Tim Bawden of the I newspaper informs us that this could be the coldest spring for 50 years and could even end up being the coldest since 1962. However if the weather in Durham and District can repeat or better its 1960 trick - you are in for a great June 2013!
We had only 7 [Seven] rainy days in the area of Ushaw Moor/Durham City of June 1960 vintage. There were 237.6 hours of sunshine - equating to a mean average of 7.92 hours per day. The hottest day achieved 79 degrees F. and that occurred on the second day of the Durham regatta. [Durham University Observation data].
So what was going on in the area at that time? Lots.Obviously. No Spanish siestas' in the valley! The Durham County Advertiser reported that in nearby Brandon children could be seen running around with axes, and a hammer was a child's play thing [!]
So it was a sunny June. The snag for Ushaw Moor Cricket Club is that Raine poured on its team. Put another way, Bearpark beat Ushaw Moor in a Northern Echo Cup semi-final. Raine scored 60 in Bearpark's total of 134 for 4. In reply Ushaw Moor was all out for 82. The damage was done by that man Raine's fine bowling [5 wickets for 23 runs].
WB
This has me wondering if this is the time we dammed the beck to make a swimming hole.
ReplyDeleteI mentioned it in a previous post and i know it must have been around 1960 to 62.There was a section of the beck down behind Broompark where the beck had a small bend and the water had formed a little deep hole and we used to jump into it from the bank but it was such a small hole we had to form a line to take turns jumping in. This particular year the beck was hardly running as there obviously had not been much rainfall. So we decided to dam the beck a few yards before it came into our favourite corner and as i remember there ended up a lot of kids helping including some of the Brandon kids. Some of us were dragging branches from the woods and others getting stones from the beck and also pulling grass sods from the banks. But our dam kept on getting burst by the water. Some of the older kids came to see what we were doing and they thought it was a great idea and decided to help.
We all went home and came back with buckets and spades and axes and some with potato sacks and we built the dam again only this time the older kids were driving posts into the bed of the beck and laying the other branches against them and others also digging a trench to divert the water away from our corner. Then we were all in there with buckets and shovels digging it out to about 4 yards in diameter (and thats just a wild guess). and about 4 feet deep and kept a shallow area for kids like me that couldnt swim.
It gave us much pleasure each weekend but eventually a rush of water from the beck and nature put it back just how it was.
As for the axes and hammers-it would be funny if thats related to this story but as i recall the games we often played were cowboys and Indians and usually what we were getting fed from what was trending at the movies and i do remember making axes and tomahawks and using a stick and splitting the end of it and putting a piece of slate in it and binding it up with string.
By the way, is the beck still running today, because my cousin Kevin said when he went there a few years back and walked down to the beck at the back of Broompark (now Cooks wood) there was no beck.??
The reason the beck no longer flows past Broompark is all down to old mine workings. They caused a fissure to open on the earth's surface some 2-300 yards east of the Ushaw Moor - Sleetburn viaduct and the river now pours down this and into the old mine workings. Seems a pity that something which has been a feature of the landscape since the Ice Age should just suddenly vanish from the scene..
ReplyDeleteI find it hard to believe that people just accept something like that happening. The river was home to probably many forms of birds and wildlife - not to mention fish frogs tadpoles.
ReplyDeleteSo now anything that travels down stream gets flushed underground.??.
Surely a diversion around this fissure or piping over it would have been a better measure of repair rather than just accepting. I saw a recent article about a dedicated group of environmental people who were working on a project to clean the river up and removing weeds etc. Why bother- there might be another fissure further upstream from the mines and then Ushaw also will be without a river.
Sorry Ron I was only having a laugh, I can assure you that the Deerness still flows majestically past Broompark. Percy Clarke
ReplyDeleteHa Ha. I fell for it then didn't i ?. Was wondering though about why years of the river going down a hole -and you giving no excuse as to where it came out without filling up the shafts and continuing on.
ReplyDeleteI should have known being an ex Geordie myself to watch out for tricksters.
Bugger, i was about to ring my cousin Kev to explain the -no beck.
Kevin always goes back in your summer months and i said the beck does sometimes dry up or slow down.
Planning a holiday myself now and will hire a vehicle and visit the old haunts.