THE Cleveland Repertory and Stokesley Advertiser was a monthly magazine, published in Stokesley by W Braithwaite from January 1834 to December 1845.

Since it is now a very rare publication, Beryl Turner has transcribed extracts of the news items in a book, which include police intelligence, agriculture, Stokesley races, cricket matches, railways, church and chapel events, inquests, births, marriages, deaths, visitors to Redcar and many more snippets of gossip.

The area covered is centred on Stokesley but includes Stockton, Middlesbrough, Northallerton, Staithes and all villages in Cleveland.

The book will be welcomed by local, family and social historians as well as residents, who will enjoy dipping into the life in an agricultural community in the 1840s. It has 124 pages and costs £8.50 from Stokesley bookshops.

In Stokesley Directories 1793-1901, more than 4,000 names of gentry, residents and tradespeople in Stokesley, taken from 19 directories between those dates, have been listed by year and alphabetically by surname, giving occupations and addresses.

Readers can look up a family name or search for all the weavers or publicans, for example. Historical descriptions of Stokesley in 1823, 1867 and 1901 are included.

This information will save researchers of Stokesley's history many hours searching directories in scattered libraries. Beryl Turner and Chris Stuart have put it all on disk in Microsoft Excel and Word, and it costs £5.

Both publications have been produced on behalf of the Stokesley Local History Study Group, to whom cheques should be made payable.

The book and disc are available by post from Beryl Turner, 19 The Avenue, Stokesley, Middlesbrough TS9 5ET. Add £1.30 postage for the book.