March 12

It was always pleasing to record local successes, especially so when it concerned an old city firm such as Messrs Folkards, the well-known chemists on The Pavement.

In connection with an All-England Window Competition for the display of “Vitafer,” they had just received the following intimation from the manufacturers: “We are glad to inform you that out of a very large number of competitors your design has been awarded the first prize of ten guineas.

We congratulate you upon being first amongst quite a number of original and excellent displays.” We at the Yorkshire Evening Press also added our congratulations to Messrs Folkards upon their skill, enterprise, and good taste.

50 years ago

“Walking down Coppergate between 11 and 12 on a Saturday night can be frightening and, occasionally, dangerous. It is the same kind of experience as walking through the Elephant and Castle at the height of the teddy boy era.”

So said Stephen Wycherley in a survey of teenage York in the latest issue of the York University magazine, Eboracum. The city’s “beat” clubs were still places for the young and “respectable” - the students, the nurses and the apprentices.

“For the core of York’s working class youth, hard and conventional, the Rock pubs, those which present groups or have a weekend jukebox tradition, remain the basis and focal points of social life.”

Naming four which were packed to capacity with young people at weekends, he claimed they had an air of frustrated violence which could easily erupt into a fight. “A casual glance at an unknown girl, a ‘joke’ is enough excuse for a fight,” he said.

25 years ago

The “passion wagon” was alive and sparking, according to a recent survey in which more than one in three motorists admitted to using their vehicles for romance.

About 30 per cent of drivers surveyed said they had made love in a vehicle while the figure for lorry and coach drivers was as high as 53 per cent. “Making love in the car has long been the only option for frustrated young lovers still living with their parents,” said car accessory retailers Halfords who had commissioned the Gallup survey.

The survey looked at 1000 road users’ habits and discovered amongst other things that taxi drivers were considered the most inconsiderate of drivers followed by older drivers, teenagers, bus drivers and “Yuppie car phone users”.

Women were seen as the safest drivers by 28 per cent of respondents, followed by lorry drivers (21 per cent), police car drivers (14 per cent) and bus drivers (11 per cent). There was no specific mention of men in the safest category.