councillors minds at rest. Burley Developments Ltd revised several points of their original plan for Scalebor Park Hospital in Burley-in-Wharfedale after concerns
Pupils at a Bradford school threw away their Pokemon cards and opted for marbles or skipping ropes as they experienced life in Victorian times. Wyke Middle School's official centenary is in 2002, but celebrations were brought forward because it is due
ILKLEY has gone to the top of the tree by scooping the award for best town in the Yorkshire in Bloom competition. Judges were impressed by the hard work by businesses, residents and Bradford Council to keep the town blooming. The town scored top marks
A hi-tech company has gone back to the drawing board over plans for a new multi-million pound factory in Baildon. Filtronic's original plans to build a production facility and offices on a 16-acre site off Otley Road at Charlestown were refused by Bradford
Doncaster....5 B Rhydding...2 The substantial crowd were predominantly behind Ben Rhydding on this long awaited Cup Final Day. The under dogs hoped to emulate Bradford City's footballing triumph over Liverpool as they too threw their hearts and souls
Ilkley Swimming Club has made a promising start to the 21st Century with seven swimmers qualifying for the Yorkshire County Championships and five swimmers qualifying for the North East Counties Championships. Helen Stevens was the highest placed member
SKIPTON have been stripped of their league title for fielding an unregistered player in the early part of the season. However spokesman Mel Mason said the club was "furious" about the decision and would challenge the disciplinary procedure - if necessary
FOR the past few years, the Gazette has chronicled the problems the village of Addingham has suffered from the problem of youths congregating on the Memorial Hall car park. Under age drinking, vandalism, swearing and general loutishness have combined
ONE of the brightest stars of world acting returned to her Ilkley roots to pay tribute to someone to whom she owes her career. Dame Diana Rigg was an overweight 12-year-old when she first trod the boards at the Wharfedale Music Festival, prompted by Sylvia
Keighley's remarkable rise to the top of the Northern Ford Premiership was completed in style by sending Lancashire to their first whitewash of the season. The match started slowly with a mixture of handling errors and dubious refereeing decisions breaking
TWO Romanians from the city of Arad will visit Ilkley in July as representatives of a charity called the 'Friendship Foundation'. Teacher Rodica Gui and international businessman Florea Tarcea have been invited by the Reverend Brian Gregory of St John's
This Tex-Mex cantina has taken over the basement site of my previous favourite restaurant. While mourning the disappearance of lovely, lost, lamented Monkman's Cookhouse, I couldn't resist seeing what new management, a lick of paint and a new line-up
WE sat on a moss covered wall on a beautiful spring day, sipping gin and tonics and admiring the view across towards Malham Moor, writes John Sheard. In this magical garden, rare butterflies sipped nectar from wild flowers, a kestrel dropped in to bathe
100 years ago CELEBRATIONS were taking place across the district to mark the relief of Mafeking in the Boer War. According to the Craven Herald's editorial, the Boers had now lost their third and last chance of reducing the British Garrison to the humiliation
Coach Matthew Elliott has warned his unbeaten Bradford Bulls side to be on their guard at Wilderspool tomorrow. The Warrington Wolves are under pressure after failing to live up to pre-season hype and they are still sore about their Challenge Cup semi-final
MOMENTUM is building in a campaign to lobby the Government for extra cash to build the A56 villages bypass. Earlier this month the scheme failed to make it into Lancashire County Council's five year Local Transport Plan. Councillors chose a Heysham-M6
RENOWNED Yorkshire cheesemaker Fred Taylor is the subject of the latest book by prolific Dales author Bill Mitchell. His book follows Fred from his early life in his native Dentdale, his introduction to the art of cheese making, especially the world-famous
PARENTS settling down to watch Saturday's FA Cup final were dragged from in front of their television sets by youngsters eager to join in the fun at Glusburn and Cross Hills Gala. The procession route was lined with people waiting to catch a glimpse of
GIGGLESWICK School has won an award for its woodland conservation work along Buckhaw Brow. The school has been presented with the Millennium Marque, awarded to projects which have displayed environmental excellence over the last five years. The scheme
A MILLENNIUM scheme in Bentham is about to become a reality. The School Hill site enhancement is nearing completion after two years and a lot of hard work by a dedicated committee of volunteers. The site, once occupied by run-down public toilets, is being
The driveway through Clapham Woods, which is open to the public on payment of a modest charge, traverses an area where, just now, trees are decked with fresh leaves and the woodland floor is a mass of bluebells, dog's mercury and anemones. At the head
A distraught father was today trying to come to terms with the jail term handed to his wife after she drove the wrong way round a busy roundabout with her eyes shut. Helen Johnson, 34, was last night starting a four-month prison sentence after trying
FLAG makers were hard at work in Settle this week in preparation for the town's community festival. Meanwhile Bentham people were displaying the fruits of their labours with millennium bugs popping up ready for the gala on Monday. Professional flag maker
'MAD' Mick Kirlew has been named as this year's Skipton Firefighter of the Year after demonstrating that being in the service is not just about saving lives. A retained firefighter, Mr Kirlew is so dedicated to his job that even during his part-time work
SKIPTON'S first mayor of the new millennium was elected under cloak and dagger secrecy at a full town council meeting last Thursday. Deputy mayor Marcia Turner failed to win election after a secret ballot and, with no alternative proposal, Richard Colley
A 14-year-old girl who refused to have an operation which could help her hear again has finally decided to go ahead with the surgery at Bradford Royal Infirmary. Rebecca Farquahar, from Skipton, a boarder at St John's School for the Deaf in Boston Spa
A MEMBER of the Yorkshire Dales National Park has told the authority not to run away from its responsibilities to record and maintain rights of way. The comments came from Wilf Fenten after the authority decided to give further consideration to meeting
A NEW college has opened to serve the Dales - but you won't find a central campus to mark its headquarters. Instead through a network of learning centres, access points with computer facilities and information points, the College of the Dales aims to
SKIPTON'S Ermysted's Grammar School has 11 unfilled places for the new academic year but won't be offering them to local boys. Instead the school has advertised for boys from Lancashire to fill the vacancies for year seven in September - to the fury of
The second race in the Harrogate District Summer Race League at distant Richmond saw a good turnout of 26 Ilkley Harriers, many of them arriving just in time for a flying start. With a few key runners missing, everyone pulled out all the stops for good
Members of the Ilkley Karate Club were in fine form as they picked up seven trophies at the SKU Premiere Championships held at Stalybridge. In the cadet under 4' 6" kumite event Joe Outterside took first place in a very close final that was tied and eventually
THE Airedale and Wharfedale Bowling Association League Cup Competition continues with the second round being played on Tuesday of this week. The Wheatley Trophy also continued on that night while the Saturday League Cup Competition for the Jennings Crackles
THE vagaries of the English weather came to the fore again with Cowling Cup games affected in the Skipton area and held over to Monday while at Chatburn not a drop fell. Embsay were the visitors and a charmed stand of 53 for the third wicket between G
THE first piece of the jigsaw which could see Wharfedale promoted into the Allied Dunbar League of England's top teams has fallen into place. London Welsh have accepted a place in the Welsh National League Division One, creating a vacancy in Allied Dunbar
AN Addingham businessman fined nearly £10,000 over the chopping down of 25 protected trees on the Grove Hospital site in Ilkley has had the amount cut on appeal. Brian Whitaker was convicted by Bradford magistrates last December of ordering the illegal
The Queen is to get a new chaplain more used to drug addicts than royal tea parties. The Reverend George Moffat, vicar of St Paul's in the Manningham area of Bradford, is one of 36 chosen to preach once a year for Her Majesty, usually in the Queen's Chapel
Tennis THE match season is well underway for members of Ben Rhydding Tennis Club. The mixed team in Harrogate League Division One narrowly lost to Harlow A but there were wins for the men's team against Heaton and the Wharfedale League mixed team at Austwick
AN ADDINGHAM schoolgirl proved a big hit at an embroidery contest - and had competition all stitched up. Gail Mawdsley, ten, beat off contenders to carry off top prize in the North Eastern regional meeting of the Embroiderers Guild in the Young Embroiderers
The grandmother of a six-year-old girl whose miraculous recovery from the brink of death touched the nation, is to undertake a sponsored walk to raise cash for an artificial heart. Barbara Slater, of Threshfield, near Skipton, plans to walk ten miles
BORED youngsters will spend more time roaming the streets because of a 'wicked' decision to cut the number of nights a youth club opens. The decision to cut the number of nights from three to two in Addingham has been branded as 'deplorable' and 'totally
A solicitor who said he could have died after doctors failed to spot he was suffering from appendicitis has won damages of £18,000. Bradford County Court had heard that despite three GP visits over four days, Andrew Walker's appendix had eventually burst
SUNDAY'S Waddilove and Birtwhistle Cup competitions were severely disrupted by the wet weather. While some matches failed to start and so will get underway next Sunday others did start and were strung out over Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. Ilkley were unable
A worried daughter spoke today of the traumatic effect Zimbabwe's bloody land invasions have had on her elderly father. The Telegraph & Argus reported last month how dozens of President Mugabe's supporters had invaded the 4,500-acre farmstead where
Just how much more public money - and it is public money, whether it comes from taxes or from National Lottery funds - is going to trickle into the Thames from that leaky investment The Millennium Dome? The thing was a disaster from the very moment the
THE future of rural Post Offices will be on the agenda for discussion at a forthcoming meeting of Menston Neighbourhood Forum. Peter Finlay, postmaster of Menston Post Office, on Main Street, will outline his concerns and appeal for the support of residents
stage White Wells fell races ON Sunday the Wharfedale Harriers club held the inaugural White Wells Fell Races on Ilkley Moor. Despite the drizzly weather threatening to put a damper on proceedings there was a very encouraging turnout, especially among
A NEW style of worship is to return to Ilkley. Christchurch, on The Grove, is to host a service based on the meditative and musical style of French ecumenical community, Taiz. The Taiz community, which involves Christians from a variety of denominations
A moving walkway could help passengers to reach Leeds Bradford International Airport from a new rail link. Directors at the airport in Yeadon are considering a small railway station between Horsforth and Bramhope, which would join the terminal via a covered
CROSS Hills library could be redeveloped into a major community facility as part of ambitious plans. Behind the scenes talks are taking place between library bosses and South Craven Community Action to look at how the library site could be used in the
KIDS in the kitchen Sophie Baker and Daniel Moon make their TV debut on Tuesday. The youngsters, both pupils at Long Preston Primary School, enjoyed filming with television cook Susan Brookes for a slot on the This Morning programme with Richard and Judy
