Since 1982, Alf and Ann Jenkins have been writing about the industrial and social history of the Welsh border land, and last week launched their latest – From the Carthorse to Concorde and Beyond.

Alf reflects on how it all began. "In 1959, when my father was taken seriously ill I asked him to tell me how he'd acquired all the wonderful skills he had, including as a joiner and undertaker. It bolstered him a great deal, and by making all these notes I somehow got to be known by Midlands Today as someone who knew a lot about the Clee Hills dialect. "I told Peter Windows of Midlands Today how people in Ludlow, just five miles away, couldn't understand our dialect.

"I illustrated that by telling him how, at grammar school I was asked by a teacher if I was born in a cave. It destroyed my confidence and I told Peter Windows how I'd hated that teacher, Fred Reeves ever since."

After the programme Alf wondered if that had been unwise, but decided there would a million in one chance of Fred Reeves hearing it. But of course he did and "I got a letter from him saying how my knowledge of the area was extraordinary and telling me that I should write about my life and let him have a copy of the book 'before I pass on'."

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That first book, Titterstone Clees, Everyday Life, Industrial History and Dialect has had six reprints and remains the best selling local history book.

The new book, says Alf, runs to 500 pages and has 500 photographs. The idea for the book was prompted after Alf and Ann attended Speech Day at Fairfax High School, where he had first taught in 1959 and had been invited to give prizes in 2019. "On our return home, Ann and I discussed the considerable changes and developments we had experienced in our community of Orleton North Herefordshire and those of my home area Titterstone Clee Hills."

Of the many changes that have taken place, Alf says the most dramatic is probably in working patterns – "Today, just 10 men produce the same quantity of road stone from the three quarries on Clee Hill as 1,870 men produced 70 years ago."

The title of the new book was provided by Mrs Irene Wall, who Alf and Ann met some years ago. "She reminded us that she had seen great changes during her long life, from the time she had been employed as a general factotum at Orleton Manor, saying that she had "lived from the time of the carthorse to Concorde and beyond”.

On Saturday, June 10 Alf and Ann Jenkins will give a presentation at Castle Bookshop, Ludlow SY8 1AS, and on Saturday, June 17 they will be launching at Orleton C of E School at 2.30pm.