IN the Teesdale Mercury, it is readily conceded, there are few stories to shift the dear old Earth upon its axis.

Every Wednesday the paper celebrates items like the best dressed banana competition (Bowes WI), the favourite piece of wallpaper competition (Piercebridge WI) and the alarm over the Beast of Barney.

Reputedly a black puma, the beast proved to be a pub dog - though the dog did its fearsome best, by enthusiastically answering to Zeus.

It is no doubt because they discern a kindred spirit, therefore, that the Mercury has sent its anthology of Teesdale life in 2002, captivatingly compiled by our old friend Jon Smith.

Once on the Echo, Jon is now senior journalism lecturer at Darlington College, holiday relief editor at the Mercury and wears several other hats, too. The advertisement for "Smithy's, Ladies' and Gent's Hair Stylist" may be someone else, however.

Classifieds in 2002 have included the "For sale" ad for the sheep dog frightened of sheep - as Gadfly noted a couple of months back - and another appealing for the person who stole a dead ginger tom from Cotherstone kindly to contact the owner.

Jon also liked the headline on the paragraph about police closing West Auckland green after a fight among 100 mourners at a funeral - "To the death", it said - though they may have missed an opportunity in Cockfield, where the bairns discovered that a magnet could turn the recently installed street lights on and off.

A new attraction, perhaps - except that a parish councilor reckoned they'd been up to that old standard since he was a nipper.

The street lights, incidentally, were paid for by local county councillor John Priestley out of his attendance allowances. There may be earth shattering news after all.

LIKE us all, the Mercury appreciates its letter writers - though other readers may not always feel so warmly disposed.

A check with the chap who modulates Hear All Sides suggests that Ernie Reynolds from Wheatley Hill is the Echo's most prolific correspondent, followed by Hugh Pender from Darlington.

In Teesdale they have the insatiable Alan Byde, though not all that Bydeversity sees the light. One rejected letter had 1,364 words - someone counted? - beginning "I get carried away with the exuberance of my own verbosity."

Announcing that it had been spiked, or at best would have to be serialised over several months, Mercury editor George Nicholson offered to send a copy to anyone interested - prompting Barnard Castle dentist Barry Parker to offer £1 to charity for every one requested. It cost the tooth fairy dearly.

Another reader, amazed to find himself in agreement with one of the myriad missives, suggested forming Friends of Alan Byde - or FAB, for short.

"I expect it to be small and select," he added.

Mr Byde, who looks a bit like radio presenter Alan Wright, lived formerly in Middleton-in-Teesdale where once the column found him up the creek without a paddle whilst trying to start a canoe-making business.

These days, however, it may not even be said - as it was in St Matthew's gospel - that a prophet is not without honour, save in his own country. Though still raising temperatures in the Mercury, he lives 12,000 miles away in New Zealand.

l Jon Smith and Teesdale vet emeritus Neville Turner will be signing copies of the Mercury's "Chronicle of the Year 2000" in Ottakar's, Darlington, on Saturday morning. Available otherwise from the Mercury, (01833) 637140.

NO correspondents surpass Gadfly's, though Bob Friend in Weardale heads his e-mail "A voice from the past."

For one thing he wishes to point out that last week's column misspelt bulrushes - verily a reed shaken with the wind - and for another to draw attention to our use of the originally Muslim word "mufti" when discussing moves to allow Church of England clergy to dress down for services.

"In these days of high profile Islamic activity, fatwahs and so forth," says Bob genially, "do you think it was a prudent choice of word in connection with Christian ministers?"

THEN there's an email from Barry Wood, a former Bishop Auckland polliss, who's had a fire safety leaflet from Darlington and Durham County Fire and Rescue Brigade.

Under the sub-heading "If fire starts" it urges: "Get everyone out of the house, closing doors if safe to do so. Get the fire brigade out and stay outside."

Get the fire brigade out? Wouldn't it be better to get them in, asks Barry. And if they need getting out, what were they doing in there in the first place? THERE'S also a letter from the editor of Collins Dictionary, seeking readers' help to include "regional English terms" in his next edition. It's an attempt, he says, to turn the tide of estuary English "The words and phrases we are looking for are the sort that incomers and visitors to your region would encounter and wouldn't understand."

What then of "dakka", exhumed at a gathering of Shildon lads last Sunday and once in common usage thereabouts? Now it's probably confused with Decca, the record company which in February 1962 turned down a mop haired foursome called the Beatles, or Dacca, the capital of Bangladesh.

Dakka is an adjective meaning very good. Dead dakka means very, very good. The column would welcome any opinions on dakka's etymology and parentage; Collins Dictionary - paige.weberharpercollins.co.uk - can for the moment have the rest.

...and finally to Don Wilson in Durham, another of the Golden Treasury of Irregular Correspondents. (The regulars, it should swiftly be added, are no less richly valued.) Born in West Auckland, retired teacher, Don has over the years offered everything from the longest word in which no letter appears more than once - ambidextrously - to the word with the most different meanings.

"Set" has ten, "order" 11.

Sometimes writing on Marilyn Monroe postcards, he has been invaluable on boys' comic characters like Wilson of the Wizard, no relation, and Alf Tupper, the Tough of the Track and proved a global authority on West Auckland's World Cup wins in 1909 and 1911.

He is also a bit of a film buff and a hoarder of collective nouns - a blindness of refs, a fumble of goalkeepers, a stand of umpires and a spin of slow bowlers were suggested as far back as 1995.

It was therefore no surprise whatever to learn that Durham's triumphant University Challenge team can't win the weekly quiz at the Elm Tree. The Elm Tree quiz is set by the near-omniscient Don Wilson.

Published: 04/12/2002