ON September 26, 1984, Margaret Thatcher made a surprise visit to York. She was almost half way through her premiership – and her visit to the city also came roughly half-way through the miners’ strike of 1984/85.

The Yorkshire Evening Press in its leader column that day studiously avoided mentioning the strike directly – an indication, perhaps, of just how divisive it was.

Instead, the newspaper contented itself with describing how the Prime Minister appeared “unbowed and remarkably resilient in the face of national problems which would test the resolve of the strongest character”.

A leader column added: “Her style of government has earned her plenty of critics, but nobody will doubt her courage and strength of purpose.”

Mrs Thatcher herself was not above using a photocall to make a point about the miners’ strike, however. Her visit took in the National Railway Museum – where she pointed to a pile of coal in an engine tender and remarked: “I see you have some… and very good coal it looks too.”

Mrs Thatcher also visited York Minster, which had been ravaged by fire just a couple of months before. She wore a hard hat as she was taken up to see the fire-blackened Rose Window. The letters emblazoned on the front of her hat read ‘YM’.

That presumably stood for York Minster, however, and was not intended as a gesture of support for the Yorkshire Miners.