25 YEARS AGO

JUNE 10, 1994

BUSINESS DECLINE: Over half of traders in Bridport are suffering a decline in business.

West Dorset Council’s operations marketing manager, Eugene Barnes, said: “Well over half of the 90 who have replied so far have noticed a decrease in trade. They feel Bridport is short of parking spaces and that short stay charges are a little too high. More than half of traders feel they have been adversely affected by the out of town supermarket.”

PREIST HISTORY: A congregation of 2,000 will witness history being made in Salisbury Cathedral when 38 women - among them Bridport curate the Rev Jacqueline Curtis - are ordained as priests.

The candidates will be the first women in Salisbury Diocese to become priests and not since the Reformation have so many priests been ordained together in Salisbury Cathedral.

RAILWAY CAMPAIGN: A campaign to revive the Bridport to Maiden Newton branch railway line was stepped up this week with a 400-signiture petition.

The petition was formulated by the Bridport Branch Line Railway Society, which wants the line to be rebuilt in four stages at a total estimated cost of £4,750,000.

50 YEARS AGO

JUNE 6, 1969

PUBLIC FORUM: For the first time for at least 20 years, members of the public were in the public gallery at a meeting of Beaminster Parish Council.

It was a long vigil for the four spectators. The meeting lasted for three hours and five minutes - one of the longest sittings on record.

WORLD RECORD: A west Dorset vicar once held the world flying record for crossing the Atlantic from West to East.

The Rev. G. V. Syer, vicar of Whitechurch Canonicorum, trained to be a pilot under the Empire Training Scheme in Australia and Canada during the early war years.

He was the first of the pupils to make the crossing from Gander in Newfoundland to Peterswick in Scotland. He did it in seven hours and 40 minutes.

LOYAL COMPANION: A two-and-a-half-year-old Lyme Regis youngster went missing for over three hours - but was never alone.

While police, local farmers and Woodroffe schoolboys searched for little Joseph Curtis, Dede, the family dog, kept constant watch on him until he was found by 14-year-old Richard Austin, a Woodroffe School pupil.