Bethany Wadlow
Do you agree with Smith’s interpretation of the effects of the opening of the Goole canal on Selby?
In this answer I will study all the sources and then make a decision whether they agree or disagree with Peter Smith’s interpretation that Selby lost trade to the Goole canal. I will then make my own conclusion whether or not I agree with Smith’s interpretation.
Source A agrees with Smith’s interpretation simply because of the fact that it says ‘and Selby fares the worst’ and therefore it is agreeing with Smith that Selby suffered when the Goole canal was opened. It is a rhyme that started in 1826. It could be quite useful because it was written at the time of the opening of Goole canal, however this was too early to reflect on its impact on Selby and tell whether it had made any effect or impact on Selby itself. It is also useful because it gives us an insight into the opinions of the people of Goole, and more times than not there are some truths in rumors. The source is fairly accurate when talking about Goole turning from a marsh into a seaport town because Goole did increase in size at the time of the opening on the Goole canal. And because the first two lines of the rhyme are true it does make me wonder if the last two lines could also be true. Though on the other had there are some very important reasons why source A is incredibly unreliable. Mainly it has no author or issue date, it was started by the citizens of Goole at the time of the opening of the Goole canal and therefore I consider it to be biased towards Goole. And because of that fact I also consider it to be unreliable. Of course the people of Goole will want their town to sound better than Selby. They may have even been aiming to convince people that Goole is better than Selby with the rhyme so that people might decide to move there, after all Goole did only have 5 houses and 25 citizens before e the opening of the canal. The last line of the rhyme states ‘and Selby fares the worst’ I find it hard to see any truth in that statement because there had not been a sufficient enough amount of time for any effects to take place on Selby due to the canal, as it had only just been opened. The main problem with the source is that it is missing key factors such as solid facts, figures or statistics and because the source is missing these vital things it is fairly un useful in helping me to find out if the opening of the Goole canal did have any effect on Selby, and the source does not actually even mention the Goole canal at all.
