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Mon - Fri 8.30am - 5.00pm
Tel: 01845 421 015
The Thirsk Weekly News is a family-owned paper for Thirsk and the surrounding area
31st December, 2021.
Thirsk White Horse Swim Team is celebrating the end of 2021 with some fantastic achievements by its swimmers.
While the pool at Thirsk and Sowerby Leisure Centre was closed for the centre to be refurbished, our swimmers continued to train hard at various pools across the area, who kindly found pool time for us to keep swimming.
All galas were cancelled until July due to the pandemic, but we were still able to hold the British Long Distance Swimming Association Challenge Swim. In the challenge, our more experienced swimmers swam for an hour and the younger swimmers for 30 minutes, trying to cover as many metres as they could. We won team medals in every age group including a whopping eight national golds, with Archie Norton swimming 4540m (2.8miles) in 1 hour......
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31st December, 2021.
The footpath connecting St James Green with Marage Road in Thirsk has reopened following temporary repairs.
North Yorkshire County Council closed the public right of way in May after reports of cracks and movement of the pavement.
An underwater survey together with detailed inspections have been carried out following the removal of vegetation along the route. This has revealed that the retaining wall has been severely affected by river erosion, damaging and reducing the structural integrity of the footpath leading to the iron footbridge.
The Countryside Access Service established a temporary solution which involved excavating the path around the bridge and picnic area, backfilling with concrete and levelling it up with tarmac. Large cracks further along the path have been filled with concrete and patched......
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31st December, 2021.
FRIARAGE Hospital has been recognized nationally for its work in joint replacements and its commitment to patient safety.
The Northallerton hospital has been titled a ‘quality data provider’ by the National Joint Registry (NJR) for its quality care.
The NJR monitors the performance of hip, knee, ankle, elbow and shoulder joint replacement operations to improve clinical outcomes primarily for the benefit of patients, but also to support orthopaedic clinicians and industry manufacturers......
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31st December, 2021.
What a strange year! It began, as 2020 had finished, with the Club Championship continuing through virtual races, which again proved hugely popular.
They were based on, and named after the championship races which would have been held in normal times, and the terrain tried to follow the type of terrain over which the actual race would have been run.
A race with hills would take place in, say Kilburn or Wass Woods, and flat races either on footpaths through villages or along flattish trails, and were devised mostly through the oft recorded ingenuity of Rob Burn.
North Ormesby and Holme House Prison Cross Country races, for instance, echoed the conditions as far as possible which one would find at those actual races, and the Cleveland Way was used extensively......
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24th December, 2021.
Thirsk Community Primary School have been busy with plenty of festivities this term and wanted to share some of the pictures with the community, family and friends.
Our amazing PTA organized an outdoor Christmas Market that was open to the public for the first time. A huge effort, hard work and pure determination meant that this event was a great success for the school. We had some lovely stalls and were supported by many lovely local businesses to which we are very grateful, we even had a bucking bronco reindeer!
We have held a virtual Christmas songs concert for years 1 to 6. Everyone wore their most festive Christmas Jumper and sung their hearts out to be filmed for parents and family to enjoy......
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24th December, 2021.
Thirsk Museum’s contribution to the festive spirit takes us back a century to an account of Christmas in 1921, with a window display of typical items from then, and this reminiscence from their archives:
For us living in Kirkgate, Christmas was a holiday, a welcome day off work.
The days before Christmas was busy - adorning the houses with greenery gathered from the wayside, the making of paper chains and other decorations, carol singing around the town, the scents and smells of food being prepared, mother getting flustered, so much to do, an atmosphere of anticipation......
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24th December, 2021.
A farm visitor attraction near Thirsk has been spreading a little Christmas cheer despite the disappointment of having to cancel their own festivities.
Monk Park Farm at Bagby has donated its showpiece 15ft Christmas tree to a local animal rescue after being forced to cancel its Christmas Experience because of the spread of bird flu.
The farm chose to gift the tree to Lucie’s Animal Rescue in Thirsk after asking their followers on social media to nominate a deserving local family or organization.
Lucie’s Animal Rescue is run by Lucie Holmes, her husband Sean and their three young children from their family home on the outskirts of Thirsk. It is self-funded and relies on donations......
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24th December, 2021.
On the last Saturday game before Christmas, amid lots of postponed matches, Thirsk Falcons team welcomed long rivals, Bedale, to their home ground at Sowerby Gateway, for their last football match of 2012.
Amid the increasing gloom of a misty and increasingly chilly mid winter afternoon, both teams played a fairly friendly game with a very rare three man official staffed soccer game.
The cold and mist made it a hard match to follow and play in for all concerned, and even more so after half time, when poor visibility made the game even more difficult to see the action, and harder for the officials to do their jobs well.
Thirsk Falcons once more struggled with player availability but made a good effort in an equally matched sparring session that gave little quarter, and was up and down the two ends throughout......
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17th December, 2021.
President Charles Gill along with Santa presented a cheque for £650 to Herriot Hospice for their help at this years Santa’s Grotto at Thirsk Garden Centre......
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17th December, 2021.
Christmas tree in the wood, our little Christmas Tree in the wood is getting bigger, in fact it's now about 12 feet tall. We've put a few decorations on at the top and local dog walkers are starting to put spare baubles they have lower down......
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17th December, 2021.
The U14’s travelled up to Middlesbrough to play South Park Rangers today for their first game in three weeks due to weather cancellations.
With the boys having also missed a weeks worth of training it meant that there was some ring rust to shake off.
Unfortunately for us, we weren’t able to put in the kind of performance we had been building up to today and it proved a game to forget......
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17th December, 2021.
It was a pleasure to visit the Kilburn Institute on Saturday to discuss a range of local and national topics. The Q&A lasted around an hour and half and was kindly organized by Cllr Graham Matthews.
I was encouraged by residents' enthusiasm and ideas on broad matters including the NHS, electric vehicles, young people, climate change, levelling up and transport. On the latter point, I share Kilburn residents' disappointment in the announcement regarding Northern Powerhouse Rail and publicly voiced this both in the House of Commons and more broadly. Have no doubt, I will continue to make my constituents' views known on this......
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10th December, 2021.
Once more, Thirsk Royal British Legion held a very successful member’s children’s Christmas Party last Sunday at the Kirkgate Club, hosted by Stewardess Danielle Adams, with Entertainments Secretary John Phillips.
It brought smiles to everyone to see the decorations and party spirit for all ages, who came along to see the fun and create the excitement for the little ones.
The hall was filled with smiling families and very happy and excited children to play party games of all types, organized by Musical Statues, headed by Tyler, Caitlin, Andi, Lindsey and Lily-May Catt......
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10th December, 2021.
Bagby Airfield has been busy this past week supporting the Power Line Helicopters drafted in to assist Northern Power Grid emergency response following Storm Arwen.
Up to four helicopters have been operating each day in the emergency effort to restore power to outlying communities in North Yorkshire, Durham and Northumberland.
Aircraft have been drafted in from 1 x National Grid from Oxford, 1 x Wester Power Grid from Nottingham and 2 x Northern Power Grid, PDG from Cumbernauld.
Bagby Airfield volunteers have been assisting with refuelling the helicopters and providing refreshments for aircrews.
Bagby is preferred by the helicopter crews because of easy access to the airfield.
Facilitating the quick turnaround of aircraft rather than using major airports where cost and time delays are prohibitive......
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10th December, 2021.
And so the Christmas lights are on in the town centre, and they make it once more a festive place, especially with the Christmas-themed display by our Yarnbombers......
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10th December, 2021.
A special candlelit charity concert is to be held at the beautifully restored Thirsk Lodge Barns in aid of Herriot Hospice Homecare.
The talented Eclectic Harmony Gospel Choir will be performing Gospel Carols by Candlelight on Wednesday December 15, starting at 6.30pm.
The concert, which will also include Christmas readings, has been organized by Letty Hunter Bell, owner of Thirsk Lodge Barns, whose late stepmother Mandy Metcalfe was lovingly cared for in a Thirsk hospice at the end of her life.
Letty explained: “This is a very positive way of highlighting the need for hospice care in the Thirsk community. The home where my stepmother was looked after has now closed, so there is an urgent need for a new hospice in the town, photo by Amy Heycock......
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3rd December, 2021.
TWO years after their last outdoor adventure – a group of scouts and leaders from North Yorkshire have been able to carry on camping, thanks to the generosity of developer Linden Homes.
Youngsters from 1st Sowerby Scout group (one of the oldest in the area) were able to be prepared for socially distanced fun at their camp with a distanced, sleeping in hammocks rather than tents to adhere to Scout Association Covid-safety guidelines.
Around 12 scouts and leaders attended this month’s camp in Ripon, with a donation from Linden Homes (part of Vistry Group) allowing the purchase of the hammocks.
Group Scout leader Jon Goom said the support had helped to end a long wait for the adventure-seeking youngsters.
He said: “We normally have three weekend camps per year and a week’s camp in the summer break - but the last camp we had was at the end of November 2019!
“Camping is at the core of Scouting, and it has been sorely missed by both Scouts and Leaders......
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3rd December, 2021.
Inspired Pet Nutrition – the Thirsk-based company behind the Harringtons and Wagg pet food brands – is supporting National Tree Planting Week (November 27th – December 5th) by planting 100 trees at the Thorp Perrow Arboretum near Bedale.
As part of IPN’s overall target of planting 1 million trees, the business is also planting a tree for every employee to help offset the carbon footprint of the whole workforce. Volunteers from IPN planted the trees which included Red List species such as Horse Chestnut.
Thorp Perrow’s Curator, Faith Douglas, is overseeing the IPN tree planting to add the 100 trees to the existing collection comprising of over 4,500 trees and plants, including five national plant collections......
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3rd December, 2021.
The Club has been in celebration mode this week with the winning of two prestigious awards. Thirsk and Sowerby Harriers won the award for Running Club of the Year in Yorkshire and Humberside, from England Athletics and Rob Burn won the award for Innovation.
The two, of course, are inextricably linked, and there are few people more innovative than Rob. In his own running, he likes to vary his methods and his routes and he passes this on to club members.
When the pandemic first struck and members were unable to meet at club sessions, Rob was soon setting up virtual races over a particular distance, run from your front door, and timed by you.
Variations in individuals' watches occurred but no-one seemed to mind, and results were published in order of recorded finishing times......
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3rd December, 2021.
Weather forecasters are by inclination pessimistic in their predictions; it would be hazardous if they weren’t. They have to warn us of the perils of too hot or too cold or too wet.
Last weekend was a case in point. The Met Office, whose original job in 1854 was to inform seamen of coming bad weather, issued a series of their colour-coded warnings, for wind, rain and snow. They graduated from yellow to amber and then the rare and serious red warning, meaning that life was at risk. It was going to be a dark and stormy night. It had its own name: Storm Arwen, a Welsh name meaning noble maiden; we were just on the edge, but it felt dire......
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