Mr Robert Clark was a member of a family who had been farmers on the Morpeth Castle estate of the Earle of Carlisle for 300 years.

His father, grandfather and great grandfather were tenants of Park House Farm, which formed part of what was known as the Great East Park of the Barons of Morpeth.

They were not only farmers, but also did a large business as timber merchants when wood was in great demand for ship building at Blyth, and on the banks of the Tyne.

They purchased extensively in oak and other timbers whose bark was in demand for tanning, a trade that was of great extent and importance in Morpeth for centuries.

They also did a big business in brushwood or undergrowth of plantations and copses, as the dressed rods of hazel and others were in great demand at the collieries and wharves for the making of corves, in which coal was raised from the pits and lowered into the ships.

Mr Clark left the Park House in 1872, and settled in Bullers Green, Morpeth, where for some time he continued to buy and sell timber.

Clarks wood wagons were a well-known feature in the trade of Morpeth, and a wide district lying north, south and east of the town.

He prided himself on the quality of his horses and on the steadiness of the wagoners he employed. Though their work in woods and along rough ways was often highly dangerous, no serious accident ever happened to them.

For more than 30 years he farmed a considerable acreage in what was formerly the West Park of Morpeth Castle, in connection with which he had a dairy of fine shorthorns. That he gave up, but only relinquished his holding on February 12, 1907, and at the end of February, 1907, his horses, wagons and farm implements were sold by Messrs Robert Donkin and Son.

Mr Clark was in poor health then, and sadly passed away at his home in Bullers Green at the age of 77. His wife eventually died too, in 1915.

This week we look at one of the more interesting characters from South East Northumberland's history. But can anyone cast any more light on why he had his unusual name?

Billy the Whaler was one of Newbiggin's real old notable characters.

Here we have two photographs of Billy. On the right, we have Billy at the sea front. On the left, he is seen posing with two Newbiggin fisher-lasses, Bella Jefferson and Ann Wake Jefferson.

Following on from last week, we now look at Longhirst Church. After the Lawson family settled at Longhirst in the early 1800s, one of their sons, Edward, became a clergyman, and for 23 years he lived and worked among the people of the village.

He finally decided to provide them with a church of their own, for they had always belonged to the parish of Bothal, and had to walk to church there.

Work was started on this new church in 1873, and in the following year it was completed and named the Church of St John the Evangelist. In 1876, when the Rev A Field was vicar, the church was consecrated by the Bishop of Durham.

THERE has been a church at Bothal, near Morpeth, since early Saxon times, and some stones used in the first building, as well as three stone coffins of the period, can still be seen.

One of these coffins is considered unique, as it is only large enough for a child, and there is little evidence that ordinary Saxon children were buried in the same manner as adults.

An early Norman church at Bothal is believed to have been destroyed by raiding Scots in 1138, and the early English building which replaced it suffered a similar fate at the hands of Scots king William the Lion and his men in 1174.

In March 1849, fisherman at Cullercoats found floating in the sea a fish of "uncommon length and of silvery and dazzling brightness".

It was later identified as one of the rare Gymmetrus species, 12ft 5in long, 13in in depth and three inches thick, with a crest of 14in in height.

The fish caught at Cullercoats in 1849

In 1846, other fishermen had caught off Alnmouth the first specimen in British waters of Trichiuvus Lepturus (the Blade Fish), 13ft 9in long.

William Carr was without doubt the most remarkable man in the history of Blyth.

Willie "Samson of England," was in his prime reputed to be the strongest man in the world.

Strongman William Carr

He was born on April 3, 1756, at Hartley Old Engine, half a mile from Old Hartley. Willie was the son of a blacksmith, who soon afterwards moved his family to Blyth to live.

What a shame to read about Tony, said to be the last pit pony alive to finally die himself.

Having worked with pit ponies underground myself, I was one of the chosen few to get a glimpse of their life underground.

I remember Tony very well as I do the others that left underground at Ellington in Northumberland, which was the very last deep mine to close in the Northumberland coalfield.

How many locals or visitors knew that Ashington possessed one of the largest cellars in the country?

In the past, hundreds of people would stand and pass its walls and never realise. This cellar (pictured) was beneath the Grand Hotel and in 1932 William Harvey was the drayman. He first came to the premises in about 1916.

Mr Harvey had first worked as a drayman for four years with Bass & Co Ltd, then worked for 12 years with the Victoria Breweries.

One question I am often asked and indeed surprised by is 'What exactly is a proggie mat then?'.

I am surprised because I assume that everyone already knows what a proggie mat is. Then I realise that it is just one of those items or expressions that you grew up with totally unaware that there is another world beyond the borders of County Durham and Northumberland where people don't speak Geordie.

If you are a Geordie then you already know and no doubt your mother made them or had them made for her by a female relative, and it probably was the thing you wiped your feet on when you came in from the back yard or garden when your byeuts [boots] were aal covered in clarts.

Tanner Milburn, uncle of Jackie Milburn, England football international and Newcastle United centre-forward, died at his home in Laburnum Terrace, Ashington, in January 1949.

He was buried at Seaton Hirst churchyard. His four footballer sons, George, Jack, James and Stan, acted as underbearers.

The Milburn family in the 1950s

Tanner Milburn was a well-known sportsman, but his first and foremost love was football. His death, at the age of 62 years, was, therefore, a great loss to this sport.