VILLAGE historian Doris Riley is taking a step back from Cross Hills Naturalists after more than 50 years.

Eighty-year-old Miss Riley has given up writing the group's press reports as well as leading rambles, although she will remain a member.

"I always said I would give up writing the reports and the walks when I was 80," she said.

Miss Riley, who lives in Sutton, is the author of several local history books, including A Home Spun Yarn.

She left school aged 14 and went to work at Greenroyd Mill, where she remained for more than 30 years before being made redundant in 1980.

It was while she was working in the mill that she developed an interest in nature.

"When I worked in the mill it was so nice to get out in the fresh air and look at things. The bluebells, even the dandelions in the fields, and the blossom in the trees," she said.

She joined the naturalists group and became a keen member, leading historical rambles around the area.

Miss Riley, who also writes a regular column for the Sutton Village newsletter, has helped students research items of local history.

She wrote her first local history book for the Women's Institute in 1973.

She says she writes from memory, backed up with research from Cliffe Castle in Keighley, Skipton's Craven Museum and by talking to other people.

"I'm not an academic, I left school at 14, but I do enjoy writing. It's something I can sit down and do," she said.

The Cross Hills Naturalists Group, which meets at St Peter's Methodist Church, holds meetings on alternate Saturdays inside from October to March and outside from April to September.

Its 100 members enjoy lectures on subjects ranging from deforestation to local history, and in the summer take trips to places such as Quarry Bank and go on historical rambles.