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In February 2025 we wrote about how wonderful it would be to get the bottle kiln outside the Burton fired up again. The kiln was a millennium project, designed to celebrate Bideford’s ceramic heritage, and firings took place regularly till about 2013. Since then, it has lain empty and rather abandoned but now the tradition…
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Congratulations to Bideford Town Council maintenance team who won first prize in the Bideford Carnival float competition for their impressive replica of Revenge, the ship Sir Richard Grenville famously defended to his death off the island of Flores in the Azores. Grenville’s reputation as one of Elizabeth I’s fiercest and bravest commanders is derived from…
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With warnings of the El Niño weather system bringing heavy rain and storms this winter, the Environment Agency held a public information event explaining the work they will be undertaking to help keep Bideford safe from flooding. Major construction works are about to start as part of the Kenwith Valley Flood Scheme to update the…
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On the site which is now the Rose Saltern on Bridgeland Street (Wetherspoons) the original buildings dated back to when the street was first laid out in 1691. This is one of the sites we’ll be featuring next Thursday 17 September as we celebrate a Heritage Open Day in Bridgeland Street. The original building was…
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In preparation for Bridgeland Street Open Day on 17 September, our research continues. One surprising finding is that, although it was built for merchants and well known for its solicitors and doctors, it was actually a street of women! In 1861 about three quarters of the adults living there were women, including almost all the…
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Bidefordians are rightly proud of the antiquity of our Grammar School, celebrated on a plaque attached to Bridge Buildings, where the school once stood. But that history hides an uncomfortable truth – that the school was for boys only and there was no similar provision for girls. Bideford Grammar School only started to admit girls…
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Have you ever noticed a brass plaque outside 24 Bridgeland Street, which reads ‘Rooker and Bazeley, Solicitors’? The antique Gothic script in the word ‘solicitors’ suggests there is a long history attached to the building, as indeed there is in houses up and down what is one of Bideford’s most emblematic streets. The difference is…
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It is good news that Westward Ho! beach has been awarded the prestigious Blue Flag status for the 23rd year running and a huge accolade for the many local people and organisations who keep our natural heritage safe and clean. But news has also arrived that Westward Ho! is one of the worst beaches in the…
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It’s great news that the Waverley is coming to Bideford again on 15 June and we would love to see more historic ships visit our ancient port alongside the SS Freshspring. Last week, seven of us from Bideford, including both town and district councillors, visited a ‘Factory-Museum’ in northern Spain specialised in traditional shipbuilding, to…
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Proposals to create a Trust Port for the whole Taw and Torridge estuary have sparked a search for a historical document dating from the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. When proponents of the Trust Port addressed a packed meeting in Appledore recently, they were told in no uncertain terms that residents had a historic right…
