North Yorkshire

The fortnightly Saturday afternoon TV show Whirligig was the first children’s programme to be broadcast live from the BBC studios in Lime Grove, Shepherd’s Bush.

A 19th century doll’s house sold for £8500 at North Yorkshire saleroom Tennants (20% buyer’s premium) – but its real appeal came from what was inside.

The New Hall China Manufactory holds an important place in the history of English porcelain. Active from 1781-1835, it was effectively a cooperative between several Staffordshire earthenware makers, who acquired the Bristol porcelain patent and financed a factory together, first at Tunstall and then at Shelton New Hall in Hanley.

The 252-lot Natural History and Taxidermy auction at Tennants (20% buyer’s premium) on June 19 included this Victorian anthropomorphic diorama of card-playing, cigar-smoking red squirrels, c.1870-1900.

Not to be confused with the modern reissues, the original Vulcain Cricket was marketed in 1947 as the world’s first wristwatch with an alarm.

A rare ‘pocket watch’ sold by East Bristol Auctions (18% buyer’s premium) was more surveillance device than timekeeper.

Keeping cool was just one of the many uses of the Georgian and Victorian fan.

Results from two salerooms including an £18,000 longcase reflect strong demand

Among the major changes to Sworders’ auction calendar because of the coronavirus lockdown is the addition of a monthly sale of jewellery, watches and objects of vertu.

Three modestly valued works selling at regional sales including a Frank O Salisbury portrait.

Estimated at just £1000-1500, this late-17th century walnut eight-day longcase clock sold via thesaleroom.com for £11,000 at Elstob & Elstob (22% buyer’s premium) in Ripon.

Compiled by Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey of Thirkleby Park in North Yorkshire, an illustrated manuscript on archery dating from the opening years of the last century has sold for £2600. It was part of a sale held in Leyburn by Tennants (20% buyer’s premium).

With supply generally exceeding demand for Spode services – such was their abundance on tables of the 19th century middle class – prices at auction remain modest.

An album of 35 photographs relating to the Alaskan ‘Gold Rush’ of the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries sold for £1900 rather than the estimate of £50-70 in a recent North Yorkshire sale.

Limited-edition work showing Salford artist’s famous football scene nets a new high

This early 19th century portrait miniature offered for sale at Tennants (20% buyer’s premium) in Leyburn is widely believed to depict the Irish naval officer Sir Henry D’Esterre Darby (1749-1823). To the reverse is a crystal retaining a lock of hair.

Claymores (the word comes from the Scottish Gaelic claidheamh-mor meaning ‘great sword’) were the weapon of choice in the ongoing warfare between Highland clans and border skirmishes with the English from c.1400-1700.

North Yorkshire saleroom Tennants (20% buyer’s premium) got its inaugural sale of sporting art off to a good start, selling just over £100,000 worth of pictures and sculpture.

It was during the Carter, Stabler and Adams period in the 1920s-30s that some of the most memorable Poole wares were produced. Much of this Art Deco range – red earthenwares covered in a white slip and a semi-matt-glaze before decoration in a variety of Jazz Age patterns – was based on the work of chief designer Truda Carter.

Pocket guide to pleasure stimulates in Staffs and saucy memoir excites bidders in Yorks.