Goole 2026

 I seem to have missed a whole month since I wrote my last blog post in May!!! But a bit like Groundhog Day we had a heatwave in June and now we are in the middle of another. My vegetables are all drooping and although I am watering them I cannot help but feel that what they really need is a steady downpour. Our old cat has changed her routine - she sleeps through the day and comes for food in the evening when it is cooler.

On the local history front my friends and I are looking forward to celebrating Goole's 200th birthday on Monday 20th July. It was 1826 when the Aire and Calder's Knottingley to Goole canal was opened with great celebrations - in the rain. We hope that the weather is fine this weekend.

Last weekend I spent a day in a very warm tent at Howden Show representing the Howden Civic Society. It was nice to meet old friends and make new ones.

I have been working on my Howdenshirehistory.co.uk website. For a long time the site has been one which my daughter made several years ago - she wrote the code for it!! Then we had a newer one she made in Wordpress which never made it online- and it too was old. So last month my updated site went live and I have managed to add quite a few new pages - about the opening of the canal, about Skelton near Howden and about Saltmarshe where I live. As yet the old photos page is in process- but I am working on it!!!

I am trying to digitise all my old photos and eventually make them available online but it is a major undertaking. Maybe for winter!

My current project is writing about Portington near Eastrington. The Portington family built a new hall in the late seventeenth century and after their line died out the estate was bought by the Bell family who were friendly with John Wesley. Their local church was Eastrington which is where my family have lived since the 1680s. So I like to think they all knew each other.

Eastrington church will be open for heritage day on 12th September. My cousin will be broadcasting from there - he is an amateur radio enthusiast and I will be there with a display of old pictures and artefacts.

Above is the impressive tomb of Sir John Portington in Eastrington church. Below is a detail from the tomb showing the Portington shield. The church is raising money for repair - the green in the picture is from damp! Come and visit on 12th September.