Planet Ryder - The Home of Peter Ryder & Friends

Planet Ryder - Home of Peter Ryder and Friends

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Historic Building Work

Memoirs of a Moldywarp

Memoirs of a Moldywarp - Episodes of Underground Exploration

The Cross Slabs of Brancepeth

The Cross Slabs of Brancepeth.. after the fire, a major archaeological discovery

Publications

Elaine and Peter publish as "Broomlee Publications". There are now two books for sale - see below - but there are still ISBN numbers available if you would like to publish through our imprint. Contact Elaine via her e-mail: elryder@broomlee.org

This is Pete’s caving book; you can buy it here for £8.75. . It is about caving, that is, the practise of going down into natural limestone caves, exploring then, mapping them, and generally enjoying the underground environment, and the company of like-minded people who also find this is one of their pleasures. It is not a scientific treatise, and does not seek to relate events that changed the world. Writing it was merely a pleasurable exercise, to some extent self-indulgent, which enabled the author to relive in mind forty years of speleology without suffering the pain that reliving it in body would have meant.

Peter Ryder is a founder member of the Moldywarps Speleological Group. Cluff, who did the drawings, is an old school friend and also an the original Moldywarps, who cartoons full time (you can see his work every day in ‘The Northern Echo’ but has also figured in such august publications as Punch and Private Eye).

Please click here to read the preface >

The Cross Slabs of Brancepeth . . .
after the fire, a major archaeological discovery
by Peter F Ryder

Price is £5.00 plus £1.00 postage and packing

When St Brandon's Church at Brancepeth in County Durham was gutted by fire in September 1998 the virtually complete destruction of its unique fittings and furnishings was one of the greatest art/historical losses that the North East has suffered in the last century or so.

However, as the burned-out church was slowly reconstructed, literally dozens of medieval cross slab grave covers came to light, eventually totalling over a hundred. Peter supervised archaeological recording throughout the reconstruction, and in this book describes and discusses this remarkable collection of medieval monuments, and what their varied and beautiful cross designs, emblems and symbols might mean.

Also included is a section detailing how the post-fire recording aided our understanding of the complex structural history of the church itself.

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Memoirs of a Moldywarp

The death and resurrection of St Helen's, Eston and the Old Churches of Cleveland, together with an appendix detailing their remarkable Cross Slabs

The Death and Resurrection of St Helen's, Eston

Publications

Elaine and Peter publish as "Broomlee Publications". There are now four books for sale - see below - but there are still ISBN numbers available if you would like to publish through our imprint. Contact Elaine via her e-mail: elryder@broomlee.org

A book that does just what its terse and snappy title says. The sad story of how Eston, on Teesside, lost its medieval parish church, the archaeological wonders revealed when that church was taken down – or rather ‘deconstructed’ – and its re-erection as part of the North of England Open Air at Beamish in County Durham. Then a good look at the remarkable group of old churches from which Eston came, and their shared history and character, and finally, joy of joys, drawings of their remarkable collections of medieval cross slabs, not only historical treasures but art objects in themselves……

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An essential handbook to any ecclesiologist who rambles the Cleveland countryside

Memoirs of a Moldywarp

A Walk with St Cuthbert

Publications

How a small group of walkers on St Cuthbert’s Way, the increasingly-popular long-distance footpath from Melrose to Holy island, were accompanied by none other than the Saint himself… Buy it here for £4.50 plus p&p

With a front cover by Cluff, an old school friend, who is a well-known cartoonist (see his work in Private Eye) The Foreword is by Adrian Plass, author of many books including the well known The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass Aged 37 3/4.