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Melbourne synagogue fire: brutal anti-semitism.
A large blaze engulfed the very religious Adass Israel Synagogue in Ripponlea in Melbourne’s south-east on Friday morning, and is being treated as a deliberately lit fire.The Adass Israel synagogue in...
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Lowestoft soft-paste porcelain: 1756-1801.
Map of Lowestoft in Suffolk,facing Amsterdam across the North Sea.A few years ago I asked my students to select an article on Lowestoft porcelain and they thought Antiques Trade Gazette to be...
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Stefan Weintraub's top German jazz band!
Austrian artist Max Oppenheimer (1885-1954) painted in 1927, capturing the rough energy of a music that was taking Berlin’s nightlife by storm in the interwar era.Max Oppenheimer, Weintraubs...
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Saving Tasmania's aboriginals: Truganini
Truganini in shell necklace, 1866 - jpgin The AustralianTruganini (1812-76) was born on Bruny Island Tasmania near the mouth of the Derwent River, in her tribal territory. Truganini was a daughter of...
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Bruno Bettelheim: a brilliant psychologist?
Bruno Bettelheim Tantor mediaBruno Bettelheim (1903–90) was born in Vienna, son of a middle-class Jewish lumber merchant. He entered Vienna Uni, but was forced to leave to take over his family...
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Hiroshima's Peace Memorials.
The most important Japanese tour for my grandchildren in 2024 was Hiroshima’s Peace Memorial. My children and I heard my father’s WW2 history many times, but my grand children knew nothing from the...
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Great seasonal music - Auld Lang Syne
The text of Auld Lang Syne is a Scots-language poem written by Robert Burns (1759-96) in 1788 but based on an older Scottish folk song. In 1799, it was set to a traditional pentatonic/Scots folk...
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Phar Lap, Australia's greatest ever racer!
Phar Lap was born in Timaru New Zealand in 1926, a chestnut gelding standing 17 hands high. The yearling was one of those sent by Sea-down Stud owner Alec Roberts to the Trentham sales. Sydney trainer...
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Melville Monument Edinburgh. Pull down?
St Andrew Square Edinburgh was built by 1781, an integral part of James Craig's scheme for New Town. For a long time, the square's gardens were accessible only by very desirable inhabitants of the...
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Was Joseph Kennedy racist before/in WW2?
Patrick Joseph Kennedy (1858–1929) was the son of poor Irish immigrants who married in Boston in 1849. Originally a saloon-owner in Boston who expanded to own a whiskey importation business,...
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Visit architecture in gorgeous Fez.
Fez Carpet marketBob CromwellLet me examine some of the connections between Morocco and Europe I was familiar with. Visitors to the Paros Gallery in Greece should see the Sèvres Imperial Hunting tea...
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Migrants welcome to Australia - Bonegilla
Bonegilla is a rural area on the western shore of Lake Hume in N.E Victoria. The nearest large township is Wodonga Vic, 9 km to the west and c12 km from Albury NSW, on the southern bank of Murray...
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Weimar Republic 1918-33: great culture, great democracy
Pres Paul von HindenburgWikiThe usual image of the Weimar Republic was one of political instability, economic crisis and cultural decadence. That always seemed ridiculous to me since this republic was...
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Janis Fink Ian - what a folk singer!
Janis Fink (1951-) the American singer, was born and raised on a New Jersey farm, Fink was raised by Jewish parents; her father Victor taught music, inspiring her early interest in the piano, which...
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Chocolate lovers: visit Malta
I loved holidaying in Malta but now I know there was much more to learn.DisplayMalta Chocolate FactoryBuilt by the Knights of St John in the mid-C16th on the centrally located Mediterranean island of...
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Fryerstown Vic: historic gold town
Never heard of Fryerstown in Victoria, just a 10-minute drive south from Castlemaine? Neither had I. Yet the locals say this now-tiny town was once home to 15,000 people during the 1850s gold rush,...
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Modernist art glass: Italy & Australia.
When I was doing art history, Art consisted of painting, sculpture and architecture. Even illuminated manuscripts were studied for their paintings, not for their other art forms eg book binding,...
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Favourite babies' names in Australia, 2024
In my community, a newborn baby is named after the last beloved relative, of the same gender, to pass away. Thus I was called Helen after my late grandmother Hinde, and my son was called Peter in...
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Edna Walling's stunning garden designs
Edna Margaret Walling (1895-1973) was born in York, second daughter of William and Harriet Walling. Edna studied at the Convent of Notre Dame in Devon, enjoying exploring with dad and the practical...
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Witches: brutal, religious Matthew Hopkins
Being a good Christian kept a person safe because he/she was guaranteed a place in Heaven. However at some stage Christianity came under threat from an invisible force. Starting among the educated...
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An amazing Negev Desert Zoo just opened.
Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Animal Park in Israel serves as a sanctuary for endangered desert animals and injured local wildlife, and as a home to animals born in captivity that cannot be returned...
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Russian born Yul Brynner's amazing story
Yuliy Borisovich Briner (1920-85) was born in Vladivostok, apparently with mixed ancestry. The mystery began with Brynner's birth, for which he gave dates anytime between 1915-22. He sometimes said...
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Archduke Franz Ferdinand, assassination ->
Danubia: A Personal History of Habsburg Europe was a big book. Happily once we get to 1848, the year of revolutions across Europe, the book became much more balanced and more interesting. The 53...
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You'll Never Walk Alone Liverpool Ftball Cl
The world of musical theatre seemed a very long way from Anfield Football Stadium in Liverpool. So how did a big, wonderful song from Rodgers and Hammerstein’s show Carousel (1945) end up as a football...
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UK's National Health Service, slow important development
Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, originally built in 1933and replaced by the new hospital in 2010.It is one of the largest single-site hospitals in the UKAfter the Boer War, a Committee on...
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