FROM this newspaper 100 years ago. - A motor car rider, Mr R Armstrong, of Northallerton, complains that farmers are ignorant of the fact that if a rider holds up his hand against a motor car rider, the latter is bound, by law, to stop, and it is the result of this that motors are often stayed, when it is desired they should only go steady, with the further consequence that there is greater difficulty and delay in getting a horse past a working, stationary and evil-smelling machine. Mr Armstrong asks if it would not be advisable to celebrate the New Year for motorists by devising an understood sign to mean 'steady'?

From this newspaper 50 years ago. - Almost deserted 15 minutes to midnight, Ripon Market Place had a crowd nearly 500 strong to greet the New Year. In the light of coloured lamps on the Corporation Christmas tree, they streamed from the two market place ballrooms to join in a seasonable setting scores of others who had turned out for the traditional ceremony. They sang to the strains of Ripon City Band and as the Cathedral bells rang out to acclaim 1954, joined hands to sing Old Lang Syne. The Mayor and Mayoress, Coun and Mrs W M Eccles, watched the celebrations from the Town Hall balcony, overlooking the square.

From this newspaper 25 years ago. - Blizzards, deep snow and drifts of up to 15ft deep have been causing problems for the isolated communities of Upper Teesdale. Many people in Harwood have been cut off from the main road and shops for days. On Tuesday, three farmers' wives struggled through drifts on foot from their Harwood farms to Langdon Beck in order to pick up a much needed monthly food and grocery order from Middleton in Teesdale Co-op. They expected to have to carry the boxes of food themselves back across the drifts but with the help of two co-op workers and four policemen who came up from Barnard Castle in a Land Rover they managed to get the provisions through to the nearest farm. The residents of Harwood express their very grateful thanks to the co-op men and the policemen for their help.