100 years ago

THE members of the New Mills Urban District Council had been supplied with copies of a special report from the County Medical Officer of Health, Dr S Barwise, on the alleged insanitary conditions existing in the town, where a house-to-house inspection had recently been made.

The most striking feature of the figures was that over seven per cent of the inhabitants were living under overcrowded conditions, and the county authorities had notes of 130 houses without backdoor, and 67 houses with neither backdoor nor back window.

Most of these houses were built into the hillsides, and were held to be unfit for habitation.

The old part of the town was built in tiers and terraces. In various instances one bedroom was occupied by: A husband, his wife, and three daughters. A husband, his wife, and four sons. Three sons and three daughters.

In a further instance a large bedroom, divided by a partition without a door, was occupied by a husband, his wife, six daughters, and five sons. In the lodging-houses there were rooms containing several double beds for couples, but there were no screens between the beds.


50 years ago

A 120-BEDROOM hotel was to be built in York – the biggest the city had seen in post-war years.

It would accommodate 200 people, and have banqueting facilities for 450.

The Express Dairy Company had announced that its subsidiary, Spiers and Pond, had signed a contract to acquire the site, which was on the bank of the Ouse between Lendal Bridge and Ouse Bridge, in North Street.

York Corporation had already given outline planning consent for the hotel, and it was expected it would open a 1967. The cost of the hotel was expected to be about £750,000.


25 years ago

HOW much longer would it be before women could stand in the church pulpit, fully ordained and viewed as equals with the male priests, we were asked.

Almost 2,000 years of tradition, opposition and oppression stood between women and their quest for ordination.

The coming weekend the hierarchy of the church would meet at York University for the General Synod meeting, and the ordination of women was the hottest item on the agenda. In her book The Last Bastion, published to coincide with the General Synod, journalist and author Jennifer Chapman had examined both sides of the issue.

“A look at religious archives reveals that not long ago black men were barred from ordination. Even further back, left handed men were also banned from the priesthood,” said Chapman. In a few hundred years perhaps the present bar against women would seem equally antiquated and bigoted.