100 years ago

DR Guy Tyrrell is the first member of the medical profession in Malvern to adopt the motor car. He has purchased a very handsome one through Mr W H Mayo, of the Coventry Cycle Works, Church Street. It is known as the "Locomobile" and is a steam motor which combines the qualities of lightness, speed, economy, safety and ease of operation. The mechanism is very compact and there is little noise occasioned as the vehicle moves along. It can climb any hill and can be driven at a speed from one to thirty miles an hour. Malvern Gazette, March 1, 1901.

SIR, Lady Elizabeth Biddulph's letter in your paper last week is rather strangely written. It seems funny to hear that she regrets Ledbury is being canvassed for funds for a memorial window to our beloved Queen Victoria. Surely her ladyship is not sorry that we are patriotic enough to honour our Queen, in a place, too, probably visited by Queen Victoria as a child. Ledbury Free Press, March 5, 1901.

50 years ago

MR De la Bere, member for South Worcestershire, will in the House of Commons on Monday next ask the Minister of Fuel and Power whether, in view of the difficulties still being experienced by householders in Malvern and the surrounding districts in obtaining supplies of coal, he can now state what steps he has taken during the past two months to ensure more adequate supplies being made available. Malvern Gazette, March 2, 1951.

A FEW weeks ago, a remarkable transformation was quietly affected in the method of supplying Ledbury with water from Massington Pumping Station. Before this transformation, the pumping station was filled with clamour from the diesel engines and thumping of the pumping shafts. Today the place is peaceful. The new machinery, installed under the humdrum description of electrification, is in fact a robot, possessing what appears to be human intelligence. Ledbury Reporter, March 2, 1951.

25 years ago

THE big Shaw and Elgar Festival planned for next year, has come under fire from an environmental pressure group.

Mother Earth, a national ecological pressure group based in Malvern, announced last week that they were "geared up to fight" the international festival of music and drama scheduled to take place in Spring 1977.

They object to the "mass tourism" which would result and claim that Malvern could become a second Stratford-upon-Avon - bursting with gifts shops, tourists and litter. Malvern Gazette, March 4, 1976.

LEDBURY Town Council is starting to move into its new headquarters in the historic Church Lane precinct this weekend. Mr Dennis Wilson, the Town Clerk, has already established his office in the ground floor of the 16th Century building. It is expected that a larger, adjoining room will be ready for use for council meetings in April. Ledbury Reporter, March 4, 1976.