Tuesday, September 28, 2004

100 years ago: The Yorkshire Brevities column echoed a Yorkshire Herald leading article, condemning the proposal to reconstruct the Exhibition Buildings, in Exhibition Square, York, and to convert them into a Secondary Technical and Art School and Pupil Teachers' Centre. It was pointed out that the buildings were handed over to the Corporation at half their original cost to be used for general public purposes; that they have been available for banquets, exhibitions, concerts, lectures, and entertainments of various descriptions; and that the large hall was the only apartment of adequate accommodation in the city for great gatherings. The article suggested that the additional buildings required might be erected on the vacant ground formerly occupied by the annexe, which would not interfere with the existing structure. At the same time the attention of the Corporation was called to the unattractive arrangements of the valuable collection of paintings in the Art Gallery, and to the necessity for having frames and nameplates attended to, and a better background provided than boarded partitions full of nail holes. The covering of the walls with maroon drapery would be a great improvement and provide a proper background for the pictures, it was suggested.

50 years ago: Children who rested their chins in their hands while watching television were liable to push their teeth out of shape in time, readers were warned. "Don't do it," young viewers were recently told by a BBC television publicity officer, when he introduced the children's feature, "All Your Own". "Don't do it," agreed the secretary of the York Dental Society, who endorsed the official warning as "timely and necessary". The health warnings followed a report by experts of the British Dental Association pointing out the dangers of "television teeth-grinding."

25 years ago: Pressman's quest for amusing errors, other than those of his own colleagues, had found one on the printed menu outside a restaurant in King's Square in York. The bill of fare concluded with the following Freudian slip: "Tipping is at the discrepancy of the customer."

Updated: 14:05 Monday, September 27, 2004