Central Stores, North Kelsey R.I.P. When I was born, my home village in the very heart of The East Riding of Yorkshire had a population of just under four hundred. Even so, the village had plenty of services. There were three grocery stores, a post office, a confectionery shop run by Mrs Austwick, a butcher's shop run by Tommy Lofthouse, a cafe, a ladies' hairdressers, a men's barbershop, an independent cobbler's shop, Holy Trinity Church, a Methodist church, a fish and chip shop, a primary school, a doctor's surgery, a police station, two pubs, an agricultural store trading in grain and seed and a petrol station with an attached car mechanic's workshop. Because of housing developments since 1964, the village now has a population of just under 2500. It is six times bigger than it was when I was a boy. However, a lot of those former services have now gone. There is only one grocery store. The barber shop has gone along with the cobbler's, the agricul...
