Four trees planted by Sue Prytherick seemed to be settling in well when I looked around the village green at Barningham this week

. These are in place of specimens which were due to be put in a year ago but failed to arrive from Holland. The foursome - a walnut, English oak, American oak and American maple - have been paid for by a generous but anonymous man who works in Teesdale. When they were ordered last year they went missing en route from Amsterdam.

They eventually turned up in Germany, but, by that time, the planting season was over and this different set had to be booked.

They are part of a project which included restoring the historic fountain on the village green, and that now looks extremely pleasant. Mrs Prytherick, secretary of the fountain project, says the trees will be mature when two others which are well known landmarks on the green, a sycamore and chestnut, are nearing the end of their life in about 50 years' time. How's that for long-term forward planning?

The village hall which overlooks the green has also been in the news for a scheme to have a stained glass window installed. It was built in 1875 as a National School, and was paid for by the family of Lady Augusta Henrietta Milbank as a memorial to her love of the parish and its people.

Mention here lately of Dr John Neville led to a call from Arnold Smith, a long-serving Evenwood member of Teesdale District Council.

He recalled that some years ago when he was on the parish council a name was needed for a new group of houses. "I had just been reading about the wealthy Neville family who were powerful in this area centuries ago, and felt it might be a suitable name," he said.

"Then I thought about John Neville, who had been an excellent and much-loved doctor for a long time in the village, and felt the houses should be named as a memorial to him." His idea was quickly accepted by other parish members and that it why the attractive small estate is now known as Neville Court.

A faded booklet which turned up the other day tells the story of Bobby Wrangham, surely one of the most remarkable postmen who ever pushed mail through letterboxes in Teesdale.

He went all over the area on foot to deliver letters and parcels for a small fee from the 1820s onwards. He trotted everywhere at an astonishing speed, completing local routes in the morning then running to Bishop Auckland, Darlington or Kirkby Stephen after lunch and getting back in time for some evening work.

It was recorded that he was passing through Winston one day on his way back to Barnard Castle when the horse-drawn coach service operated by Joseph Fawcett caught up with him. He was offered a lift but said he was in too much of a hurry to accept.

He ran straight on, while the coach had to divert to Staindrop and other points to set down and pick up passengers - and of course he reached the town well before it. Bobby, who also served as an Army volunteer each summer until well past the normal retiring age, kept on delivering until the winter of 1849, when at the age of 70 he took a parcel to Brough.

He got lost in a fierce blizzard on the way back over Stainmore, and was found dead in the snow, a few feet off the road, the next day. Friends said it was the sort of end he would have chosen for himself.

* I'll be glad to see anyone who calls with snippets of news at The Northern Echo office at 36 Horsemarket, Barnard Castle, on Mondays and Tuesdays, telephone (01833) 638628.