From this newspaper 100 years ago. - It is hardly creditable to a budding health resort to have to listen to a reproof from the Chief Magistrate of the Bench as to the bad language used in its streets, and yet this is what occurred at Ripon on Wednesday morning. Sulphur water is being brought from Aldfield to cure bodily ailments, but some drastic measures are needed to cure this moral depravity and spirit of lawlessness manifested in particular among the young people - as the Mayor truly said. Something stronger than sulphur water is needed to cleanse the speech of many foul-mouthed people, and the determined action of the police should have a beneficial effect.

From this newspaper 50 years ago. - A few seconds before a runaway lorry crashed into a Darlington butcher's shop window two children were dragged clear. Mrs Ethel Willcox had gone into the shop at the corner of Louisa Street and Eastbourne Road, and outside were her children, one-year-old Barbara in the pram and Katrina, aged two and a half, standing by it. There was a collision between a furniture wagon and a lorry, as a result of which the driver of the lorry was thrown out of the cab, and the lorry ran uncontrolled off the road and into the window of the shop. Mrs Willcox heard the crash and ran out to the children. Though the brake of the pram was on, she dragged it clear, and Mr W Spence, a newsagent of Milton Street, pushed Katrina out of the path of the lorry. Though the shop was full no one was hurt.

From this newspaper 25 years ago. - The nation was stirring itself for the announcement of a general election, Mr Callaghan's postponement of that event came as a shock to many people. Not so Richmond Liberals. They have reason to celebrate the Prime Minister's announcement and it has nothing to do with politics. Their agent Mrs Daphne Ledger, of 21 Oakfields, Middleton Tyas, has just had a baby. She gave birth to a daughter, Helen, at the Duchess of Kent Military Hospital last Wednesday. Prospective Liberal candidate Gerald Hodgson said: "Politically we were all set to go for the election, but Daphne is the main spring of our organisation and we are naturally glad that she will be able to take an active part in the campaign - when it happens."