John Newth

Thomas Hardy sits permanently, wearing a slightly gloomy expression and with his hat and a book on his lap, on a tree stump at Top o’ Town where four roads meet. On the plinth are inscribed simply his name and dates, 1840-1928.  The great novelist and poet is inextricably linked

Geologists love the Dorset coast for its variety and oddities. Among those oddities are the shale cliffs of Kimmeridge Bay. The shale is rich in oil, which can create spontaneous fires that smoulder for years. The shale has sometimes been commercially exploited and oil from it fuelled the street lights

20 August 2011, 1.50 pm. The crowds watching the Bournemouth Air Festival are buzzing after a spectacular display by the RAF aerobatic team, the Red Arrows. The team is returning to its temporary base at Bournemouth International Airport. Making a tight turn, Red 4, Flight Lieutenant Jon Egging, blacks

Still rather an isolated town, Beaminster was even more isolated before the building of the Horn Hill tunnel almost 200 years ago. To the north, in fact, it was almost cut off by the 600-ft Horn Hill. There was a road over the hill, but it was precipitously steep.  A

This 200-year-old notice is in St Andrew’s church in Trent. Most people know what clogs were, but pattens? They were wooden platforms with straps that fastened them over shoes. Often an iron ring was set in the sole to raise the wearer above the mud, and as some clogs

We all have our favourite holiday spot, and kings of England are no different. George III’s was Weymouth. He visited first because sea bathing had been recommended by his doctor (a Weymouth man) as a cure for his recurring mental illness, and George became very fond of the town,