THE GREAT NORTH ROAD: A Guide for the Curious Traveller by Frank Goddard (Frances Lincoln, £14.99): THE name is rarely used these days. But 50 years ago, journeys to and from the North were as likely to be on the "Great North Road" as on the "A1".

Holiday-bound in the late 1940s and early 1950s, your reviewer was always thrilled to be informed by his father, at the wheel of a pre-war Singer: "We're on the Great North Road now". What an adventure, to be travelling along the most famous highway in the land, even if, at that time, its traffic was so light that my father, on the straight stretch beside Dishforth airfield, once kept level for a good half mile with a lone racing cyclist, while I bawled the rider's speed (top 28mph) through a rear window.

At that time, of course, the A1 (sorry, the Great North Road) wended its way through the scores of towns and villages now bypassed by the A1(M). For millions, it was the introduction to the world beyond their native patch.

Retired Leeds deputy head teacher Frank Goddard has a strong sense of the romance, yes the romance, of what he rightly calls "one of the most celebrated routes in the world". Not a little of its fame stems from that emphatic name - a title which, as Frank says, "has the ring of history about it... redolent of Romans and robbers, coaches and highwaymen".

An admirer - a disciple, in truth - of Alfred Wainwright, Frank has done for the Great North Road what Wainwright did for the Lakeland fells: composed a virtual love letter to it, in the exact handwritten style of Wainwright, adorned with pen and ink drawings that could be by the master, and, of course, including the inevitable maps - but of roads, not footpaths.

Where Wainwright rounded off his love letter by choosing his six favourite fells, Frank completes his confessed "labour of love" by selecting his half-dozen favourite GNR towns. Three, Durham, Alnwick and Berwick, are in the North-East. And though Frank's Yorkshire stamping ground doesn't provide even one, the Broad Acres figure prominently, not least because Frank doubles-up through the county, profiling much of the Old North Road, possibly older than the Great North, which ran via York, Thirsk and Northallerton.

"At any point in history," Frank explains, "the line of the Great North Road would show differences and variations". That the road linked London and Edinburgh we all know. But Frank reveals: "The Great North Road was never simply a link between capital cities". More particularly, and especially from the 17th century onwards, it aimed to adopt the most direct line between the postal centres in London and Edinburgh. Surprisingly, these still mark the A1's start and finish, although, as Frank notes, it is today impossible to buy a stamp at either end.

Frank has freshly covered the route and explored its environs beyond the slipways and service stations. Yorkshire places embraced by his travels include Richmond, Ripon, Bedale - and Bolton-on-Swale. Drawn to its graveyard, like many before him, by the monument to the long-lived Henry Jenkins, he typically comes up with a discovery of his own: "Look for the modern musical memorial to Gerry Widd (d. 22-12-1996)".

Kirby Hill, near Boroughbridge, was once the midway point between London and Edinburgh, and in the cellar of its Blue Bell Inn Frank found wall rings to which prisoners were tethered overnight. But Frank was captivated by his discoveries a little further north.

"An interesting collection of villages is divided by the Great North Road hereabouts," he writes. "We have spent quite a few satisfying summer afternoons pottering about along these byways not far from home. So, Wath, Kirklington, Skipton-on-Swale and Pickhill ("a charming place") share a page with the two Baldersbys, which are further honoured with a drawing of the slender, landmark tower of their parish church.

North of the Tees, Frank salutes such uncelebrated spots as Sunderland Bridge - "neat, well-kept, a delight to the discerning eye"- and Aycliffe, where the floral display on the green caught his appreciative eye. "If you pass this way in summer, enjoy it while you may," he urges, before, on the next page, filling what he calls "an odd corner" with a cameo of the Ketton Ox - pure Wainwright.

Darlington wins praise as "a pleasant and compact town with much to see," and Frank's North-East illustrations range from the toll house on Blackwell Bridge and Locomotion No 1, via the Lambton Worm and Penshaw Monument, to the Angel and the Millennium Bridge. Very interestingly Frank makes the point that while, generally, motorways obliterate character, "it took a motorway to reveal the truth" about Co Durham - that it was badly represented by what was seen from the former A1.

"The A1(M) cuts through a wide green landscape... The built-up ribbon remains, but it now seems cleaner... The towns and villages are learning to assume fresh identities..."

There have been other books, though too few, on the Great North Road. Highly personal, yet still doing justice to the essential history, Frank's makes a timely appearance as the stirring name is in danger of falling into disuse. Even "A1" and "A1(M)" might be destined for oblivion.

Frank observes: "As I write, the daily paper informs me that the A1 is to be Europeanised (can there really be such a word) as the EW15 which will connect Edinburgh with Gibraltar. Not in this book... London to Edinburgh will always be the Great North Road."

Amen to that. And surely every reader of Frank's book, of which there deserve to be many, will say the same.

Published: 03/05/2005