RETIRED policeman John Walker had a pang of guilt when he saw last week’s Memories, which featured an article on Bert Harland, who had a fruit and veg stall on Bishop Auckland market in the 1960s and 1970s. Our photograph, from August 1968, also showed the Market Place pavement outside Doggarts sprinkled with no parking signs.

“In 1968, I was a brand new Probationer Police Constable at Bishop Auckland, and I was given my orders,” he says. There had been a complaint about stall-holders leaving their vehicles all day in the Market Place, and even an array of no parking signs was not getting the message across.

“One Market Day morning, I stood in uniform outside the old Northern Gas shop at the bottom of Newgate Street, watching the stall holders unload their goods and set up their stalls.

“As ordered, I then observed for some time any stall-holder who did not move their vehicle after they had set up and commenced trading. The stall-holders knew I was there but it never occurred to them why.

“I then approached a stall-holder whose wagon had not been moved, and I spoke to him about parking on the clearly visible "No Waiting signs" after he had set up his stall and started trading. The result was me reporting said stall holder for contravening said parking restrictions – it may well have been Mr Harland, as I remember the stall in question was on Doggarts corner.

“I also remember feeling sorry for reporting this man as I could not see a major problem.

“The stall-holder pleaded not guilty at Bishop Auckland Magistrates Court and I believe it was one of my first appearances in the witness box to give evidence. I was hoping the defendant would get off, but sadly he was found guilty.

“The following day The Northern Echo ran the story, possibly with your photograph.

“Can I apologise now to Bert’s son, Graham, if it was his father I reported as I really felt the stall-holder had a raw deal.

“Sadly, parking in Bishop Auckland now seems to be a major revenue raising issue for the local authorities even to this day.”

ALSO featuring last week was the Bishop Auckland Odeon which, it was suggested, was built in 1938 on quicksand.

Tom Sellars, now in Guisborough, was the Gaumont chain of cinemas relief projectionist in the 1950s and 1960s, and regularly wound up showing films at the Bishop Odeon.

“The first time I went, in about 1958, there were dustbins either side of the proscenium arch catching rainwater that was coming in through the great cracks in the roof,” he recalls. “I went back in 1961, and the crack had moved so I could get my fingers in right down to the palm of my hand. Engineers came and tested the foundations and discovered it was sinking at the rate of 2cms a year.”

This subsidence could have been due to quicksand, or it could have been because the Odeon, at the top of Tenters Street, backed on to the railway.

“The 6pm Bishop Auckland to Crook express got up speed just behind us,” says Tom, “and every time it did, the picture on the screen was shaking like anything.”

The Odeon shut in 1983 and was demolished in 1984. A supermarket, next to the Government skyscraper, is now on its site.

MEMORIES readers have responded to last week’s front page picture of a cross-dressing clown inside the Odeon’s foyer in 1950 in the way they do best: by naming the person involved.

The Northern Echo: IT'S MAGIC: Local hypnotist Ossie Rae is the chap with the balloons at Bishop Auckland Odeon in 1950. Next to him is Mr Rogers, the theatre manager
Local hypnotist Ossie Rae is the chap with the balloons at Bishop Auckland Odeon in 1950. Next to him is Mr Rogers, the theatre manager

“The man with the balloons on his head was Ossie Rae, a local hypnotist and magician, who used to do shows in pubs and clubs and theatres,” says Ernie.

Can anyone tell us any more about Ossie?

AND then there’s been some quite brilliant googling from Sarah Richards who was intrigued by last week’s postcard from America, which showed a grand mansion in “Darlington”.

The Northern Echo: IN DARLINGTON: The Crocker Mansion in New Jersey in the US

But not Darlington in County Durham, as it turns out.

It is in Darlington in the township of Mawah in the county of Bergen in the state of New Jersey in the US. It is, in fact, the 75-bedroom Crocker Mansion, pictured above, which has recently been restored, and is truly stupendous. 

It was built in 1901 by the multi-millionaire railroad pioneer George Crocker on a large estate he’d bought from New York businessman Alfred B Darling – a man so modest, he called his estate “Darlington”.