Todmorden and Pirates

Posted by brian in Our Yorkshire | Villages, Towns and Cities - (0 Comments)

Todmorden is a bustling town on the edge or more correctly the border with that other county. Situated at the meeting point of three steep valleys, Todmorden is an ideal base for walking, mountain biking, bird watching and horse riding. I visited the local tourist information office after leaving the railway station and left with all the information and route maps I could cope with.

International Talk Like A Pirate Day is celebrated on 19th September 2009 in aid of Marie Currie Cancer Care. Look out around Todmorden for swashbuckling parrots, plank-walkers and pirates all after your pieces of eight in a good cause. According to Todmorden List of what’s on ‘If you just want a quick fix, a surface gloss, a “pirate patina,” if you will, here are the five basic words that you cannot live without. Master them, and you can face Talk Like a Pirate Day with a smile on your face and a parrot on your shoulder, if that’s your thing.
• Ahoy! – “Hello!”
• Avast! – Stop and give attention. It can be used in a sense of surprise, “Whoa! Get a load of that!” which today makes it more of a “Check it out” or “No way!” or “Get off!”
• Aye! – “Why yes, I agree most heartily with everything you just said or did.”
• Aye aye! – “I’ll get right on that sir, as soon as my break is over.”
• Arrr! – This one is often confused with arrrgh, which is of course the sound you make when you sit on a belaying pin. “Arrr!” can mean, variously, “yes,” “I agree,” “I’m happy,” “I’m enjoying this beer,” “My team is going to win it all,” “I saw that television show, it sucked!” and “That was a clever remark you or I just made.” And those are just a few of the myriad possibilities of Arrr!’

I will be shivering my timbers with a pint or two of local grog and will probably end up with patches over both eyes. Meanwhile the young ‘Pirates of The Calder’ will be canoeing along the canal towards Hebden Bridge.

Update -

The British version of the successful Swedish political party’ The Pirate Party’  is fielding 9 candidates in the general election on May 6th 2010. As the BBC puts it the pro-internet file sharing Pirate Party  hopes to make waves in the UK on 6 May.  Pirates as MPs,  surely not!

Otley Folk Festival featured the Duncan McFarlane Band and they sang a couple of pirate songs with the Skull and Crossbones waving and the audience singing Yohoho or similar as a chorus.

Todmorden 1875 – Mill Explosion.
A well researched and presented story of a boiler explosion at Lord Brothers Mill Canal Street can be found on Ancestry community site for ‘Todmorden and Walsden’ presented by Dorothy Hargreaves and Linda Briggs. The Halifax Guardian newspaper headlined in January 1875 ‘Dreadful Boiler Explosion at Todmorden’. ‘Six Persons Killed and Many Seriously Injured – Great Destruction of Property’. What I learned from the various reports was the prevailing conditions of small pox and other health problems in a town only a little over 100 years ago. Despite our gripes about the Health and Safety industry and our current NHS I know what era I would prefer to be living in.

Ten Top East Riding Churches

Posted by brian in Our Yorkshire | Yorkshire History and Heritage | Yorkshire Trips and Places - (2 Comments)

  • Beverley’s church of St Mary has a magnificent west front,outstanding porch and splendid tower built around 1530. Some norman remains but essentially an early English church. The woodwork is fantastic on the stalls and misericords. A rare Priests room contains ecclesiastical relics. A focal point for all visits to Beverley.
  • Hedon St Augustine although much reduced from former glory this is still one of the grandest East Riding churches. Imposing black marble grave slab form 13th century and a late 14th century effigy with a beard.


    © Copyright Scott Rimmer and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

  • Flamborough St Oswald has a nineteenth century tower shown in this photograph but a Norman font and chancel-arch
  • Hemingborough St Mary linked to Durham Abbey in 1426.  Architecturally it has a slim spire rising from a thirteenth century tower.
  • Holme on Spalding Moor All Saints has one of the best churchyards in the East Riding’. There is a fine tower, patching to the roof and an eighteenth century porch of note.

    Steve Punter Creative Commons

  • Hull’s Holy Trinity was rebuilt in the 14th century as the town grew It became the largest parish church in England and is now surrounded as can be seen for the photo. Inside and outside there are many monuments and a 14th century effigy in the south transept.
  • Partington St Patrick One of the finest parish churches in England built around 1300-1345. The elegant spire is enclosed with an open gallery like the cresting of a crown. Also includes fine architecture with Jacobean benches, screen and pulpit.

© Copyright Roger Gilbertson and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

  • St Nicholas North Newbold is known as the most complete Norman Church in East Riding and one of the finest in England, was built around 1151. The upper tower, chancel and priest’s vestry were rebuilt in the 15th century. The church has been called the Cathedral of the Wolds. The church has a fine organ.
  • Winstead St German largely rebuilt during the perpendicular period and further restored in the last century. Main features include 15th century glass, medieval monuments and jacobean family chapel. On the floor of the south chapel are ten eighteenth and nineteenth marble tablets to members of the Hildyard family.
  • North Grimston St Nicholas with 13th century coffin lid and statue of St Nicholas above the west window. Remarkable font with primitive figure carvings.
  • Wetwang St Nicholas is a Norman church modified in the 13th century with a tower and transepts. Restoration and modern furnishings in 1902

Research credit to Frank Bottomley and ‘Yorkshire Churches’ and Pevsner

Hull Trucks New Talented Playwright Nick Lane

Posted by brian in Our Yorkshire | Yorkshire Arts & Music - (1 Comments)

Nick Lane has been directing the Christmas Shows at Hull Truck Theatre in both the old and new premises for over 10 years. Recently Nick has continued to develop scripts after his autobiographic, comedy success with ‘My Favourite Summer’.
Nick Lane’s second major comedy ‘Me and Me Dad’   still retains the autobiographical context; ‘When Andy Green’s mum dies, Andy does the decent thing – he takes a month off work and moves back home with his dad to teach him how to cook. Fighting memories – and occasionally each other – and risking the sanity of friends and neighbours, not to mention Andy’s new girlfriend, the pair boil pans, set grills on fire and worse in an attempt to prevent a diet of pickled beetroot and jam sandwiches. Can their relationship survive? Or is this one kitchen nightmare even Gordon Ramsay couldn’t fix?’ Read more in the Yorkshire Post

Nick Lane complete guide to works produced in and around Yorkshire.

Get out to your local theatre more often. The cost is very reasonable compared to a football match or night out at your local restaurant and it beats the telly hands down. In fact why not make a weekend trip to a new venue to see something a bit different like ‘Me and Me Dad’

Yorkshire Independence Movement

Posted by tejvan in Our Yorkshire | Wit and Humour - (22 Comments)

Today the Party for an Independent Yorkshire State (PIYS) made a bold claim to stake complete independence from the UK.

yorkshire

Earlier today, forces loyal to Yorkshire Independence unravelled the Yorkshire White Rose flag over Humberside County Council – reclaiming the East Riding for the Republic of Greater Yorkshire. The flag was unravelled to great rejoicing from the locals.

The New Yorkshire Parliament has already promised:

  • Not to join the EU,
  • Bring back old fashioned weights of lbs, stones and inches
  • Offer free Yorkshire puddings to old age pensioners
  • Remove VAT for flat caps
  • Impose tariff barriers on Southern beer and Lancashire Hot Pot
  • Campaign for Whippet racing and Coal carrying to becoming Olympic sports
  • Make Yorkshire dialect compulsory learning in schools.
  • More controversially have been the plans to build a customs barrier stretching across the Pennines between the Yorkshire and Lancashire border. The Lancastrian independence movement has responded coldly to today’s developments. There was widespread dismay that yet again Yorkshire had beaten Lancashire.
  • But, in Yorkshire, such sentiments were not in evidence. Huge crowds turned out to listen to the new Government. Geoffrey Boycott speaking as the New President of the Republic of Yorkshire said.

“Ey by eck, It’s a grand day to finally have our independence from those Southern fools. Long live Yorkshire!”

Breaking News!!!!

The Yorkshire Independence Party sweep to power in a shock general election victory! – find out what it means for you, your family and your whippets.

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