HERE’S a few stories from the Barnsley Chronicle’s archives as they were reported back in January 1972.
THE LIVES of scores of old people risk from hypothermia because of the cold, and the shortage of coal is aggravating the problem, a social services spokesman admitted this week.
“The position is frightening. Many old people don’t realise the danger they are in,” said the spokesman.
When the temperatures dropped this week, special teams of social workers were formed into a ‘flying squad’ to make sure people at risk who are unable to get supplies from their dealers are supplied with coal.
The spokesman said: “We can get supplies of coal for priority groups, and if there is a need we shall endeavour to help them.
“In cold weather, accidental hypothermia — a state of extreme body cold — is a real danger to many aged people who live alone.”
ONE of Barnsley’s best-known licensees Elsie Turner died this week at the age of 78.
Elsie, who gained the love and respect of the whole of Barnsley for her ‘comforts fund’ work for the soldiers during the Second World War, spent 66 years living in local public houses.
Her first taste of a licensee’s life came in 1906 when her father, Mr R Whitaker, took over the Woodseat Hotel. In 1920 she married Henry Turner, and in 1927 they took over the Corner Pin hotel in Barnsley town centre.
In 1928 they took over the newly-built Wilthorpe Hotel, which Mrs Turner named. It was during their stay at the Wilthorpe Hotel that Mrs Turner organised her comforts fund events. She retired in 1956, two years after the death of her husband, and went to help her son Albion Turner, at the Lundwood Hotel.
When her son took over the King George Hotel, Barnsley, she continued to help there.
LATEST figures show that 9.1 per cent of Barnsley men are unemployed.
There are just 99 vacancies in the area for the 4,251 men and boys which means there are 42 males for every available job.
The overall unemployment figure is 7.1 per cent, which adds up to 5,090 unemployed in the town.
WHEN the manager of a Barnsley public house closes the doors of his pub on February 19 it will signal the end of a commanding Barnsley landmark.
For the Cross Keys Hotel, the sale of which was reported last week in the Barnsley Chronicle, and which has towered over the May Day Green market like a watchful eye since it was built in the late 1860s, is to come under the hammer of demolition as part of the town centre’s redevelopment.
And before the present building was built the site was occupied by another public house.
Local historian, Mr E G Tasker, says that his first records of a pub occupying the site are dated 1841, but believes that a pub may also have occupied the site for many years before that.
THE youngest member of the Yorkshire Opera is a 13-year-old Barnsley girl named Jean Lucas.
Jean, of Cope Street, Barnsley, is a pupil at Charter Secondary School.
She has been singing for many years and in 1969 won the Pontefract Music Festival Shield for solo singing.
