From the Darlington & Stockton Times of July 22, 1871

THE D&S Times of 150 years ago this week was concerned with two topics that still hog the headlines to this day.

The lead letter was about taking the knee – before God, rather than before football matches. An anonymous correspondent railed against the disgraceful way modern people lounged forward onto the edge of their seats and held the back of the pew in front, rather than go the whole hog and lower their knees on the kneeler in front of them. “I call it a very clumsy apology” for kneeling, he said.

The editorial was headlined “the irrepressible anti-vaccinationists”, in which it took to task the Darlington branch of the Anti-Vaccination League for spreading disinformation about the efficacy of the smallpox vaccine.

The vaccine had recently become compulsory with parents being prosecuted for not vaccinating their infants.

That very week, the D&S reported a mild outbreak in Barnard Castle, where one man had died, and its editorial concluded: “If science is worthy anything, it conclusively demonstrates that vaccination is one of the most effective safeguards of society, and whether the anti-vaccinationists care having smallpox or not, we cannot suffer them to be centres of infection wherever they may abide.

“We lock up madman and criminals – we cannot suffer fatuous persons who seem to care less for their neighbours than their own silly crotchets to injure us with impunity.”