In the last two decades of the reign of Queen Victoria, large sections of the population of England still lived in abject poverty. This was especially true of the industrialised north of the country, where the increase in the population following people seeking work in factories … | Continue reading
Z=Zealous Zealous is usually a word associated with religion these days, as in ‘Religious Zealots’. A rather old-fashioned word that has changed its meaning over time in society. In the past, ‘Zeal’ was a good thing. It made me think of brave soldiers, hard-working inventors, and … | Continue reading
Y=Yearning. I looked up this word to make sure I was using it correctly. I was. yearning /ˈjəːnɪŋ/ noun a feeling of intense longing for something. “he felt a yearning for the mountains” I have definitely yearned for many things in my life. But nothing comes close to how much I d … | Continue reading
I would like to wish all my American blogging friends a happy and peaceful Thanksgiving today. In our troubled world, giving thanks for the good things we have is definitely the right thing to do. | Continue reading
Originally posted on Loren Berg's Blog: I first recieved the following quote as a video featuring Mark Twain, while Twain may have penned this comment, it appears that it is more likely from Shera Starr. It also appeared in something from Sir David Attenborough. Regardless o … | Continue reading
X=Xenophobia xenophobia /zɛnəˈfəʊbɪə/ noun dislike of or prejudice against people from other countries. “the resurgence of racism and xenophobia” I was introduced to this from a very early age. I didn’t know the word until I was in my teens though. The area I was brought up in wa … | Continue reading
I found an article online about this Victorian portrait photographer. He took hundreds of photos of the English fishing port and tourist town of Whitby, in the 1880s. Whitby is in Yorkshire, and is still incredibly popular with tourists to this day. The town also inspired Bram St … | Continue reading
From 1800 until the late 1930s, the ownership of pets in London increased to huge levels. Especially cat ownership, as cats were favoured to contol the mice that invaded every home, and rats too. In the year 1861 alone, it was recorded (by Henry Mayhew) that around 300,000 cats l … | Continue reading
W=Wordpress. WordPress to me means blogging, but I used something else for ‘B’. I came late to blogging. It was not until after a suggestion from my friend Antony that I even considered starting a blog. He thought it would be something for me to do once I retired from work. I loo … | Continue reading
After WW1, not that much had changed in London in almost 100 years. Photographers were still keen to document life on the streets, and the jobs of ordinary working people. A Concertina Man. This elderly man is trying to make a living as a street entertainer, playing his Concertin … | Continue reading
V=Violence Fortunately, I have been more of a witness to violence than a victim of it during my life, save for a few notable occasions when I was on the receiving end. At school, fights were common. They seemed to start over nothing, and end quickly. If teachers did not step in f … | Continue reading
Thinking of films that get overlooked today, I decided to offer a list of recommendations of a variety of films that I thought were great. I have reviewed some of these, but not all. I am only going to supply IMDB links, and/or trailers where I can find them, but I believe they a … | Continue reading
This past week has been dominated by the weather. To be specific, rain. Relentless rain, day and night for days on end. I wrote about it on a blog post, and despite a dry day on Saturday, it started again overnight. As well as being unpleasant and affecting my mood, it has caused … | Continue reading
U=Unhappy Unhappy is a word that I (and others) use frequently to easily describe so many things. I can be unhappy if it is raining when I want to do something ouside. I can be unhappy if they cancel a TV series that I really enjoyed. I can be unhappy if a shop has sold … Continu … | Continue reading
Lactose Intolerance. This post may come under the category of ‘too much information’ for some readers, but I have published it anyway, as it may be helpful to those experiencing the same symptoms. During the peak of the heatwave this summer, when it reached 39.4 C (103F) in Beetl … | Continue reading
Like most people, I was shown a version of the Wild West by Hollywood films, and TV shows. Gunfights, saloon bar brawls, brave sheriffs, and cowardly bushwackers. The nice guys wore white hats and tin stars, the bad men had black hats, robbed stagecoaches, and shot people in the … | Continue reading
T=Technology. It is impossible to fully describe the impact of technology since I was born. I was initially brought up using an outside toilet, and a tin bath filled on Friday nights. The television had one channel, if you were lucky enough that it was working properly. There was … | Continue reading
**No plot spoilers.** This film was shown on TV over the Halloween period. I had never heard of it, but recorded it on the PVR. The action begins in a remote farmhouse in the small community of Brightburn, Kansas. A couple is in bed one night when something like an earthquake sha … | Continue reading
I have posted many photos about London in the 19th century. But I never forget that 60% of my followers are from America, and I want to post things relevant to them as well. So here is a post of photos from the famous photographer, Jacob Riiss, and his images of poverty in New Yo … | Continue reading
S=Science This S is about the applications of science in my lifetime. Things that were unimaginable when I was born are commonplace now. Some of those are materials; things like Teflon, Polyurethane, Velcro, Waterproof Fabrics, Memory Foam, Polyester. They have provided advances … | Continue reading
I found these photos by the keen amateur photographer Edward Linley Sambourne, who was also the chief cartoonist for Punch magazine. They are early examples of candid street photography, using a hand-held camera. He was obviously interested in the fashions of the day, and as you … | Continue reading
R=Regrets. When you reach the milestone of 70, you must surely have a few regrets? I know I do. I would have liked to have been better prepared for my first marriage, that’s for sure. It would have been nice if my second marriage had worked out better too. But it didn’t, so hey-h … | Continue reading
When I went to bed on Tuesday night, it was raining heavily here. I lay in bed listening to the sound of it, driven against the window by strong winds. Then I woke up on Wednesday, and it was still raining torentially. It carried on that way until just after midday, when a break … | Continue reading
I don’t think these photos need any captions. :) | Continue reading
Q=Quality One good piece of advice my dad gave me was, “Pay more for quality”. I took that to heart. A handmade bespoke suit can last a lifetime. Loake shoes may cost four times as much as a high-street brand, but will last you ten times longer. A Sony Colour TV was three times m … | Continue reading
P=Politics From an early age, I became interested in left-wing politics. I was very aware of social injustices, and also inspired by studying the Spanish Civil War, and the International Brigade soldiers who volunteered to go and fight in what was a ‘just war’. In my teens, I joi … | Continue reading
I found some more! I hope you are not bored with these yet? All of these photos were taken between 1880 and 1889, when Victoria was still The Queen. (Some can be enlarged by clicking on them.) An early electric car in Lower Regent Street. You can see the chauffeur and footman in … | Continue reading
N=Nostalgia I have always been a nostalgic person, even when I was quite young. Once life started to become ‘modern’, in the late 1960s, I was only 16, and already looking back to when I was at primary school, spending a lot more time around my family, and living close to the doc … | Continue reading
M=Mum It was always going to be mum for ‘M’. What else could it have been? I have written so much about my mum on this blog, I doubt anyone needs to be reminded of what a great mum she was to me, and what great friends we were. Rather than repeat all that, here … Continue reading … | Continue reading
O=Ollie Ollie has only been in my life for just under 11 years, but has already become such a significant part of my whole life so far. Everyone knows how much I love my dog, my constant companion. He is the heart and soul of my blog, and has become a firm favourite of many … Con … | Continue reading
For the Fallen Poem by Robert Laurence Binyon (1869-1943), published in The Times newspaper on 21 September 1914. With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children, England mourns for her dead across the sea. Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit, Fallen in the caus … | Continue reading
Is it just me, or has this year gone faster than 2021? Julie booked our Christmas Day meal with the restaurant yesterday, and not long after that it will be 2023. Each year I get older seems to pass by more quickly. Perhaps that is one of the curses of old age? —————————————————— … | Continue reading
L=London It had to be London of course. Anyone born and raised in that city will know how it gets into your blood. It goes further than being British, or English. You are a Londoner, and that is what you portray to the rest of the country, and to the world. There is history on … … | Continue reading
More everyday scenes from London, photographed around 1900. A policeman directing the busy horse-drawn traffic in Piccadilly. A similar scene in Piccadilly on a different day. Traffic congestion was just as bad 122 years ago as it is now. Piccadilly Circus at the time. Clerkenwel … | Continue reading
K=Kindness. When I was quite young, I don’t remember the exact age, my Mum gave me some advice. “Be kind”. “Be kind to animals”. “Be kind to people”. “Help people when you can”. “Kindness costs nothing”. “If you cannot say something kind, then say nothing at all”. I took those wo … | Continue reading
A random selection of photos from the end of Victoria’s reign, until WW1. (Some photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.) A shop in London selling caged birds, 1895. Singing birds like Canaries were very popular in Victorian households. A group of skilled metalworkers, 1895. T … | Continue reading
J=Jealousy. There are times in my life when I have been jealous, I admit that. After my first marriage broke down, I was jealous of the fact that my wife got to remain in the nice house in Wimbledon, that eventually netted her a small fortune when she sold it decades later. I hav … | Continue reading
I found a nice group of photos taken in London during 1875. The photographers were not credited. The Oxford Arms, in East London. There was a group trying to save this old coaching inn from demolition, and they employed a photographer to publicise their campaign. Sadly, they did … | Continue reading
I=India I have never been to India, but that country featured significantly during two very different periods in my life. My father was a regular soldier. He had joined the British Army in 1936, and served in the Royal Artillery. When war broke out in 1939, he spent some time wit … | Continue reading
The year before WW1 broke out, a photographer climed into an early aircraft to photograph London from the air. Given the limitations of cameras and unreliable aircraft at the time, I think the results are outstanding. St Paul’s Cathedral. The Tower of London, and Tower Bridge. Tr … | Continue reading
H=Holidays Some of my earliest memories are of going on our annual summer holidays when I was a child. They were always in Britain, and usually by the coast, or an easy drive to the sea. I was constantly car sick as a child, and with no motoways then, the trips from London to Cor … | Continue reading
I had never heard of this photographer before, and found some of his photos online. He visited the districts of Liverpool 8 and Everton in 1975, with the intention of documenting ordinary people living in deprivation in those working class areas. I think his black and white image … | Continue reading
G=Growing Up This was my first choice for ‘G’. I started to write about growing up, and then I remembered I had already posted something almost identical, back in early 2021. So I deleted the part I had started to write as a draft, and I am adding a link to the 2021 post instead. … | Continue reading
F=Friends. Being an only child with no siblings to play with, friends became important to me at an early age. Once I went to Primary School at the age of 6, I soon discovered that being good at sport, especially football, was a good way to make friends. But I was below average at … | Continue reading
E=Examinations When I was young, the big examination that everyone talked about was called the ’11-Plus’. At primary school, we didn’t have exams beteen the ages of 5-10, but we did have ‘Tests’ as we got older. They took the form of essays, handwriting, or simple times tables an … | Continue reading
An uneventful week that began with me coming down with something on Tuesday that I thought might be Flu. Sore throat, persistent cough, and aches. I spent three days taking various tablets and going to bed early, and by Friday afternoon it had gone away. ————————————————————————— … | Continue reading
D=Divorce When I got married for the first time in 1977, I expected it to last my lifetime. Divorce never entered my mind, even though my parents had split up the year before, and had gone through the divorce process earlier that same year. Eight years later, and my wife had othe … | Continue reading
C= Cold and Cars I could not decide between these two choices for ‘C’, so included them both. Cold. Many of my childhood memories are about being cold. Until I was fifteen years old, I did not live in a house with central heating. We relied on one main coal fire for warmth, with … | Continue reading