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Camborne Trevithick Day is on Saturday April 25th 2020.  The 36th year of a one day festival celebrating the town’s mining and industrial heritage and named after its most famous son Richard Trevithick, pioneer of high pressure steam and builder of the first road and railway locomotives. Dancing, entertainment, bands, lots of steam engines including a full sized working replica of Trevithick’s Puffing Billy of 1801 and much much more.

After an absence of a number of years, two sets of entertainers historically known as The White Boys, brought back the traditional Manx version of the mummers play to the towns and villages of the Isle of Man.

Although not distinctive to the Island, it's loosely based on a version of the theme of St George and the Dragon (although the latter is never seen) with some local anecdotes threaded amongst the story - which has been part of Manx tradition for many years.

The annual ceremony commemorating the anniversary of the death of William Christian took place at Hango Hill, just outside Castletown, close to the site of both his execution and his now demolished home at Ronaldsway.

His death in the seventeenth century tends to provoke comment, with ongoing discussion as to whether he was a traitor or a patriot, although many agree that he saved the Island from bloodshed.

Minister for Education and Skills, Joe McHugh, this week announced plans for the development of the first comprehensive Irish-medium education policy with an ambitious target of doubling the number of young people in Irish medium schools to 120,000.

"Gaelic is vital to Scotland's future and a forum launched yesterday heard that the Scottish Government will ensure that those who want to learn and speak the language are given the support they need.

Despite being only the second year running this event, the Isle of Man Young Farmers' Christmas Tractor Run captured the imagination of the Manx public, as fifty working tractors left the Island's farms to raise funds for local charities.

Gaily decorated for the festive season, they gathered along Marine Parade in Peel and at Tynwald Mills in St John's before embarking upon a dedicated route along the TT course, with large numbers of spectators gathering at various points along the route.

The official website of the EU has chronicled the march of the Irish Language towards full status within the European Union:

" Irish has been an EU language since 2005 with a limited status, meaning that only a small share of documents were translated into Irish. In December 2015, at the request of the Irish government, the Council decided to increase the material available in Irish to progressively reach full status for the Irish language in the EU by 2022."

The Scottish National Party (SNP) won a landslide victory in Scotland in the British general election held on 12th December. They won 48, that is 80%, of Scotland's 59 seats. Although  the Conservatives won a significant majority across the rest of the UK, they lost seven of the 13 seats they previously held in Scotland.

As most people are only too well aware. The 2019 United Kingdom General Election was held on Thursday 12 December. Three of the Celtic countries, Scotland, Cornwall and Wales also went to the polls as part of that election. Brittany, Ireland and Isle of Man are, of course, not part of the UK and did not participate in the election. However, that part of Ireland in the northeast where Britain retains a colonial presence did take part. The result was significant.

A star and planet will be given Manx Gaelic names after being chosen in an international competition. The International Astronomical Society held the competition, to name a star and planet. The winners were two classes of eight and nine-year-olds from Cronk-y-Berry school in the Isle of Man (Manx: Mannin). The star, WASP-13, will be named Gloas, the Manx for 'shine', and planet WASP-13b will be now be known as Cruinlagh, which is Manx for 'orbit'.