Category: Roseberry Topping
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4th February, 1921: Redundancies at Roseberry Ironstone Mine
His day began long before any sensible person would even consider waking. At 4:30 in the morning, he and his wife dragged themselves from their bed, greeted not by comfort but by the biting cold. The morning’s first ordeal was the outhouse—an unenviable journey in deep winter, where snow, ice, and the ever-present risk of…
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Slippery Paths and Roseberry’s Summerhouse
A supposedly “gentler” path to the top of Roseberry Topping winds up the southern side from the Summerhouse Field. After last night’s heavy rain, the path has become a veritable death trap, with these walkers wisely prefering the rough grass for better footing. Ascending it is manageable, but descending? Practically suicidal. Avoiding the path might…
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Burns Night: Tartan, Haggis, and a Global Legacy
Ah, Burn’s Night, that annual spectacle of tartan-wrapped sentimentality when the Scots remind everyone of their heritage. Beyond haggis, neeps, and tatties, there is, of course, The Address itself: Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face, Great Chieftain o’ the Puddin-race! Perhaps not Robert Burns’s maximum opus for surely that superlative must go to ‘Auld Lang…
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Cleopatra’s Needle and its Tenuous Connection to the North Riding
Let us journey back to this day, 21st January in 1878, to Gravesend, Kent. Imagine the children, thrilled to avoid school, lining the Thames estuary to witness the grand arrival of Cleopatra’s Needle. This 3,500-year-old, 224-ton, 21-metre-high granite obelisk had been towed from Alexandria to London in a cumbersome iron vessel shaped like a cylinder.…
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Flocking Together: Hebridean Sheep and Sheepdog Training
I heard, through the ever-reliable grapevine, that this small flock of Hebridean sheep at Aireyholme Farm is being used to train a young sheepdog. Predictably, just before this photo was taken, the dog had had its lesson, and the sheep were beginning to calm down. Hebridean sheep are apparently the darlings of the sheepdog training…
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The Light: Conspiracy Bile Delivered Direct to Your Letterbox
There I was, about to embark on my virtuous trek up Roseberry Topping, coat in hand, when a free newspaper crashed through the letterbox like an unwelcome guest. A relic of a bygone era, I thought, since such things had ceased to grace my street years ago. Still, the design carried a whiff of credibility,…
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An Unofficial Path Gets Official Attention
Ah, one for the history books. Last year, the main path up Roseberry’s eastern flank was given a facelift, and now it is this desire path’s turn. The one by the fence that skirts the hill’s south-east side, linking the Cleveland Way with the Folly Field. The upgrade might happen this year, or perhaps next—what…
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Tudor Christmas: Twelve Days of Saints and Swans
Up at an unholy hour to climb up Roseberry Topping and watch the sunrise. We were not alone. The place was packed, because apparently nothing says “Christmas spirit” like elbowing strangers on a hilltop. In Tudor times, you would not have found the masses up here. They would have been at Mass, fulfilling their religious…
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A Slog up Roseberry Topping and a Nod to Pagan Roots
I could claim it was a brisk dash up Roseberry Topping this morning, but in truth, it was more of a plodding trudge. Perhaps it only felt that way because I foolishly dressed for winter, not realising it would be unseasonably warm for Christmas Eve. This is the view from the summit, looking down on…
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A’ Thomasing: A Quaint Custom for St. Thomas Day
Yesterday was St. Thomas Eve, or so I gather from the indisputable evidence of my own post about it. Naturally, this means today, 21 December, must be St. Thomas Day—a grand occasion for destitute medieval widows, who marked the day by going “a’ Thomasing.” That is, begging for alms. In some places, it was called…