The Wiltshire Times celebrated its 150th birthday by putting editor Toby Granville in the stocks.

Anniversary festivities kicked off at Trowbridge's annual May Fair when readers - and staff - had the chance to throw wet sponges at Toby to raise money for a charity fund being set up by the paper.

The newspaper staff are in the process of raising £20,000 to create The Wiltshire Times 150 Fund. It will be invested to provide small grants to some of the many groups and organisations which help readers but may be unable to get funds elsewhere.

The newspaper, now owned by Newsquest, was founded by printer Benjamin Lansdown and remained in his family until great grandson Michael, the fifth Lansdown to be editor and the fourth generation of the family to work on the paper, retired in 1981.

The eight-page first edition, then a monthly penny publication called the Trowbridge Advertiser, was published on May 6, 1854, and is being reproduced in full inside an anniversary supplement going out with the paper.

The newspaper turned weekly in 1885 and after several name changes became the Wiltshire Times in 1880.

Birthday celebrations include a staff party, an anniversary beer on sale in selected Wadworth's pubs during May, and a charity walk.

Readers have also been able to get in on the act with the Wiltshire Times lined up to guest at a number of community events through the year, as well as a reader competition to win £150 of Tesco vouchers each week for 10 weeks.

A book featuring pictures from the paper's photographic archives, which date back to the employment of the first staff photographer in 1932, will be published later this year.

And the newspaper has already featured in a spring exhibition at Trowbridge Museum which included memorabilia, pictures and artifacts from the Wiltshire Times' history.

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