What a chaotic world we seem to be living in at the moment.
It’s often a great relief to dip back into the past – not that there ever seemed to be many periods of our history that were spared from crisis or chaos of some sort.
I know I have gone on in the past about our living in an age that is much better than the “good old days” – but sometimes even I wonder where it is we are going.
But, enough of this. Pessimistic pondering over!
Time to dip – albeit randomly – into the past.
I was casting an eye over a press cutting from the West Cumberland News for February 1949, when I came across the week’s lost and found column.
Ordinarily I wouldn’t have given it much attention, but with some police forces allegedly refusing to accept items found by members of the public, the item rang a bell, so to speak.
I had wondered what I should do if I came across anything which had obviously been lost or misplaced by some unfortunate.
In 1949, the column consisted of four items.
The first ad announced that a pigeon, ring no D2643NUHW45, had been found.
The owner was informed that it could be retrieved from a fish and chip shop in John Street, Maryport.
Two further ads were from ladies who had each lost one glove.
One ad offered a reward “on returning to news office, Maryport.”
The owners might even have been reunited with their gloves.
But I wonder how the Maryport man who had lost a £5 note, between Maryport and Grasslot fared – even though he was offering a reward for its return.
I know that in 1949, £5 was a fair sum of money – but I suspect, cynic that I am, his advert would have found no takers.
I found these ads on the back of a press cutting, which took me back in time.
How many of you remember Wilfred Pickles and his Have a Go radio programme?
It was required listening in our house.
I can still hum the theme tune – although I can’t remember any of the words.
His programme had visited Keswick and one of the personalities he had interviewed was Robert Just – described as a veteran beekeeper.
I have dealt with cures for rheumatism before, which included the sufferer being stung by bees. Robert Just had been one such sufferer – being unable to lift his arm – but after making 20 bees “sting the affected part” he was right as rain.
His cure was not as potentially painful as the one used by another local farmer.
As I remember his cure was to go to bed with a quantity of bees stuffed under his vest. Ouch!
I have been watching late-night TV screenings of the old Bullseye programmes – and some of them are extremely old.
I always hang on when the details of many TV programmes are tagged onto their ends and I am often amazed at just how old some of them are.
I wonder if Jim Bowen was descended from Methuselah – he never seemed to change.
Recently an extremely ancient programme, possibly one of the very first, was broadcast.
It lacked the pace of some of the later programmes – but it was still very enjoyable and I don’t play darts.
I don’t understand why on earth the programme was scrapped.
It is still an improvement on some of today’s woefully boring quiz programmes.
This is all leading up to a question. Have you got any information about the Broughton Moor-based firm Nimrod Dart Limited – which manufactured dartboards?
I will be asking more questions about local organisations and firms in future articles.
It is surprising just how fast information about various buildings and undertakings can vanish – even in this internet age.
All you have to do is to walk around your local town, look around you and try, if you can, to remember what was there – even a few short years ago.
Just imagine what sort of picture someone 40 or 50 years in the future will have of it.
I know that some people see local history as something that is about the dusty past – and they are wrong.
Local history starts yesterday. And it is all about you.
In 1954 The West Cumberland Times began a new feature, entitled The Junior Times.
Any child of school age could submit an article for this feature – on any subject they were interested in.
Were you a contributor?
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