Thursday, May 13, 2004

100 years ago: A police constable from Heworth was leaving after 11 years' duty in "that pleasant outpost of the city". His service in the force totalled nearly 23 years, and it was generally thought that he had well earned the more comfortable post the Chief Constable had given him. He was going to live in Monk Bar house, and take duty on the walls. The many friends in the village he was leaving wished him "good luck", for he was a zealous officer, of good judgement, and courteous manners.

50 years ago: York's Castle Museum had a national reputation as a "living" museum, but during the York Festival its period rooms and cobbled streets would come to life in a different way. They were to be filled by museum staff, their friends and relatives, with past and present pupils of Burton Stone and Beckfield Schools, all in Jacobean, Georgian, Victorian or Edwardian costumes. There would be animated conversation over tea in the Victorian parlour, and in the moorland cottage, the spinning wheel would be busy. In the weavers' cottage, weavers would be hard at work, and the streets thronged with people, where visitors would hear the cries of street traders selling their wares. One problem the museum had in planning all this was a lack of male Victorian and Edwardian costumes. The curator said that of the 350 Victorian and Edwardian outfits which the museum possessed, only two were normal men's suits, as wedding dresses were easy enough to come by, but everyday clothes were rare.

10 years ago: Some of the greatest bores in the world were on display at the National Railway Museum in York, namely the ones that tunnelled under the English Channel to connect Great Britain to France, the biggest piece of civil engineering ever undertaken. An exhibition of dramatic and "surprisingly colourful" photographs capturing the sheer scale of the project from beginning to completion was also on view at museum.

Updated: 11:02 Thursday, May 13, 2004