The Line That Never Paid: Memories of the Bishop's Castle Railway

This treasure found on YouTube this evening combines footage of the remains of the Bishop's Castle Railway with the memories of people who remembered it in operation. It closed in 1935.

When was this film shot?

The 'Craven Arms and Stokesay' running in board at the end dates it to before 1974 and the first photo of the station without any buildings, as it appears here, dates from 1972 - see the Disused Stations site.

However, the start of the film shows the Six Bells in the town and it is a Wrekin Brewery pub. A story on the revival of the name says that brewery closed in the early 1960s.

I suspect that that early footage of the town is some years earlier than the footage of Craven Arms station at the end.

Whatever the truth of this, it is a wonderful find.

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This Land: A Pentabus Theatre play on fracking

You may remember (how could you forget?) my day trip to Sheringham to see the Lone Pine Club.

That play was staged by Pentabus Theatre. Their latest production, This Land, looks at fracking and is currently touring the country.

It has already played Bishop's Castle and Snailbeach, and will soon be over in Northern Ireland before returning to the mainland.

You can find a full list of performances on the Pentabus website, where you will also find this video.

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Ronnie Lane and Eric Clapton at the Drum and Monkey

The Drum and Monkey today

I have just listened to the BBC Radio Shropshire programme on Ronnie Lane and Eric Clapton that I blogged about on Monday. (It was broadcast today at lunchtime.)

Far from exploding the myth that you could once hear rock and roll aristocracy playing at remote Shropshire pubs it proved the stories were true.

It also includes a rare interview with Ronnie Lane's widow Kate. Well done, Johnty O'Donnell.

You can listen to the programme for the next month on the BBC website. It occupies the second hour of Paul Shuttleworth's show.

There are also some photographs from the most celebrated concert at the Drum and Monkey on the BBC Radio Shropshire Facebook page.

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Row over the 'African grave' at Bishop's Castle

There are some remarkable graves in Bishop's Castle churchyard in Shropshire.

One of them, as this video from the Shropshire Star shows, is currently the cause of controversy:

A wood and perspex cover protecting the Grade II-listed “African grave” may have to be removed as it does not have permission to be there. 

But the locals who made the cover and put it there to save the 200-year-old monument say action needs to be taken now to stop it eroding further. 

The grave belongs to a man only identified as ID, who is said to be a native of Africa who died in Bishop’s Castle on September 9 1801.

Such monuments have to be looked after, but the locals say the cover is only temporary.

It is hard not to see this incident as a new Ealing Comedy. An inspector, perhaps played by Raymond Huntley, is dispatched to Shropshire to call the locals to heel.

Once there he is plied with beer from The Three Tuns, shown the wrong churchyard and sent back to Whitehall defeated.

And this part of Shropshire is one of the few places in England where you can still imagine this happening.

I recently saw an old episode of The Green, Green Grass of Home, which is set in the county. An American who had been stationed there as a serviceman decades before wanted to go round the village to see how it had changed.

"Oh it's not changed, sir," came the reply. "If anything it's more like it was now than it was then."

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Bishop’s Castle charter celebrations 1973

In 1573 Bishop's Castle was made a borough by a charter granted by Elizabeth I. This film shows the celebrations of the 400th anniversary of the charter in 1973.

This charter, and a later on granted by James I, were kept in a locked box at a local bank. For many years, as BBC News reported in 2011, they could not be consulted as the key to the box had been lost:

Town Clerk Diane Malley said: "In the 1970s we did have access to the charters because for a short time they were on display in the town hall, and sometime after that they were locked in the bank and the keys mislaid." 

Mrs Malley found an envelope marked "unknown keys" in a cupboard and decided to see if one of them would unlock the charter box.

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Mike Storey to visit Church Stretton and Bishop's Castle

A good write up for the Liberal Democrat peer in the Shropshire Star:

Lord Mike Storey is the Lib Dem spokesman on education in the House of Lords and will be visiting two south Shropshire towns whose leisure centres both receive funding via schools, and face a shortfall of tens of thousands of pounds due to cuts. 

Lord Storey, who was a headteacher and also leader of Liverpool City Council, is expected to visit Church Stretton on January 22, where the future of the town’s swimming pool is being reviewed. 

He will then visit Norbury Primary School, near Bishop’s Castle area, and the SpArC Centre in Bishop’s Castle, which is also threatened by cuts.

The report also quotes Charlotte Barnes, the Liberal Democrat councillor for Bishop's Castle:

"Our leisure centres contribute to the well-being of our residents, they help to keep people healthy and happy. 

"They must save the care budgets a fortune and of course they are one of the few places to offer young people activities in our more isolated areas."

The scale of the cuts being inflicted on council spending represents an area of vulnerability for the Tories. David Cameron, for one, has not grasped what George Osborne is doing to local services.

I hope the Lib Dems will take up this issue in the way that Mike Storey and Charlotte Barnes are in Shropshire. Such a campaign will mean more to our traditional voters than a call for further tax cuts.

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