THIS week, we’ve raided the Staindrop packet in The Northern Echo’s photo-archive. Staindrop – “the stony valley” – is at the heart of Teesdale, almost in the shadow of Raby Castle, the Neville family’s stronghold which gave the village its prosperity.

It is a picturesque place, with the old turnpike road from Durham to Bowes running through the middle of its long, tree-lined green. Some of the houses lining the green date from the 18th Century, and many of them have ornate fanlights over their front doors.

In fact, there are so many fanlights – the semi-circular windows above the main door which became fashionable in the mid-18th Century – that Staindrop has been called the “fanlight village”. It is said that there were two craftsmen brothers competing with each other to produce the most fancy fanlight in the village.

Here’s how Staindrop looks in the Echo’s archive. If any of the pictures bring back memories, or you have any information about any aspect of them, we’d love to hear from you...