100 Years Ago

THE 51st Craven Agricultural Show, held in a field next to Castle Woods, made a loss of £110 due to the terrible weather on show day. Heavy rain started overnight and continued through the day and as a result attendances plunged dramatically. Gate receipts, which were £167 the year before, were down to just £33. The highlight of the show was a military spectacular put on by the 18th Prince of Wales Hussars.

A peace treaty was signed bringing to an end the war between Russia and Japan. The Japanese had won every important conflict of the war. The Herald commented: "Japan's conduct in dealing with the sick and wounded and prisoners was invariably approved by the nations of the world as worthy of the most Christian of nations. And yet Japan is peopled by the despised yellow race and was previously looked upon as one of the most heathen countries which might be guilty of all sorts of atrocities when engaged in war".

Work began on turning Jerry Croft, which we know as the town hall car park, into a new cattle market. It was envisaged the work would be completed and the auction site in use by the following spring.

50 Years Ago

THE village of Kirkby Malham lost its water supply when the spring by the church which supplied the village dried up. A force pump managed to extract some water but households were reduced to a bucket a day. Farmers were spending almost all their day bringing water from the river Aire in milk kits to supply their cattle.

As if that was not enough for Malhamdale, a correspondent wrote in to say that the stench of decomposing rabbits, the victims of myxomatosis, was making life terrible. Locals wanted the council to gather up and incinerate the corpses.

A proposal by West Riding County Council to take 13 acres of land at Bridge End, Settle, for playing fields for the new Settle Secondary School was criticised by Settle Rural District Council. It deplored the use of good agricultural land for playing fields and urged West Riding to look further afield.

Takings at Skipton Baths plummeted after a rumour swept the town that there had been an outbreak of polio. But the rumour was entirely false, there were no cases of polio and the baths manager urged people to come as normal.

25 Years Ago

SHEPHERD'S crook maker Harry Binns of Grassington was pictured in the Herald handing over a crozier he had made for the Bishop of Bradford, the appropriately named Ross Hook. The bishop was leaving to become assistant to the Archbishop of Canterbury and turned to the skilled craftsman who lived in his diocese for a memento, made from hazel cut from Grass Wood. Mr Binns was almost blind and relied on his sense of touch to create and carve his crooks with a ram's horn handle.

Barlick barber Bob Sneath was retiring 52 years after he left Rainhall Road school to start in the barber's shop at 13 Albert Road. Two years before retiring he had moved premises into an old butcher's shop at number seven. Mr Sneath said the biggest change was the demise of men popping into the barber's for a shave - it did not happen any more.

Also saying farewells were the landlords of the Craven Arms, Appletreewick, John and Pauline Stanford Davis, who were retiring and David and Maggie Clark of the Devonshire Hotel, Grassington, to run a pub down south. Mr Clark had previously been the only barber in Grassington.

10 Years Ago

AS Britain's drought continued, plans were made to install standpipes in Skipton. The Government gave permission to extract an additional three million gallons of water a day from the river Wharfe to alleviate the shortage in Bradford. Meanwhile Yorkshire Water said that while almost everywhere people had reduced water consumption, in Skipton demand had actually gone up. She said Skipton's reaction was "puzzling and worrying".

The temperature clock on Skipton Ford showed 37 degrees - 99 degrees fahrenheit and at Burnsall Sports the first three home in the fell race did not stop at the winning line, instead they carried on running an extra 50 yards and dashed straight into the Wharfe to cool off.

Murphy, an English mastiff owned by Martin and Julie Barker, was officially recognised as the biggest dog in Britain. He was heavier than the 20 stone maximum on the digital scales. You wouldn't have liked his food bill though. He ate two washing up bowls of dog meat a day topped up with a tin of beans, tuna, cheese, fruit (especially melon) and his favourite, a few bottles of Budweiser beer.