Side-tracked in local newspapers...

[Feen]

Local newspapers are fantastic resources for family history but am I alone in finding it's terribly easy to get side-tracked while trawling them for family info? While it's obviously a good thing to learn more about local history and the environment our ancestors lived in, this means I never get to achieve half of what I set out to do on any one day in the archives...

I suppose my gripe here is really lack of time, not the fact of being easily side-tracked.

I was looking through the Kilmarnock Herald for obituaries of several members of my Cuthbertson/Wark family who died within the space of a few weeks in 1883 and happened upon the following report, which made me smile:

"Strange Freaks by Sheep

On Wednesday afternoon while three tups and some lambs belonging to Mr Thomas Paton, flesher, Portland Street, were being driven to the slaughterhouse, the foremost of the three tups bolted and leaped through the glass door of Messrs R C Robertson & Son, painters, the other two following suit. The glass door was smashed to pieces, and the wonder is that more damage was not done as various valuable mirrors were in the shop and quite unprotected. The sheep were little the worse of their adventure, their large horns protecting them."

In a 1911 edition of the same newspaper I found a promotional article for a product called Zam-Buk. Headed "Prostrated by Itching Piles - Zam-Buk Ends A Wife's Torture", it featured Mrs Margaret Finniemore, a washerwoman from Plymouth, telling how an operation to cure her piles had seemed the only hope until she discovered "this grand balm", which took the pain and itching away. Did Mrs Finniemore actually exist, I wonder? Her address was given in the article as 101 Tavistock Place.

Has anyone else got any quirky news items or ads to share?

[cristol]

Hi Feen

You are not alone in being easily distracted ! I find that with every aspect of this family history bug we seem to have. This is borne out by all the others on this forum who I’m quite sure have loads of their own research still to do, yet find the time to unravel all our own problems and queries too – which is why I’m sure that if Mrs Margaret Finniemore really did exist then her whereabouts will soon be unearthed by our brickwall bashers. The clock starts now !
Lesley

p.s. what is a tup ??

[Feen]

Hi Lesley,

A tup is a ram... I think! Or perhaps a ewe... something sheepish whatever :-)

Feen

[cristol]

I suppose Bo Peep should know - perhaps we should ask ?

Lesley

[Procat]

Perhaps it is a young tup per ware?

[AnnB]

A tup is an uncastrated male sheep

Best wishes
Ann

[Feen]

Thanks for the clarification AnnB!

Procat, if there'd been one tup per ware that day, Messrs Robertson & Son would've been well out of pocket!

Something I remember cropping up quite a bit in those late C19/early C20 Ayrshire newspapers was rather a preoccupation with Mormons - locally they were said on one occasion to be using the public baths for baptisms... there was also a report on the "unfortunate" young wife of a Mormon worthy in Utah, who had left her husband. Whether the journalist thought she was "unfortunate" because she had left her husband, or because the marriage was polygamous, was not very clear from the article.

The range of extremely detailed reports of world events and events in other areas of the UK also surprised me... it amused me to think that 3 x GGF Cuthbertson, carpet manufacturer and Free Church elder in Kilmarnock, had the opportunity to tut over the exploits of 2 x Great-uncle Fred, erstwhile publican turned bungling forger and attempted murderer - hundreds of miles away in Birmingham!

[Barnzzz]

I've learned a lot from the old Bristol newspapers, most of it concerning one distant ancestor, Albert, who seemed to be in court all the time. When he wasn't being taken to court himself for various misdemeanors, he was taking someone else to court. The most bizarre concerned his boot making enterprise.

His boot making 'empire' was next door to a fish gutting business. The fish gutters knocked a hole in the wall between them, to let the smell out. Albert took them to court as he believed the wall belonged to him and also because the smell was intolerable and made it difficult to work.

It was confirmed that the wall actually belonged to the fish gutters, so they were not guilty of damaging Albert's property and were entitled to make a hole in the wall if they wanted to. However, the judge also said that they were breaking the law by allowing the smell to pass from their business to Albert's!

I've no idea how they sorted this out as there was nothing more in the paper. I had lots of fun trying to find out though, as those papers are full of absolute gems. Every time I look at them I'm there for hours, completely distracted by anything and everything.

[jandy]

Zam buk was super strong ointment!!! My mum used to work in the Leeds factory, filling the tins. There was always a tin in the top drawer of grans dresser!!!!

[lizone]

ZAM-BUK also turns up in the next column to my great great great grandmother's obit in the Brighouse Echo (West Yorkshire) in 1913 ...

'Scalded foot? inflamed patches? poisoned sores? sprains? festering sores?' - apparently it's 'the greatest healer of the Twentieth Century'. I won't go into any more details - unlike the advert ....