SOME corners of North Yorkshire resemble the land that time forgot. Not so Acomb. Still a sleepy farming village at the beginning of the 1900s, it is now a sprawling, bustling suburb of York. With a busy shopping centre and a population of 25,000, it is more like a small town than the rural backwater it was.

"Undoubtedly it's changed," says Geoff Hodgson, author of a new history of Acomb. "It's a shopping centre for parts of York I think now."

The cover of his book A History Of Acomb: Richardson's History Revised And Enlarged is illustrated with a photograph of a large home known as the White House in Front Street. It neatly highlights the contrast between then and now. The White House was demolished in the 1960s and was replaced by the Working Men's Club.

Today this end of Front Street, location of the Safeway supermarket, is busy, built-up, modern - a different world even from the Sixties.

"The other end of Front Street is still relatively quiet," Mr Hodgson said. "But York sucked up Acomb. It was very useful for overspill, which is why its character has changed.

"I don't know where it's going to finish. The car park is beginning to get overcrowded. That's for the future."

All the more important, therefore, to get Acomb's past set down in print.

As Mr Hodgson's book title suggests, that task was originally done by Harold Richardson. Soon after his book was published, in November 1963, more than 260 original documents concerning the manorial courts of Acomb came to light. Mr Richardson took on the task of editing and publishing many of them.

But he died before being able to update his history. So Mr Hodgson took it upon himself to do just that, including evidence from further books of Court Rolls that have since appeared.

He was ideally placed to do so. After retiring from his teaching post at the Mount School, Mr Hodgson began researching the history of Holgate, home to his family for many years, publishing two books on the subject.

Inevitably he came across documents relating to the neighbouring district of Acomb. Encouraged by The York Philosophical Society, he set about writing the new history last year.

It is a thorough, academic and well-presented work, illustrated with many pictures that will evoke memories for older Acomb residents.

Although the explosion in development in Acomb took place in the 20th century, its character had begun to change earlier than that. "The 19th century ushered in the end of Acomb as a village, though that may not have been realised at the time," writes Mr Hodgson.

The coming of the railways made a big impact. In 1854 the North Eastern Railway was created in York. Subsequently what became Leeman Road was developed and the carriageworks set up. As a result, Acomb began to grow. Some of the new arrivals were railway workers, others were those moving to the suburbs to escape the crowded city.

Meanwhile, Acomb was allowed to break free from Great Ouseburn district council under an 1894 Act.

By 1901, Mr Hodgson writes, "Acomb was so enjoying its new found independence that a threat from nearby York was considered to be non-existent..." That was to prove a misjudgement.

The sometimes prickly relations between city and township were coming to the surface. When Acomb asked for York's horse tramway to be extended into the district, its request was rejected. "Twelve years later when it was proposed to extend the electric tramway into Acomb it was met by strong opposition in the township and accordingly the electric trams never came further than the boundary between Holgate and Acomb, near where the Regent Cinema came to be built."

After much gnashing of teeth, Acomb was finally incorporated into York in 1937. Mr Hodgson writes: "The most immediate effect of this absorption was the almost overnight disappearance of working farms from Acomb. There were as many as five on the length of Front Street but, once April 1 1937 dawned, the farmers could be seen driving their animals along its length for fresh fields and pastures new.

"The problem was that grazing land was to disappear under a York City Council housing estate and it was not long before this began to take shape between the east side of Gale Lane and the roundabout which had appeared on Green Lane at its point of intersection with the proposed ring road."

A new shopping centre was also built on the triangle that was the original green. "The shop I remember best was Thrift Stores - Acomb's first move towards the supermarket - but there was also Mr Ogram's fish and chip shop on that part of York Road just east of Cross Street."

Mr Hodgson concludes his work with a chapter on Foxwood. Mr Hodgson is clearly unhappy by the way the way this "remorseless march of roads and houses" has been undertaken. The result, he believes, is the lack of any sense of belonging to the community of Acomb.

Today, Mr Hodgson is part of the Acomb Local History Group. The group, he says, will continue its researches "for people who like looking at the past, not living in the past."

And, despite the great changes, he is sure that "if you look for old Acomb, it's still there".

A History Of Acomb by Geoff Hodgson is published by the author, price £12, and is on sale at the Barbican Bookshop in York. Contact the author on (01904) 738461 for other outlets.

An exhibition tied in with the book is at Acomb Library from today for two weeks.

Mr Hodgson's walking tour of Acomb Churchyard takes place on May 2. Inquire at the library for details.