Picture: Joan Foster of Norton, Stockton-on- Tees, sent this picture after seeing last month’s archive picture of the Friarage Hospital nurses from 1986 which featured her daughter, Helen Bate, who now works at Scarborough Hospital.

This picture dates, she thinks, from 1959 and is again of Friarage Hospital nurses at a prize giving day. Mrs Foster is pictured second from left on the back row. Some of the names of the others pictured are Ethel Cousins, Margaret Pascoe, Maureen Kyme, Judith Parker and male nurse Bobby Cooper.

The advertisement featured here appeared in the Darlington and Stockton Times, June 1, 1963.

From this newspaper 50 years ago

The rent strike called by leaders of almost 700 Thirsk RDC council house tenants got underway on Monday when rent collectors called at three of the biggest estates. Out of 294 tenants asked for their rents on the Norby, Queens Gardens and King’s Gardens estates, 66 refused to pay the recently announced increases.

Instead they gave the money to the organisers of the strike so that it could be banked for them. The feeling was that more tenants would have joined the strike but for the possibility of eviction under the council’s minute that tenants four weeks in arrears with their rent would face legal action for the recovery of the house or arrears.

Most people in Thirsk and Sowerby were prepared to talk about one of the biggest controversies the council has had on its hands for sometime; but few people, especially tenants, will add their names to views.

One of the main reasons appears to be that among the tenants themselves, there is some disagreement. The council has, in effect, offered the tenants a rent rebate scheme under which those tenants who show that they cannot afford the new rents will be helped. The tenants leaders’ have rejected the offer out of hand and said that they will oppose the plan more bitterly than they oppose the increases. They claim it would take them back to the days of the means test, and as an alternative demand that the council levy a special threepenny rate over the whole district to avoid the increases.

From this newspaper 100 years ago

In the opening of its new town hall on Saturday Masham witnesses the consummation of an act of generosity such as seldom fallen to the fortunate lot of a town so small. The building, a gracefully designed structure which will add as much to the appearance of the town as to social and public convenience of its people, has been erected out of a sum of £5,000 bequeathed by the first Lord Masham for their benefit, and thus stands as a lasting memorial of one who to the inventive genius which founded a great industry added the public spirit that gave it birth.

The gentlemen who have made such wise use of the bequest are also entitled to the gratitude of the inhabitants.

The present Lord Masham did well to associate with himself in the administration of the trust Mr C F P Edmundson and Mr R Imeson, two of the most experienced and capable men of business to be found in the locality, and the vicar of Masham.

The building, situated in a little square that adjoins the market place, may be truly described as an ornament of the town. Lord Masham, in his speech at the opening ceremony, alluded to the difficulty of placing such a building in a quaint and picturesque old town without its appearing incongruous.

Suffice it to say that all such difficulties have been effectively overcome. Though a prominent building that strikes the eye from the approaches of the town it introduces no jarring note of modernity. It is at once graceful and commanding, yet in charming harmony with its old world surroundings.

Darlington and Stockton Times:

From this newspaper 50 years ago

Barnard Castle Board of Health. At the usual meeting held on Saturday, the following words of undoubted utility were ordered to be proceeded with. The pavement in Thorngate and the Horsemarket is to be repaired, and gutters and channels laid down in King Street. The water course in the Demesne Lane is to be covered and a footpath formed. The south side of the cattle market in Galgate is to be paved during the next three years; and during the discussion on this subject, Mr Cust suggested that a row of trees in the open space opposite the Grove would greatly improve the street.