A MAN’S relationship with his shed or his attic is an extremely special one.

It is where he stores all the things that are of interest to him. It is where he spends his time ruminating on the meaning of those things. It is where he goes to escape the dreaded words of his wife: “Why don’t you clear up that mess and throw away that rubbish?”

Echo Memories has been privileged to visit a very special shed in the Richmond area, jam-packed with what some would consider junk but others might well consider to be fascinating relics of the past.

We have promised not to shed any light on the identity of our shed-owner, but what a shed it was, full of receipts, old pulleys, old signs, even the remains of the cot in which he was first laid.

Just inside the shed door was a knee-high stoneware flagon, with “WJ Dixon, wine and spirit merchant, Darlington”

pressed into the clay when wet. Up in the ceiling’s cobwebs was a row of glass codds bottles, marbles intact, which once belonged to Carter Bros of Barnard Castle and the Bishop Blaize pub in Richmond.

Three items caught our eye:

A NEOLITHIC AXE HEAD

“I was just walking one day on an old route between Dalton and Gayles, between Richmond and Barnard Castle, and saw it lying there, so I picked it up,” said our man in the shed.

A Durham University archaeologist has identified it as a good specimen of an axe head made in the Neolithic period – between 10,000BC and 2,000BC – of a rock from north-west Ireland. Originally it would have been polished smooth, but it has weathered over the centuries.

A ROMAN THROWING STONE

“My father showed me this in a garden in Dalton when I was small, and then I saw a programme on the Discovery channel showing Romans with a large pile of stones to throw at their enemies, so I went back and got it,” said the man in the shed.

It is indeed an intriguing item, beautifully rounded and smooth. And the Romans did fashion throwing stones, either for hand propulsion or for firing out of a sling. In fact, in the British Museum are a couple of Greek stones made for throwing. They have messages on the side: “Catch” or “Take That”. Gary Barlow is believed to have been inspired by such a throwing stone…

A 19th CENTURY PUNNER

If we are honest, we were sceptical when a punner was produced from the back of the shed. “I found it in an old builder’s yard off North Road in Darlington,” he said. “It is a 19th Century road-builder’s punner.”

But he’s absolutely right.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a punner is “a tool used for punning, or ramming, something down”.

As an example, the dictionary quotes from FW Simms’ indispensable book published in 1844, Practical Tunnelling: “The space is rammed solid with earth by a man…using a long-handled punner.”

Punner is supposed to be from the verb “to pound”, and the pounder in our man’s shed is made of wood, with two wooden handles, and two iron rings around it to hold it together.

Only in a shed could you find such items as a 150-yearold punner, a 2,000-year-old stone and an axehead fashioned by human hand 5,000, 6,000 or more years ago. It was a pleasure to handle the treasures of the shed.

YESTERDAY Belongs To You is the title of an biannual exhibition put together by all the local and family history and heritage societies, associations and organisations in County Durham.

It acts as an introduction for the public to all the many and extremely varied societies that delve into the past in the county, researching it and conserving it as they go.

The last event, at Locomotion: The National Railway Museum at Shildon, in 2011, attracted more than 1,200 people.

Yesterday Belongs to You was run by the county council but this year it has been taken on by the brave volunteers of the County Durham History and Heritage Forum.

It is to be held on May 18 in Durham County Hall. So far, 40 local societies have signed up to take at least one table each, and the door is still open for anyone else who wants to be involved.

Tables are £15 for non-profit groups and £35 for commercial enterprises, like postcard dealers and family history software sellers.

Inquiries to YB2U2013@ gmail.com or check out the Forum website at durham web.org.uk/historyforum FERRYHILL on Film is the title of a special meeting of Ferryhill History Society on January 30.

David Parsons, from the Northern Region Film and Television Archive, Teesside University, will show old films about life in Ferryhill and the Durham Miners’ Gala, including 1950s footage of Norman Cornish, Nye Bevan and Hugh Gaitskell.

One film will show Sam Watson of the Durham Miners’ Association unveiling the Dean and Chapter Colliery banner in Ferryhill Market Place in about 1951. This was filmed by Edward Roberts, the Durham County Inspector of Schools who had been headmaster at Broom School, Ferryhill.

All are welcome to the meeting in the Eldon Arms, Ferryhill Station, at 7.30pm. Admission is £1.