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Woke Showdown: National Trust vs. Restore Trust
Ah, Roseberry Topping, Yorkshire’s Matterhorn, one of those many places the National Trust looks after. Now, in 2020, the Trust issued a report, a bit of a mouthful, called ‘Addressing our histories of colonialism and historic slavery.‘ They wanted to tell about how their 93 historic houses are tied up with the British Empire, the…
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The Crags of White Hill: Evidence of a 1872 Landslip
A brisk autumn morning but with a subtle nip in the roriferous air, though the temperature would soon be rising. A warm day beckoned. Meanwhile, 377,000 kilometres away, the moon hangs in the morning sky, as is often the case during its waning gibbous phase, when it transitions from full to half. Down below on…
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Cheese, Stones, and a Summer Solstice Alignment
I’ve been diving back into that book, “Rock Art and Ritual,” the one I got off eBay a few weeks back. It’s been giving me the itch to go revisit some of the out of the way nooks and crannies on the North York Moors. So today, I took a little jaunt around Urra Moor,…
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The Cairn, the Schoolboy and the Vulpicide Outrage of 1903
A rickety cairn, perched precariously over Baysdale. I was told by a onetime resident of the dale that the cairn was built by Roland Close, an estate worker and archaeologist, who was brought up in Shepherd’s House, which can be seen in the distance. Close would walk this way to school in Kildale. A curious report…
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On this day in 1804: Jane Ewbank’s Journey to Whitby
Hardly a week goes by without news of some historical document being digitised. Recently, a diary of a lady named Jane Ewbank who lived in York during the time of the Napoleonic Wars has been published. Jane was born in 1778, and her father, George Ewbank, was a well-known druggist and banker in York. He…
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Benchmark on Kildale Moor
I unexpectedly stumbled upon this benchmark a week ago. And yesterday, seeking a breather after a gruelling climb from Hob Hole, I concealed my bike amidst the heather, then ambled a couple hundred metres to revisit it. The mark, showing little sign of erosion, distinctly directs attention to a notch atop the boulder. Clearly an…
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Vandalised Legacy: The Tale of Beggar’s Bridge
A stroll down to Beggar’s Bridge to take a gander at the scene of recent vandalism that had struck the 17th-century packhorse bridge. News of the damage, likely inflicted by a sneaky hand wielding a Stihl saw, has cast doubt over the bridge’s future. The old structure, standing for 400 years, now bears the scars…
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Boom and Bust: Glaisdale’s Brief Ironstone Mining Era
Back in 1831, Glaisdale was a mere township within the parish of Danby. But, by the end of the century, Glaisdale was a parish in its own right. The village, though, pretty much developed as a mining community, which began around the mid-1860s, and by the end of that decade an ironworks had been built.…
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27th April 1979 — A Tragic Day in Lealholm
A tear in the clouds allowed a ray of sun to grace Lealholm Side, a hamlet perched a few hundred metres above the main village of Lealholm in the Esk valley. Back on Friday 27th April 1979, the village was buzzing with activity. The school had full attendance, its corridors echoing with youthful enthusiasm. Around…
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The Nine Stones of Thimbleby Moor
Isn’t it funny how when you haven’t been to a place for months, you seem to end up going there over and over again? This is now the third time in just a few weeks that I’ve ended up around Thimbleby Moor. This time, I took a different route, coming via the Hanging Stone after…
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