100 years ago

The constabulary of Sussex were agitated by their new chief’s intimation that many of them exhibited an excess of adipose tissue.

Hitherto we had always felt, with the Queen of the Fairies in Iolanthe, that “stoutness in moderation” was not out of place in the figure of a rural policeman. His comfortable curves harmonised with the contour of a rolling downland better than would the lanky outline of the obvious athlete. The Sussex men were of opinion that their new chief, who came from Wales, had not yet realised the fattening propensities of the southern atmosphere.

If the force gave a little attention to its dumb-bells and the Chief Constable thrived in his new command, the two sides would possibly meet halfway. In York to date, no ban had been placed on the development of adipose tissue.

50 years ago

The journey made by Bonnie Prince Charlie from the time of his landing in the Hebrides to his march down to Derby and his retreat in 1745, had been brought to life by Miss Nancy Ridley when she spoke to members of the York Women’s Luncheon Club.

Miss Ridley was an authority on history and spent most of her time lecturing on this subject, particularly on the Stuart and Tudor periods. Miss Ridley had made the journey following that completed by Bonnie Prince Charlie and his followers. It had taken three years, during which Miss Ridley had tried to find out to the best of her ability what Bonnie Prince Charlie was like.

Miss Ridley said she could not believe that all the locks of hair shown in Scotland as belonging to Prince Charlie had belonged to him. “Otherwise he had an awful lot of hair. Some are genuine, but some are just to attract the tourists.”

25 years ago

If you were additive conscious when shopping – and there was evidence to show that more and more people were looking at labels before they bought – there was a little test to see how well you had done your E numbers homework.

What could you buy that contained water, sugar, cellulose, flavour enhancer monosodium glutamate, colours E160(a), E160(d), E101, antioxidant E300, plant acids and flavourings? And would you eat it? Probably... because, according to Sainsbury’s, the sum total of all those nasty sounding constituents was the humble and nutritious tomato. The information came from the latest in the supermarket firm’s Living Today leaflets, called Facts About Food Additives.

The point they were making, of course, was that the additive panic had got out of hand. There were plenty of natural additives and preservatives that could be added to our foods without causing concern.