A York family has praised the Evening Press for helping to get back a stolen bike - and some missing homework.

Nick Warlow, of Barmby Avenue, York, had his lifeline stolen when his bike was taken in broad daylight from the back garden.

Only days later his 10-year-old son Corin, a pupil at the York Steiner School, lost a geography project he had spent weeks working on while on a school trip into the city centre.

But, thanks to the Evening Press, local people rallied together to ensure both items were returned to their rightful owners.

Mr Warlow said: "Without the Press I am quite sure we would never have seen either the bike or the project again.

"But as soon as people saw the stories that were printed about the losses they made the effort to get them back to us which, in this day and age, wasn't expected and was certainly very welcome."

Mr Warlow, a kindergarten teacher who works in North Lincolnshire, is without a car and relies on his bike to get into the city centre.A neighbour spotted the thief taking it from his garden.

Following an article in the Evening Press the bike was discovered abandoned by a man who delivered it to Mr Warlow's home.

Corin's project was found in the Impressions Gallery of Photography, in Castlegate, and returned to the boy.

"If the people who returned these things had not seen the stories in the newspaper they would never have known to return them to us," said Mr Warlow.

"I would have been pretty much lost without the bike, and Corin would have lost a lot of work. We are both very grateful that they have been brought back to us."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.