By Geoffrey Dagg, Donald Clegg and Clive Dalton Falstone Today’s small village of Falstone at the top of the North Tyne valley and at the foot of the Kielder dam, was a much larger and busier place before the 1914-18 war than it is today. Photos of the local school before 1914 show over 50 pupils, … Read more
Strange but true By Donald Clegg 2012 Aa was workin’ in the garden, Aa remember varry plain ‘Cos it was the only day this yeor when it hadn’t poured wi’ rain. Aa cut the grass and forked the beds, howked weeds ‘til aal was tame, Pruned bushes, sorted oot the shed…….and then the midgies came! … Read more
By Clive Dalton One of the great fascinations for us Noble Street kids going home from school in the village up past the railway yard, was to watch the arrival of the little bogey which carried the surfacemen (platelayers) from their Bellingham base to where they were working on the track. They did most of … Read more
I think the photo was taken in the Bellingham Black Bull around 1954 – and judging by their dress, it was after a fairly formal gathering or meeting, and not a night out! What Adam Dodd was doing as the sole male among them is intriguing. Adam served as a postman in Bellingham for many … Read more
Photographer: W.P. Collier By Dr Clive Dalton Walter Percy Collier was born in Newcastle in 1875, and moved to Liverpool after his father’s death in 1891 where he lived with the younger of his two sisters. He then went back to Newcastle to work for the industrial photographer, Harry Ord Thompson. After his wife died … Read more
I got my hands on a copy of this email newsletter put together by the North Tyne and Redesdale Community Partnership. Cracking read to catch up on what is going on in the neighbourhood. You can get your copy by emailing adminbct@btconnect.com or phoning Rachel on 220714
Well, to be fair I knew they were – Google Analytics gives me a lovely picture of the woolshed1 blog heading up and down the valley from time to time. But here’s a few other cracking little websites that came to me via the Bellingham Heritage Centre. Bellingham and District Trade and Tourism Association http://bdtta.co.uk/ Wark … Read more
By Dr Clive Dalton Saturday – day of play Saturday was the best day of the week for us Noble Street ‘yunguns’ – because there was ‘nee school’ and we were free from the terrors of Jean Milburn in the Juniors, before progressing to Joe Lumley in the seniors. Here you knew that the dreaded … Read more
A welcome sightIt was always a welcome sight during hay time when we saw helpers turning up from the village to lend us a hand with the haymaking. They came after finishing their full time day’s work on the railway, the roads or in the village businesses. Most village folk in the 1950s and 1960s … Read more
Note by Clive Dalton: In the North Tyne valley of Northumberland, there’s no such thing as a ‘stone’. They are all ‘staens’ (pronounced steens). And it’s similar on the Scottish side, so when ‘Borderers’ set off to meet at a noted landmark Staen, like the one near Kielder – they all arrived at the same place … Read more
By Donald Clegg and Clive Dalton Victorian engineersThis wonderful example of Victorian engineering fortunately survived two major threats – the closure of the Riccarton-Newcastle railway line, and the the flooding of the upper Tyne valley to form the Kielder resevoir. The viaduct was designed by John Furness Tone to get the railway across the Deadwater … Read more