IT was 36 years ago this week that a woman declared her intention to wipe out an entire district.

These days anybody making such a pledge could expect an immediate visit from Special Branch and MI5, but the situation in Swindon in mid-August of 1980 was different.

For one thing, the person in question was a blameless senior citizen. For another, many thousands of people living in the district also wanted it wiped out.

We said: “Thamesdown councillors are facing yet another fight to give Swindon back its identity. Facing them this time is a pensioner determined to restore the good name of Swindon.

“Battling Annie Hurcomb, 84, has launched a one-woman campaign to sink the name of Thamesdown for good.”

Thamesdown had been created in the 1974 local government reorganisation which saw the end of the old Swindon Borough Council. The name and the change it represented had been widely loathed ever since. As far as government went, Swindon had effectively ceased to be a distinct entity.

Although largely unable to leave her York Road home and obliged to campaign by telephone, Mrs Hurcomb had organised a 100-signature petition which she planned to put before councillors.

She told us: “I didn’t meet one refusal. I think the name of Thamesdown is so stupid. It doesn’t mean a thing. I feel very strongly about it indeed.

“We are going to be submerged if we don’t do something about it. Eventually we shall completely lose our identity.”

Mrs Hurcombe, whose husband, brother, father and grandfather had been Railway Works veterans, was joined in her demands by local MP David Stoddart.

It would be 17 years before another local government reorganisation abolished Thamesdown.

Still in local politics, a Conservative councillor called Frank Richards reaffirmed his commitment to Margaret Thatcher’s industrial policies in spite of being caught in the fallout from them.

“Coun Richards,” we said, “one of the 250 Plessey workers and managers who have been given the chop this year following the drastic fall-off in orders for tractor pumps, says the shake-up in the economy has come years too late.”

He told us: “Although I dedicated 38 years of my life to them they were good to me. It has taken a few days to sink in, but with a world recession you have to be a realist.”

One of our more unusual images that week showed a car in the process of being flattened by a new £37,000 machine at a scrapyard in Cricklade. In those pre-internet days local newspapers were the go-to source of such novelties, just as they were for amusing photos of cats.

Our rather melancholy caption noted: “Vauxhall Viva PYD 240F probably gave many hours and miles of pleasure to its owners – but its existence came to an end in just 30 seconds.”

Some local people were inadvertently caught up in bitter upheaval on the other side of the Channel. They experienced both the good and bad in human nature.

French trawler crews were blockading their country’s ports in protest at employers’ plans to cut numbers. Just about everybody using those ports was affected.

“A day trip to France turned into a nightmare for a Swindon family,” we said.

“They were caught up in the French fishermen’s dispute – and their planned 12-hour voyage became a 24-hour round trip.

“The Varney family set off on the ferry Viking Valiant to meet their daughter, who was coming home after a three-week holiday in France.

“But the Valiant ran into trouble at Cherbourg when angry fishermen bombarded the ship with bricks, lead weights, stones and rocket flares.

“And the family watched helplessly as the ship was marooned in the middle of the harbour – with their daughter Vanessa still on shore.”

Some of the passengers, the Varneys said, had thrown missiles back at the drunken fishermen.

Eventually Vanessa was able to board another ferry for home, but then had to wait at Southampton for the return of the Viking Valiant.

Also caught up in the dispute were young couple Vivenne Witts, 18, from Watchfield, and Geoff Ralph, 17, from East Hanney in Oxfordshire.

The two were among about 800 holidaymakers stranded in Dieppe for three days.

Vivienne said: “It was absolutely awful but to be fair the fishermen were very helpful.” Geoff added: “French families opened their homes to the tourists.”

The week also saw us deliver an update on an aviation story which had been playing out in our pages since the 1960s.

Swindon man Mike Dolling, who was 46 by 1980, had long been attempting to prove his theories of human-powered flight a reality.

Some of the machines he built looked similar to ones created and successfully flown by inventors in other countries who were backed by sponsors with deep pockets.

Mr Dolling had no such resources and his creations seldom left the ground for long. He was undaunted by this, and so was his son, 18-year-old Chris.

It was Chris who featured in our latest story about the ongoing project, posing in a harness next to a lightweight pedal-driven creation. He had piloted it at the International Birdman Rally in Bognor Regis, but ended up in the sea after only a short flight.