THE GRAND new staircase welcoming guests into the newly refurbished Tennants of Leyburn gleamed, the cabinets full of an array of exhibits from telescopes to war memorabilia, and staff were busily setting up the Garden Rooms for the arrival of a celebrity guest.

The antique valuation day at Tennants, Leyburn, from 9am until 3pm today (Thursday, October 2) was a celebration of the opening of the new wing, 20 years after a similar event to mark the opening of the existing saleroom.

Arriving early armed with two important pieces of Northern Echo history – a framed front page from the first edition of the paper and a letter from esteemed editor William Thomas Stead sent in 1871 to a friend in Darlington, debating whether or not to take up the position – I waited for Bargain Hunt host turned Strictly Come Dancing star, Tim Wonnacott.

Tim was keen to see the memorabilia I had brought along, pouring over the tiny script of the Echo’s first front page, printed on New Year’s Day 1870, and imagining what significance some of the traders' advertising on the page may have had at the time.

He said: “It’s a wonderful piece of history and takes you back to a time when readers would have taken in every word of the paper.”

Looking at WT Stead’s letter – sent to a Congregational minister in Darlington ahead of his appointment as editor to ask his advice on Darlington, and on leaving his career as a clerk in a shipping office in Newcastle to take up the role – Tim said if it were presented for valuation with 30 others, plus other possessions, it could be worth about £200.

“This is all part of the embroidery of the story – but there really needs to be a group. More letters that detail his life would make it more interesting,” he said.

“Handwritten material is popular though, many people collect autographs of their idols, literary enthusiasts enjoy collecting letters.

“Nowadays valuers like to delve further into the history of an item before they put a value on it.”

Tim was interested to hear about what is rumoured to be WT Stead’s editors’ chair, which I didn’t manage to bring with me, and said the chair, along with several more letters if we could get our hands on them, could be of value to fans of newspaper history.

Before leaving, I wished him luck ahead of appearing in this weekend’s instalment of Strictly Come Dancing, with dancer partner Natalie Lowe.

He said: “It’s really not my area at all - sometimes I feel like a right old wally.

“I said to Pixie Lott, ‘I’m three times your age and you have 2.4 million followers on Twitter’.

“I’ve never been a dancer so the competition is quite mismatched but it is lovely to be there, I feel energised."