GOING, going, gone … One by one, the pleasure spots of long ago are drifting into obscurity, through closure, demolition or name-change.

Long gone from the Penrith street scene are the Beechwood and Dayson’s milkbars, the multi-purpose Drill Hall, the YMCA and the Regent Cinema.

Now they have been joined on the scrapheap of memories of youth, in the post-war years, by the Alhambra — although this loss is in name alone!

For the Middlegate cinema, known as the Alhambra for 100 years, has been renamed Lonsdale Cinemas, Opera Bingo. The sudden change has sparked irritation, perplexity, bafflement and exasperation!

For many Penrithians, the Alhambra was part of growing up. As children, they paid threepence or sixpence to attend the Saturday afternoon matinee, complete with cowboy serial, and as they progressed in life, they moved to the more expensive back stalls or the circle.

Courting couples spent many hours in the semi-darkness of the town’s first cinema, which had earlier served as a skating rink, theatre and public hall.

A local entrepreneur, William Forrester, created the Alhambra on the site of a former brewery, over a century ago.

The Alhambra has always seemed intrinsic and engrained, part of the legend and tradition of town.

Name changes are not new in Penrith. Councillors in the distant past considered Lovers’ Lane rather too suggestive and substituted Elm Terrace. In a more acceptable switch, Station Road gave way to Ullswater Road.

Wetheriggs School, on the Wetheriggs estate, was re-christened North Lakes by the governors. And after many years as the Dog and Duck, the pub in Burrowgate is now called Last Orders.

Name-changing is invariably accompanied by claims that “images” will somehow be improved after many years.

Watch out for Penrith Beacon and the Musgrave Monument!

CATTLE PLAGUE IN 1714

A question-mark has always surrounded the slaughter policy in dealing with farm animals infected with foot and mouth disease and other cattle plagues.

The doubt existed 200 years ago, according to an old document sent to this columnist by George Newbold, Kirkby Stephen.

The author of the article, Richard Smith, Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, claimed that following an outbreak of rinderpest in 1714, the slaughter policy was initiated by Thomas Bates, a “surgeon royal”.

Smith wrote: “Although the infected animals were slaughtered and burnt, the epidemic continued unabated.

“Mr. Bates had by chance, in 1714, unknowingly discovered that viruses like foot and mouth were spread by burning infected carcases.”

So the carcases were buried, 15 to 20 feet deep, and covered in quick lime, and the disease died out.

Two centuries on, the best means of fighting foot and mouth is still a contentious issue, with vaccination considered a possible alternative.

NEWS STORY OF YEAR?

The most memorable news stories are not about death and disaster, murder and mayhem.

More appealing by far are offbeat stories, which embody the remarkable or the unique and have happy endings.

Extraordinary tales like last week’s much publicised episode about a dramatic rescue on Ullswater when a red squirrel, struggling in the water, 300 yards from shore, probably owed its life to the occupants of a passing pleasure boat.

They threw the little charmer a rope, enabling him to climb on board and hitch a lift to safety!

And there were pictures to prove it really happened.

The totally worthless View from a King Street Window award for the strangest news story of 2007 must go to the red and his rescuers.

Such stories occur only occasionally to amaze the readership.

A personal favourite among local reports of the bizarre and unlikely was the tale of a Penrith cricketer who, by running from field to field, somehow managed to play in two matches at the same time, batting and bowling in both.

The late George Veitch, a master at Ullswater School, hit national news headlines through this unique achievement.

Another freakish story, carried by many daily papers at the time, followed a road crash on Kemplay Bank, just south of Penrith, when the “vehicle” involved was a bath, which had been converted into a car by a party of students to make a trip from John O’Groats to Lands End.

PC Geoff Harrington, of the motor patrol, road tested the bath before allowing the group to continue their journey over Shap Fell.

Just one more example of the idiosyncratic, again from the sphere of cricket, was the story of a batsman who seemed set to make a big score in a match at Edenhall — but declared his innings in order to get back to the farm to milk the cows.

Thankfully, the task of the local reporter isn’t just about courts and council meetings.