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Did Australia invent the Milk Bar?
It has been argued that the first business using the name "milk bar" was started in India in 1930 by an Englishman, James Meadow Charles, when he opened Lake View Milk Bar at Bangalore. The concept...
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Orientalist architecture in Victorian and Edwardian beach resorts
I have often referred to Orientalist art in this blog, largely that created by late 19th century French, British, German and Russian artists who spent time in Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Israel...
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My dream round-the-world rail tour
The ultimate rail journey is a new 53-day trip on some of the world’s most iconic trains, including the Tsar's Gold Private Train from Mongolia, the Venice Simplon Orient-Express and the British Orient...
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Elie Wiesel (1928-2016) - Holocaust survivor and Nobel Prize winner
Eliezer Wiesel (1928-2016) was born in the small town of Sighet in northern Transylvania, and area long claimed by both Hungary and Romania. In the 20th century, it changed hands repeatedly, an...
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Australian terraced housing that survived and thrived
Terraced housing was introduced to Australia in the C19th, the design work being based on the architecture of terraces in London and Paris. Rows of terraced houses became common in the inner suburbs of...
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A child murderer in Jack the Ripper's London (1897)
Jack the Ripper Tours have been a wonderful source of information. Robert Coombes worked as a purser and chief steward for the National Steamship Co. He, wife Emily and their sons (Robert 13;...
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Sarona: elegant German colony in the centre of Tel Aviv: guest post
The Temple Society was a Protestant sect that originated in the Lutheran Church in southern Germany in 1858. Two of their leaders, Kristoph Hoffmann & Georg Hardegg, encouraged their communities...
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Willoughbyland: a strange English colony in South America
I actually read The Spectator’s review of Matthew Parker’s book Willoughbyland: England’s Lost Colony (Windmill Books, 2015) before I had ever heard of the book. But perhaps reviews are useful like...
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Design in Napoleon's Consular and Empire periods (1799-1815)
As early as 1740, the Vincennes manufactory was created with the backing of King Louis XV and Madame de Pompadour. Then in 1756 the Vincennes factory moved to Sèvres and was soon given a royal warrant...
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Busy Dutch explorers around 17th century Australia
The question my students had to answer was who was the first European to set food on Australian soil and when? Possibly it was Dutchman Willem Janszoon in 1605-6. But although Janszoon said he...
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Victorian and Edwardian calling card cases
Everyone I know carries business cards in their wallet, giving them out to new colleagues and clients at work or at conferences. I assumed that Victorian calling card cases did the same job, at least...
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Jean Etienne Liotard - early Orientalist artist in pastels
Jean-Etienne Liotard (1702-1789)’s parents were French Huguenots who fled to the independent Protestant city state of Geneva. Thus the lad was born in Geneva, did some of his training there and later...
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Ignacy Paderewski - pianist, composer, activist, Polish prime minister
Ignacy Jan Paderewski (1860-1941) was born in Kurylowka, a Polish area that later became Russian and then Ukrainian. His father ran the estate of the local absentee landlords and may not have been...
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A kindly, capable, caring GP, but deadly to elderly women
Harold Shipman (1946–2004) studied medicine at Leeds School of Medicine, graduating in 1970. Then he did his house year, junior and senior residencies at Pontefract General Hospital in West Yorkshire....
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Frida Kahlo: do we love her for her art? or for her feminist/socialist politics?
Frida Kahlo (1907–1954) grew up in the family’s home where she was born, the Blue House. Her father Wilhelm was a German citizen who had immigrated to Mexico where he met and married her mother...
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Venice's ghetto and synagogues - 1516-2016 exhibition
Even before the great influx of Spanish refugees in 1492, Italy's Jewish population was expanding. The first European ghetto was actually built in Frankfurt, not in Venice. But the Venetian Ghetto...
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Percy Grainger's music, sex life and his Australian Museum
Percy Grainger (1882-1961) was born in Melbourne, son of British architect John Harry Grainger, and his wife Rose Aldridge Grainger of Adelaide. His father had migrated from Durham to Adelaide 1877 to...
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British princes who wanted to marry "inappropriate" women
Prince William of Gloucester (1941–1972) was the son of Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester (d1974) and the grandson of King George V and Queen Mary. His mother was Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester,...
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Vienna's Indoor Snow Palace - the world's first
As the last of the Vienna terminus railway stations, Nordwestbahnhof was built by architect Wilhelm Bäumler in the years between 1870-1873. The building was placed in a great location, on the corner...
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Have you ever said anything monumentally stupid in public?
Sometimes I truly despair about the educational standards in our schools. Not regarding obscure PhD theses on particle physics; rather I mean ordinary primary school, high school and undergraduate...
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