Some domestic matters this week for you in Bizarre Bradford, beginning with the curious case of the wife who, as our headline had it, “didn’t speak for four weeks”.

This is from October 27, 1955, so you may be excused a momentary lapse of taste and allowed to comment, “So what’s the problem with that?”, while sucking on a Woodbine and holding up your bottle of Mackeson.

Now that behaviour has been confined to the dustbin of social history, where it belongs, let’s look at the particulars of this case that appeared before the Divorce Court at Leeds Assizes.

A 34-year-old Bradford chap had, quite frankly, had enough of her indoors and had gone to the courts to get shut. We reported his other half’s misdemeanours: “A 30-year-old Bradford wife at one time refused to speak a single word to her husband for four weeks. For a year she refused to cook, wash or mend for him.”

In other words: “The marriage had failed because the wife had failed to carry out her fundamental wifely duties.”

Mr Commissioner Gallop, QC, granted the husband a decree nisi on grounds of “cruelty by his wife”.

The Commissioner said: “Any woman who makes a continuous grievance, grumbling day in and day out at her husband out of self-pity is, in my judgment, falling far short of what a reasonably-minded person should do.”

The court was told: “Throughout the years the wife’s grievance had been that she wanted her husband to make money, realising it would be necessary for him to work hard, and at the same time make her happy by his constant presence with her.

“Not that I believe she ever would be happy,” observed Mr Commissioner Gallop. But what had the wife to say for herself? Her contention was “that her husband had shirked his responsibilities and that he was mean”.

But Mr Commissioner Gallop was having none of it.

Those women with their cruel ways, eh? What can be done with them? Well, they can be told to stop smoking, for one thing, which was pretty much the headline of the story we ran on September 8, 1947 – a call from Parliament, no less.

We reported: “Mr Ivor Thomas, Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies and Labour MP for Keighley, speaking at Stockton-on-Tees last night, advocated that women should give up smoking altogether during the present economic crisis.

“He advised the women in his audience: ‘If you cannot get your husbands to give it up, give it up yourselves. You will feel better for it. It is largely all a matter of habit.”

A much happier marital tale to end on, from December 16, 1955: “Bradford twin sisters to wed twin brothers”.

We wrote: “Brian and Peter Thirkill, 19-year-old twin sons of Mr and Mrs George Thirkill, of Royds Hall, Wortley, Leeds, are engaged to be married to Betty and Joan Gledhill, twin daughters of Mr and Mrs F Gledhill, of Marlborough Road, Idle, Bradford.”

Got a story for Bizarre Bradford? Write to us at the usual address with as much detail as you can remember – dates are good for helping us find the cuttings – or e-mail david.barnett @telegraphandargus.co.uk.