Canny lass

I'm afraid I would be needing proof about that. Are you quite sure it wasn't one of these: ...or even one of these?

Christmas Special! 1. Which Christmas song is the best-selling ever? 2. In English-speaking countries we say ”Merry Christmas”. To which European language has Google translated Merry Christmas here? i) Gleðileg jól ii) Buon Natale iii) Feliz Navidad iv) Glædelig jul v) Frohe Weihnachten 3. The modern Santa Clause, with a red outfit and a big white beard, is originally based on St Nicholas, an archbishop from Myra. In which modern day country was he born? 4. During the 12 days of Christmas, how many ‘legs’ did “my true-love give to me”? 5. Which one of Santa’s reindeer shares a name with a famous symbol of Valentine ’s Day? 6. In Charles Dickens’ novel “A Christmas Carol” what was the first name of Mr. Scrooge? 7. In The Muppet’s Christmas Carol who played Mr. Scrooge? 8. According to the folklore of Austria (and some other countries) what horned figure punishes naughty children at Christmastime? 9. What well-known Christmas song was the first to be broadcast from space in 1965? 10. Which holiday movie includes a cameo by Donald Trump 11. Whose eyes are “all aglow” in The Christmas Song? 12. Who said “One can never have enough socks. Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn’t get a single pair. People will insist on giving me books.” 13. Why did Scotland ban Christmas? 14. Which world leader celebrates his birthday on Christmas day? 15. Which country sends a tree every year to be erected in Trafalgar Square? 16. Which royal monarch made the first Christmas broadcast? 17. “Twas the Night Before Christmas” , Clement Clarke Moore’s classic poem,was originally published under what name? 18. What are the two most popular words used on Christmas gift tags? 19. We all know Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer, but what are the other eight called? 20. Who resurrected Frosty in Frosty the Snowman? I’ll bet you didn’t know …. Golf balls were originally made of leather stuffed with feathers. Answers will be posted on WEDNESDAY 30 December - together with a New Year Special (to keep you out of mischief).

Answers to last week's quiz: 1. Nod 2. Limestone 3. Change money 4. Hungary 5. Crewe Alexandra 6. DNA 7. Gorky Street 8. Left 9. A stone anchor 10. Aniseed 11. Shoulder Pork And Ham 12. Sherlock Holmes New quiz in a few minutes.

Lovely photo Maggie! There's somebody local who goes around putting old spectacles on those small, mossy mounds here . They look quite charming. Maybe something for you to start in England?

Yipee! It's Christmas! Let the celebrations begin!

Merry Christmas everybody!

Where's Wilf? It's not offically Christmas without Wilf!!!!

Then your learning curve must have gone steeply upwards this week, Vic. Well done!

This week's quiz: 1. In the book of Genesis, which land is said to lie to the east of Eden? 2. Marble is formed by the metamorphosis of which rock? 3. What would you do in a Cambio? 4. Which European country produces Tokay? 5. Which football club play at Gresty Road and are nicknamed the Railwaymen? 6. How is deoxyribonucleic acid better known? 7. Tverskaya is the name of one of Moscow’s most important streets. What was it called prior to 1990? 8. That’s one small step for man. One giant leap for mankind, said Neil Armstrong. Which of his feet, right or left, made that first step on the moon? 9. What is a killick? 10. What do fennel leaves taste of? 11. What does the name Spam stand for? 12. Who lived at 221b Baker Street? I’ll bet you didn’t know …. Author Raymond Chandler’s wife did the housework in the nude. Note: Answers on WEDNESDAY next week. (being as Thursday is the equivalent of Christmas day here). Friday’s quiz - a Christmas special – will also be posted on WEDNESDAY instead of Christmas day.

... and also for creating one of the best galleries of Bedlington photos i've come across. He gets my vote along with Andy Millne, Vic Patterson, HPW, Jammy and your good self.

Thanks John. I wasn't familiar with just this case but with several others like it. An elederly woman's statement of having been born at a certain palace and the son of a certain prince, and adopted by the palace carpenter springs to mind. That story was deemed to be "delusional thinking".

That explains it. seems from Susan James-Hemsted's post that Piper was in use around the area. Short form of the pedigree name perhaps.

That would be the one! Mid- to late 50s is about right and the couple did live at the lower end of First or Second Street, putting it in the higher numbers. I remember Dennis but O'Brian doesn't ring a bell for the elderly couple. Perhaps it was his maternal grandmother?

Answers to last week's quiz: 1. Mullion 2. The Who 3. Seahorse 4. Gamma 5. 1984 6. Popeye 7. Oscar Wilde 8. Speed skating 9. Ted Ray 10. One million 11. Benbecula - An island between the Uists “During his voyage, the Prince's boat was caught in a storm, and he was forced to land on Benbecula. Despite mainly being Presbyterian, Flora and the population of Benbecula were sympathetic to the Jacobite cause, and the Prince and his companions received hospitable treatment. Nevertheless, the Prince was a fugitive with a price on his head and his companions therefore sought out Flora. She disguised him as an Irish spinning maid, Betty Burke, and by this means smuggled him off the island, on 27 June, and took him "over the sea to Skye". Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benbecula 12. Nathaniel Winkle New quiz tomorrow.

Perhaps we should combine the two topics in one?

The name Donkin seems to crop up quite often. In my childhood there was a family baker's shop in Bedlington owned by the Donkins. There must be Donkins around today who may have information/photos etc.

I remember a Bedlington, owned by an elderly Netherton couple, who's name escapes me just now. The dog, however, was called Piper - a lovely natured animal that we kids used to love to see and stroke when he was out and about with the owners. Piper wasn't a common name for dogs in Netherton so I wonder if he was a direct descendent? Can anybody remember the name of the couple who owned him?

Pets in institutions are the 'in-thing' today and considered to be therapeutically beneficial. Perhaps the owner (Garbutt) was ahead of the times in his thinking. More likely, however, is that taking the dog was a means to get Ned to the asylum without causing distress/anger on his part. It's also worth remembering that these places were run for monetary gain. If taking the dog meant a few extra coppers in the bank, I'm sure it would have been agreed to. With regard to understanding Ned's state of madness, it's necessary to filter off all present day knowledge of mental illness. Diagnosis was a different matter then and now. I'm sure that illnesses such as those defined in the greater groups of: psychoses (including such illnesses as Schizophrenia and Bi-polar disorders) and neuroses (including such illnesses as depression and personality disorder) were around at the time. However, they had not been fully identified or named. Some of the most common diagnoses encountered by me in old case histories (prior to 1953) are: severely retarded, simple-minded, feeble-minded, idiot, mentally deficient, of unsound mind, non compos mentis, lacks understanding, and incapable of reason. Feeble-minded or incapable of reason were applied to persons for a multitude of different reasons, some having no resemblence whatsoever to what we term mental ill health today. One of the most common I've seen is pregnancy outside of marriage! You would be amazed at the number of women in their 70s and 80s who were still sitting, now institutionalized, in mental hospitals around the UK in the 1960s, having been admitted some 50 to 60 years earlier simply because they became pregnant - without the help of a "husband"! That was enough to have you "put away", as was the common expression, and for many that meant " the further away the better". Mental illness, as we know it today, didn't need to be present at all in order to be comitted to an asylum. It was interesting to see the drawing of Dunston Lodge Asylum which headed the article you provided. Founded at the beginning of the 19th century it has many of the hallmarks of the asylum recommended in the 1845 act. This act was really an ammendment to an earlier act (around 1810 if I remember right) which advocated county care. There were however too many loopholes in that act which allowed counties to circumnavigate the law and is one of the reasons why work didn't get underway with asylum building until mid 19th century when the 1845 act enforced the earlier act. In the drawing, you can clearly see the move away from treating patients as prisoners.- which was the aim of the law. There are gardens for recreation and therapeutic work and what appears to be a farm adjacent to but outside of the asylum walls where patients could work and contribute to the running of the asylum by producing food., so was the occupational therapy of the era. I note also an enclosed courtyard where dangerous patients could be safely exercised, allowing even those a chance to see daylight and feel the weather on their faces. Many of these features are common to the later builds and marked an advance in the treatment and conditions of the asylums.

Great stuff! Interesting to read that the owner was named Garbutt. There was another asylum called simply Garbutt's Asylum but I don't know just where in Gateshead it was. The old road passing Dunston Lodge was still there in the 60's and was known locally as Asylum Road.

Correction: That should read DUNSTON Lodge Asylum - NOT Denton. Auto-correct sometimes works overtime when I produce English text. Denton is another area.

Very interesting reading! I might be able to point you in the right direction here. While I am not familiar with Ned’s problems, I did work for some years in both north- and south Tyneside with mental health issues and got to know a great deal about the history and development of mental health services. Unfortunately for Ned, and thousands of others, reform came too late. Ned had already been dead for some ten years before the passing of the County Asylum/Lunacy Act of 1845 which determined that all counties should provide humane care and treatment for their lunatics. Northumberland County seems to have been particularly sluggish in getting to grips with the terms of the act and it wasn’t until 1859 that the Northumberland County Pauper Lunatic Asylum opened its doors to the first ‘patient’ – as they were now to be called. It eventually became St Georges Hospital, Morpeth having had many other names along the way. As I said, this came too late for Ned Cotes, so prior to his demise he would have been cared for under the terms of a previous act – The Madhouse Act of 1774 – which allowed unlicensed practitioners to run their establishments as commercial enterprises whose premises, but not practices, were subject to yearly inspection. This meant that people like Ned could be sent almost anywhere and I know that many of North Tyneside’s lunatics were sent south of the Tyne and vice versa. I have seen Bedlington adresses in old South Tyneside records. Gateshead, on the other hand, sent lunatics north of the Tyne and even chose to build its County Asylum in Stannington outside of Morpeth. It later became known as St Mary’s Hospital. Gateshead, one of my old stomping grounds, had several such establishments during Ned’s time: Bensham Asylum, Wrekenton Asylum, Sherriff Hill Lunatic Assylum and Garbutts Asylum and one other which I think could be of interest in Ned’s case - Dunston Lodge asylum, which I know to have been in use during Ned’s lifetime. Denton Lodge Asylum goes down in asylum history as being one of the most advanced in terms of treatment, not only in Northumberland or even England but in the whole world! It was visited by people from all over the world and had a success rate second to none, better than any other in the UK. I believe it was in use in one form or another right through to the 1930s. I know it was talked about a lot by older nursing staff (1960s) and quite a few elderly patients. That to me sounds like a reason it may have been chosen by the Rev. Cotes for his son. The clients weren’t paupers and Ned’s father was a vicar who I’m sure would seek out the very best help available. I also know that a great deal of documentation from these places is preserved at national. archives.gov.uk - try the Northumberland Archive . If it wasn’t for the fact that Christmas is two weeks away I’d gladly have a poke around myself. But, a woman’s work is never done especially in the lead up to the festive season. Good Luck wishes from a former Llanbradach resident!

I wasn’t implying in any way that you were having a go at local councillors and I apologize if it came across in that way. I also believe that the council members who post here are doing their best in the role of councillor – as well as balancing it with their day jobs and caring for their families. That’s one role more than most of us have, and a big role at that. I’m not sure, however, that “shaming” anybody or any body (such as the local council) into action is the best way to go about achieving results. Surely sensible discourse is the answer and it seems to me that that the two councillors in question do a good job on that front. By transparency, I meant letting people know the lie of the land. I was, of course, speaking for myself, an ex-pat, for whom any information is much valued. I don’t believe it is part of any councillor’s job description to give up their own free time to update people on social media, yet here we have not one, but two who do just that. And, it is worth mentioning here, the role of the councilor is without salary. You say, @_pauls, that there is very rarely any response to comments on their posts and that you would welcome debate. I believe that some meetings are open to the public. I know that at least one of these councillors holds regular surgeries in his constituency. Why not pop along and join the debate there? Malcolm and Russ seem to do a pretty good job, over and above what is required of them, with regard to providing transparency and keeping us up to date.

Here we are again, happy as can be All good pals and jolly good company (on Fridays with corona regulations) 1. What is the name of the vertical bar dividing the panes in a window called? 2. Which rock group was called The Detours and The High Numbers, prior to 1964? 3. What name is commonly given to the Hippocampus? 4. Which letter of the Greek alphabet is equivalent to ‘G’? 5. In what year did the IRA bomb a hotel in Brighton during the Conservative Party Conference? 6. Bluto is the arch rival of who? 7. Which writer was imprisoned as a result of his relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas? 8. In which sport has Ard Schenk been a world champion and record holder? 9. Who played the headmaster in Carry on Teacher? 10. How many cubic centimetres are there in a cubic metre? 11. From which island did Bonnie Prince Charlie row a boat to the Isle of Skye? 12. Which of Mr Pickwick’s friends married Arabella Allen ? I’ll bet you didn’t know …. The Silverstone racing circuit is built on abandoned RAF runways. Answers next Thursday!

My sentiments exactly! Something unique to Bedlington!

As you know, I'm a part of the 95% who don't live in Bedlington and that's just one good reason why I appreciate so very much the input of people like Malcolm Robinson and Russ Wallace who do their best to ensure transparency in local politics by keeping us informed. Once a Bedlingtonian, always a Bedlingtonian!