What makes Yorkshire so special?
Is it legendary cricketer Geoff Boycott? Or our stunning scenery perhaps?
And what are the people, buildings, foodstuffs, inventions, landmarks and businsesses that make the county England’s greatest?
A new book published on October 1 attempts to answer these thorny questions.
Yorkshire’s Greatest Icons brings together the results of a major survey carried out by the Dalesman magazine to celebrate its 75th anniversary.
More than 11,000 votes were cast in a poll to find Yorkshire’s greatest icons as the debate captured the public’s imagination.
It proved so popular that the poll was even turned into a special edition of the hit BBC programme Countryfile.
Lavishly illustrated, Yorkshire’s Greatest Icons tells the inside story of 75 things the county is famous for from stainless steel to Yorkshire puddings.
Can you pass the Yorkshire citizenship test below?
It’s a book that wiull make any Tyke smile with pride.
Written by Dalesman editor Adrian Braddy who dreamed up the idea in 2013 the book also contains the personal choices of many famous Yorkshire names including Patrick Stewart, Alan Titchmarsh, Geoff Boycott and the Calendar Girls.
Mr Bradby said: “Our anniversary edition sold out within a week of the broadcast and there was a clamour for us to turn the idea into a book.
“So here, for the first time in book form, are the 75 greatest icons of Yorkshire, as voted for by the people of God’s Own Country.
“You may not agree with some of the icons detailed on the pages that follow, nor the order in which they appear, but hopefully this book acts as a starting point to a pub debate or a dinner table conversation.
“With the help of thousands of Yorkshire folk, we have had a stab at attempting to pin down some of the many elements that make Yorkshire so special.
“We restricted the list to 75 icons, simply because it was the Dalesman’s 75th birthday, but the number could just as easily have been 375 or 475.
“Yorkshire has given the world so much and we would need a far bigger book to mention everything.”
