Yorkshire Almanac 2026

Unedited excerpt

If an excerpt is used in the book, it will be shorter, edited and, where applicable, translated.

For many, the series became addictive viewing. An extract from the Western Daily Press, dated 30 January 1978, illustrates the high regard in which it was held:

Churchgoers in the village of Lowick, Cumbria, have been blessed with the chance to worship all things bright and beautiful – and then go home to ‘All Creatures Great and Small’. For the tiny Lakeland church has been given a special dispensation to hold its Sunday evening service earlier than usual so the congregation can get home in time to watch its favourite television programme.

Since the series started, there had been a decline in the numbers attending Evensong and those that turned up complained of missing the start of the programme.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

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Tags

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• All Creatures Great and Small (1978 TV series) (1) W/G ·
• BBC (3) W/G ·
• Church of England (94) W/G ·
• Comedy (drama) (9) W/G ·
• Comedy (7) W/G ·
• Cumbria (3) W/G ·
• Herriot, James (2), pseudonym of James Alfred Wight (1916-1995), Sunderland-born veterinary surgeon and author W/G ·
• Lowick, Cumbria (1) W/G ·
• North Riding of Yorkshire (51) W/G ·
• North Yorkshire (11) W/G ·
• Thirsk (14) W/G ·
• Veterinarian (2) W/G ·
• Yorkshire Dales (9) W/G ·

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

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30 July 1882: On his way to play with the Muker church band, Richard Guy of Hill Top Farm climbs over a wall to inspect a fertile heifer

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

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Dates. Malise McGuire has discovered a mention in the press (the Northern Echo? I can’t find it) of this tragedy. It is dated 4 August 1882, so Sunday was 30 July: “On Sunday at Hill Top Farm, near Gunnerside, Richard GUY went out to look at some young cattle and was soon afterwards found in a field dead. His clothes were literally torn to shreds.” I haven’t looked on Ancestry, but this is the Richard Guy born in 1833 at Scar House, Muker, and present in the 1881 census:

70. Hill Top Farm
GUY/Richard S/Head/M/47/Farmer 158 Acres/Yks Muker
GUY/Rosomond/wife/M/47/Farmers wife/Yks Muker
GUY/Thomas/son/U/20/Farmers son/Yks Muker
GUY/Robert J/son/U/17/Farmers son/Yks Muker
GUY/Richard/son//13/scholar/Yks Muker
GUY/Elizebeth/dau//8/scholar/Yks Muker

The anecdote also turns up in abbreviated form, perhaps abstracted from the above, in an outstanding book by Marie Hartley and Joan Ingilby (Hartley 1982).

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