If you feel like getting out your bongos, your kazoos, your trumpets and your beat boxes then please do and play them with joyous delight as we celebrate all things Yorkshire. For this is a county of 5.6 million souls - slightly bigger than the population of Scotland but so often air-brushed and actively sidelined by successive London-based governments and the general British media. Where are the Yorkshire voices beyond that odious stereotypical soap opera - "Emmerdale"?
Let us celebrate flat caps and whippets, the chalky coves of Flamborough Head, The Bronte Parsonage, John Smiths Brewery, Sam Smiths Brewery, York Minster, rhubarb, parkin, Ted Hughes, Andrew Marvell, Amy Johnson, David Hockney, the curving spit of Spurn Head that guards the mouth of The Humber, the rolling Yorkshire Wolds, The Three Peaks, The Arctic Monkeys, The Human League, Joe Cocker, the coal industry that Thatcher butchered, Harold Wilson, Hull City A.F.C., Sheffield - the birthplace of modern football, Dame Judi Dench and Sir Patrick Stewart, Kevin Keegan and The Chuckle Brothers, William Wilberforce and of course the great Captain James Cook. And let us celebrate our many prehistoric sites, stainless steel and cat's eyes, the spring mousetrap and the first commercial steam railway in the world. And we give thanks for neighbourliness, kindness, common sense, hard work, bluntness and having the most beautiful no-nonsense women in the world and Wensleydale cheese, Yorkshire chutney, our public footpaths and of course, it goes without saying, the mighty Yorkshire Pudding that rises golden above all of us like a mighty pagan god.
Back in 2018, I wrote a poem to mark Yorkshire Day and I shall share it again with you today...
Yorkshire DayAugust the first is Yorkshire Day!
Our hearts lift up, we shout hooray!
From Flamborough Head to the Pennine Chain
We cheer our county once again
Dear blogging friends, for what it’s worth
There’s nowhere better on this Earth.
You can keep your Sydney and L.A. too
Your South Sea isles and your Timbuctoo
I would rather walk a Yorkshire street
With Yorkshire ground beneath my feet.
From Middlesbrough to Malham Cove
Our county is a treasure trove
Of coastal path and rolling dale
And foaming pints of Yorkshire ale
Where people use their common sense
No empty words or proud pretence
A land of graft and imagination
Surely The Lord’s very best creation
So drink and feast and dance away
August the first is Yorkshire Day!
Now here is something to celebrate.
ReplyDeleteYou and Lord Hamster could attempt a Morris dance in celebration.
DeleteI'd like to add something to your Yorkshire list, from my point of view. During the pandemic, I was living and working from home and not seeing many people. It was the time of tiptoe to the grocery store at 6:01 AM, heavily masked, nod at the cashier behind the barrier, and dash home. Both covid and my irresponsible, lunatic government's response was shocking, every single day. I started binge watching The Yorkshire Vet. Until that time, my knowledge of cows was solely in that glass of milk on the table. Because I didn't grow up on a farm, I wondered why I found myself drawn to this show; I've never been as keen on any other vet program. The scenery was fantastic every episode, while I was trapped in my house. But more than that, I saw so much NORMALITY in hard-working, intelligent, plain-talking, practical, funny people who knew every day to just get the job done and to do what is right. I think you can trust a person who has to face either horns or excrement on a daily basis. ...if only our current president would face it, rather than create it.
ReplyDeleteBonnie in Minneapolis
Glad you enjoyed that show Bonnie. I think you have brought out the main reasons why it struck a chord with so many viewers.
DeleteEnjoy your day!
ReplyDeleteWe had a special meal with mountains of Yorkshire puddings.
DeleteI get the impression that you are quite proud to be a Yorkshireman. I really would love to visit there.
ReplyDeleteHow on earth did you get that impression?
DeleteHappy Yorkshire Day, YP!
ReplyDeleteI accept your best wishes joyfully young man.
DeleteNo, you sent the Yorkshire Ripper south to Broadmoor some years ago, though he's now gone elsewhere.
ReplyDeleteMadam, twas not me that sent the monster to Broadmoor it was the judge who tried him! I had no say in the matter.
DeleteIs this the wrong time to mention Lancashire ?
ReplyDeleteI like their dish known as Butter Pie, Friday Pie, or Catholic Pie.
Slices of potato & onion, butter garnished, baked in a shortcrust pastry.
A humble dish once eaten in Preston, Clitheroe, Salford, Eccles, Wigan.
I had it in a pub in Morecambe with a pint of Tetley's Bitter. Good Friday, 1970.
Orwell was passing Wigan by train and saw a young woman in her backyard.
She was fixing a broken fence ; he'd never seen such despair in anyone's face.
I wonder what that young woman was cooking for supper for her bairns ?
The Road To Wigan Pier. Published on 8 March 1937.
Yes. It is entirely the wrong time Mr H. The woman was probably cooking potato peelings with nettles - a popular Lancashire dish.
DeleteIf I can help some folk ... as Gracie Fields liked to say.
DeleteWe'd have a glass of Stout together in The Ring o' Bells in Rochdale.
Gracie used to say, * Trouble wi' Yorkshire folk, they think Bradford's
belly o' the world and Sheffield's the other end, like ... *
Nice list, but Yorkshire doesn't own rhubarb.
ReplyDeleteMadam, Google "The Rhubarb Triangle" for this the home of rhubarb.
DeleteCOMMENT FROM ADDY....A friend of mine lives next door to an influencer who works from her 'summer house' at the bottom of her garden. She gets so many freebies delivered to her house to promote, that the cardboard boxes left out for the dustmen don't get collected as there is far too much for one household.
ReplyDeleteI am my local binfluencer. My neighbours watch to see what bins I put out so they know to follow suite, as our collections alternate every week between paper/cardboard and glass/plastic. It's a responsibility I take seriously!!
As a binfluencer, perhaps you can help Count Binface to beat Farrage in the Clacton by-election.
DeleteI didn't realize that Yorkshire had a population that large. Happy Yorkshire Day!
ReplyDeleteIt seems that the wallahs in London don't realise that fact either.
DeleteHappy birthday my favourite county
ReplyDeleteYou should apply for refugee status.
DeleteI did not know Yorkshire had its own day. And here in Australia it was yesterday, being the 2nd here already. I am typing from your future, ha ha. I would like to visit Yorkshire one day, but don't see it actually happening.
ReplyDeleteI doubt that you would pass the entry test Elsie. Too bolshie.
DeleteWell a happy belated thumbs up to Yorkshire (North is my favourite). Rhubarb needs a cold dark place to grow, so it is very happy in Yorkshire! Our town lives on the boundary line between Lancashire and Yorkshire, so just walk up to the river and you can be in either county. Also don't forget the magnificent Cistercian abbeys hidden in the valleys.
ReplyDeleteYou are right. Rievaulx Abbey is one of the jewels in Yorkshire's crown.
DeleteHappy birthday to the country's largest county from your most humble neighbour.😁
ReplyDeleteAbout as humble as Nigel Farage.
DeleteWell. That was very rude!
DeleteAgreed. I am terribly sorry if I have unwittingly upset you Christina. I should have remembered what a sensitive soul you are.
DeleteI forgive you. Just this once, mind! 😘
DeleteErrrrm I thought Yorkshire had been split into east and west
ReplyDeleteBut happy Yorkshire day
You cannot split ancient realities. For administrative convenience Yorkshire had three "ridings" or thirds. In my mind they persist no matter what modern governments may decree and that includes unwelcome boundary changes.
DeleteYour list omitted one of Barnsley's greatest - my Dad! Oh, and P's Dad from Sheffield.
ReplyDeleteMaking a baby is like mixing a cake and I am pleased to learn that Lord and Lady Peregrine both contain hefty dollops of Yorkshire. Proves you can't be all bad. Where in Sheffield did Peregrine's daddy grow up?
DeleteI've never wished Happy Birthday to a county, but ... okay ... Happy Birthday Yorkshire!
ReplyDeleteYour greeting is happily accepted young fellow.
DeleteEnjoy your Special Day!
ReplyDeleteHip, Hip, Hooray
ReplyDeletefor
Yorkshire Day!
Ironically, Yorkshire Day was my first day back home from Yorkshire! My sister and I would have loved to join in the celebrations in Ripon, watching the annual St. Wilfrid's Parade and eat genuine Yorkshire Pudding in one of the many nice eateries around town. Instead, I was sweating in Ludwigsburg at around 30C. But my husband drove up to spend the weekend with me, which of course made up for having to leave Yorkshire for another year.
ReplyDelete