Lothersdale: An Image Of England

It is a tiny village in the Yorkshire Pennines, yet it was already established when the Domesday Book was compiled. Its land was farmed by the Vikings and usurped by Normans. It has sent men to the wars from Flodden and Agincourt to Gallipoli and Alamein. It sheltered Quakers from persecution; gave Charlotte Bronte a job as governess; today its farmers grapple with the Common Market Agricultural Policy. The people of Lothersdale make their contribution to the programme in their own forthright way. ' Nobody's ever heard of Lothersdale,' says a local farmer but if the spirit of England is alive and flourishing it is in a place like this.