HERE are the stories that made the Northwich Guardian headlines 100, 50, and 25 years ago this week.

100 years ago

A MAN charged with being drunk in charge of a horse and cart admitted that he was ‘a little the worse for it’.

He was fined 20 shillings for his offence in Willow Green Lane, Little Leigh.

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A FORMER soldier returned from war and told magistrates he had forgotten he couldn’t carry a gun in day-to-day life.

He told Eddisbury Petty Sessions he had ‘come to pay the fine’ when asked whether he had anything to say in his defence.

He added: “I have been that used to carrying a gun without a licence this last four years that I thought I could do so now.”

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A GUARDIAN reader wrote to the editor in defence of the Middlewich war memorial. A reader had suggested the committee intended to spend the donated funds on other means, but a letter in response put paid to the theory.

50 years ago

COUNTY councillors told the Government that part of Weaver Hall should be demolished ‘as it will tend to perpetuate ... such stigma as continues to attach to former workhouses’.

Northwich councillors had expressed their wishes to preserve the building, but restoration was estimated at upwards of £25,000.

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A 17-YEAR-OLD was fined £10 after crashing into a police car – but kept his licence.

He told officers his foot has slipped off the clutch and he lost control, as he swerved into the police car waiting at the Bull Ring traffic lights.

25 years ago

CHESHIRE County Council was ‘facing the axe’ as a bid to create a new ‘super council’ of 250,000 people.

The two-tier authority, of which Vale Royal was a district, looked set to go.

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WINNINGTON Park FC officially folded, a season shy of its 50th anniversary.

The club withdrew from the Mid Cheshire League after failing to attract a main sponsor, and fielded just nine players in its last game – a 3-0 defeat to Barnton.