Saturday, June 12, 2004

100 years ago: Columnist TT was stuck in a railway carriage with an opinionated gentleman, who interrupted his reading of Punch to suggest he had a better idea of how to run a seaside resort than Scarborough Corporation did. His first change would be to cover the castle with fairy lights, as it would look "sweet", and having missed the sarcasm of TT's suggestion of painting the walls too, agreed it was a good idea but it would be too expensive to carry out. The gentleman did suggest instead a tea room on the battlements as a draw for the crowds, but TT thought people who appreciated the town's natural beauty would be driven elsewhere by such tawdriness.

50 years ago: The Chief Constable's annual report for York was issued, full of facts and figures about the force. However, rather than being crime statistics, it carried a different set of numbers. The average policeman in the city was just half an inch short of being a six-footer; his average age was 35 years, nine months; and his length of service 12 years, six months. Miss Average Policewoman was aged 30 years, ten months; was 5ft 7in tall; and had been wearing blue for four years, five months. The report continued that there were 168 members of the City Force, one for every 630 of the population. "Generally speaking," wrote the Chief Constable, "we are fortunate in having sufficient applications to meet our immediate requirements. But this may not be so next year when the number of resignations is likely to increase." Conditions of service, although better than ever before, were still not attractive enough to encourage men "of the right type" to apply for appointment as constables, he added.

25 years ago: Scarborough Dutch Week brought more than 100 folk dancers, musicians, majorettes and bandsmen to the town, who launched the resort's 21st annual Continental Festival with a concert before nearly 3,000 people in the Spa Grand Hall. They would be performing all week in Scarborough, Whitby and Filey, and were counted amongst the highlights of the week alongside the Carnival Procession of more than 100 floats.

Updated: 16:23 Friday, June 11, 2004