Harping on about old Bishop, getting sosed with Tot Blair, and the derivation of Jeep

Despite the pub's dereliction, the picture appealed to Gavin Bake because his ancestors ran it more than a century ago.

The pub was in the Clayton Street/Grainger Street area of Bishop, behind what is now the Newgate Centre. It was built in mid-Victorian times, and from the 1880s it was owned by Baxter's Brewery of Leeds, and Patrick Flynn ran it as a beerhouse. He also had an experimental photography business in his back yard – Gavin has several of Mr Flynn's pictures of his relatives, the Thompsons, who lived nearby in Saddler Street.

The Thompsons married into the Snowball family, and for decades until after the Second World War, William and Mary Snowball ran the Harp Inn. They had nine sons, who all played amateur football – in fact, in 1945, the Evening Despatch newspaper said that if they fielded William, they would only need to sign one more player to complete an eleven.

However, as William was 94 when the Despatch article was published, it is likely that his youthful turn of pace would have deserted him.

If you have any information about the Harp Inn or the Snowball family, Gavin would love to hear from you. Please email him: gav.bake@gmail.com.

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MEMORIES 201 contained the brilliant photograph of the wedding of Annie Blair and Thirkell Douglas Dougill, a Haughton-le-Skerne couple who married on June 1, 1921.

The Blair side of this marriage is related to Robin Blair, the former Darlington Citizen of the Year whose family have run their greengrocers stall in the Covered Market for 140 years.

The best man, he points out, was Thomas "Tot" Blair, who was quite a character in the area into the 1950s.

Tot had a milk round, his cart pulled by a horse, and he would go round the district ladling out a gill or a pint of milk as his customers demanded.

Once he had sold out, he would begin to wend his way home to Great Burdon, calling in at the baker's for some cream cakes, and than at the Highland Laddie for some liquid refreshment.

"After he had had a few, he would sose in the cart," says Robin, using a fascinating south Durham word which we think can also be pronounced sowse and which obviously means "to fall dead drunk".

Robin continues: "When the horse felt him sose in the cart, it would automatically take him back to Burdon.

"Tot would sose on the cream cakes that he had bought."

On the other side of aisle at that wedding were the relations of Darlington landscape architect Ian Dougill. "All Dougills come from Nidderdale," he says, "and they were stonemasons and builders right back to the 15th Century when they provided stone for Fountains Abbey.

"The Haughton Dougills built the Hurworth Moor mansion and the Imperial Hotel, on the corner of Coniscliffe Road, and my uncle, who was mayor of Darlington, built the Odeon cinema in High Northgate and Doggarts' art deco department store in Northgate."

Dougills are one of the families who are named after North Yorkshire ravines, or gills. The others include Pickersgills, Scargills and Hugills.

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MEMORIES 201 also took a journey by Jeep, but it was a dangerous journey because it included a throwaway line stolen from Wikipedia. We said: "A Jeep is a Jeep because originally it was called a Ford GP. The G stood for government, as the US government ordered the vehicles, and the P indicated it was a passenger vehicle. GP soon became Jeep."

Many people threw the throwaway line back in our faces, but no one with more detail than Dave Middlemas.

"The origin of Jeep is widely speculated and argued among the world of military vehicle enthusiasts – and I think its fair to say that the jury is still out," he says.

"Bantam, Willys and Ford all initially competed for the US Goverment contract to build an army passenger vehicle," he says. "Initially, the Bantam Reconnaissance Car won, but only about 2,500 were built before it became apparent that the company was just not big enough to provide the numbers needed.

"The contract was given over to Willys Overland which changed the design slightly, added its own ‘Go Devil’ engine and produced 350,000 Willys MB (Military model B) jeeps – these are essentially the Second World War jeeps that we all know.

"But after a few months, it became apparent Willys could not meet the 75 vehicles a day target and Ford was called in to assist, being awarded a contract to produce exactly the same model. Ford made about 250,000 jeeps which were called the Ford GPW (‘Government’; factory chassis designation ‘P’ for 80 inches; licensed by Willys).

"Another theory is that the name comes from a popular Popeye cartoon character at the time: Eugene the Jeep, who could go anywhere and anyhow!

"Perhaps the most likely theory is that the US Army nomenclature was also GP – as in General Purpose. This same nomenclature has also since seen the naming of the ‘Humvee’ (from High Mobility Multi-Purpose Wheeled Vehicle).

"Either way, Willys Overland formally filed a trademark claim for the term ‘Jeep’ after the war. It continued to make Jeeps for the military and civilian market – entitled ‘CJ’ for Civilian Jeep – although MB/GPW models ceased production in 1945."

During the Second World War, the Americans gave many jeeps to friendly countries to assist their war efforts, and at the end of the war, when the Americans went home, they left many jeeps in Europe. Consequently, there are still a lot about.

"The North-East jeep scene is quite healthy, partly because of the efforts of colourful Darlington businessman Bob Isles. Sadly, Bob died a few years ago, but in the 1980s he imported decommissioned French army jeeps by the wagonload to his yard on Albert Hill. I remember visiting as teenager and being fascinated by the jeeps.

"I eventually purchased a French army jeep from a seller in Nottingham in 2001, and was pleased to note that its 1980s official ‘Domaines’ release document stated that the initial civilian purchaser was indeed Monsieur Bob Isles from Darlington."

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MEMORIES 194 included pictures from the Teesdale villages between Staindrop and Darlington, and it waxed lyrical over the name of Wackerfield – "one of the greatest names of any hamlet", we said.

Wackerfield could either come from a field renowned for its wicker, or from a field in which wakes and fairs were traditionally held, or from a field owned by an Anglo-Saxon called Waca.

Ralph Hodgson from nearby Ingleton says that in the 1901 census Waca's hamlet was mistakenly called Walkerfield, and Mr Hodgson has an Edwardian postcard which continues the mistake (there doesn't appear to be a Walkerfield anywhere in Britain).

Another of the pictures in that From the Archive showed Ingleton in 1973 when villagers were raising money for two bus shelters and some streetlighting.

There were whist drives, dances, bric-a-brac stalls and coconut shies. "There was a guess the weight of a farm animal competition, guess how far it was from the road to a farm, and guess the height of the house end," he says, "and clay was brought from a building site in Darlington to make two claypits for quoits."

Although everyone was very pleased with their fund-raising efforts, all eight of the villagers' streetlights were erected in Gainford Road when the intention was to install just two with one on the corner and the other five in Front Street. "It was too late when the mistake was found and it was going to cost too much to move them," says Mr Hodgson.

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THE front cover of Memories 199 confused Steve Shields because it included an old picture of a little chap in a railwayman's hat blowing a whistle and waving a flag. The little chap was showing the way to the article inside about the family gala day at the Head of Steam museum in Darlington, and it did not name the little chap with the flag.

"I was the signalling manager at Teesside in 1993 for British Rail and was approached by the Northallerton and District Round Table to see if it was possible to make a little boy's dream come true," says Steve. These, of course, were innocent days when a certain person on the television fixed it for hopeful youngsters.

"The boy's dream was to be a signalman for a day at the signalbox at Low Gates in Northallerton, and I agreed. The little boy's name was James Mortimer of Ainderby Steeple, and The Northern Echo took a picture of him with me and the signalman, Derek Jones.

"I wonder where this little chap is now."