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British children of the Raj. Where was home - India or UK?
Last Children of the Raj: British Childhoods in India was edited by Laurence Fleming and published by Radcliffe Press in 2004. This book is a collection of retrospective reminiscences contributed by...
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Daniel Cohn-Bendit 1968 - red hair and red politics
In 1968 I saw Daniel Cohn-Bendit on tv and decided straight away who I would marry. The man of my dreams would have to be a red-head, Jewish, European-born and educated, politically left wing and a...
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Ragged Schools and Industrial Schools
Thomas Guthrie was born in Arbroath Scotland in 1803, 12th child of his father David, a merchant and banker. The young Thomas went to Edinburgh University at 12 where he studied as a divinity student,...
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Australia invented cochlear implants!
Australia invented surf life saving, pavlova, rotary clothes hoists, plastic bank notes and black box flight recorders. But now I want to concentrate on cochlear implants.How did the deaf communicate?...
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History Carnival, July and August 2017. The best history posts
Thank you for the nominations. Let me know which you enjoyed most.BRITAIN & EUROPEThe late Norman “Little Malvern Priory Church” was ready in 1171. In 1480 the Church & lodgings were ruined, so...
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Great American art faker but not for profit: Mark Landis
Mark A. Landis (born 1955) was born in Virginia but was constantly on the move with his Navy father. At age 17, the young man suffered a schizophrenic breakdown when his beloved father died. Art...
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Bonnie Prince Charles, battles, a Jacobite Exhibition and silver art treasures
The Jacobites, supporters of King James II, were the original opponents of the Glorious Revolution of 1688. The Act of Union in 1707 had led to the creation of Great Britain, with a single parliament...
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Arts precincts and the City Beautiful in Melbourne and Philadelphia
Melbourne has become renowned as Australia’s cultural capital. Note Southbank’s Arts Precinct located next door to Southgate, stretching from the Yarra to the end of Sturt Street. Over the years it...
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Escape from Berlin; Thank you Shanghai!
Once Hitler came to power in 1933, Germany’s 572,000 Jews faced catastrophe as was made perfectly clear in Peter Nash's book Escape From Berlin (Impact Press, 2017). So how did some European Jews...
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Brave New World - Australia in the 1930s
Brave New World: Australia 1930s is a special exhibition at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV in Melbourne until mid Oct 2017. The 1930s was a turbulent time in Australia’s history. Major world events,...
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WIlliam Morris, Edward Poynter, Edward Burne-Jones and Philip Webb: V&A...
The Museum of Manufactures and the Government School of Design were located in Marlborough House, an impressive Pall Mall residence. When a new home for this Museum (later Victoria & Albert) had to...
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Sex Lives of the Kings and Queens of England - Edward Prince of Wales
Nigel Cawthorne’s book Sex Lives of the Kings and Queens of England (Carlton Publishing, 2004) proposed that there was more to fascination with royal sexual antics than mere prurience. Throughout...
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Hitler's hangman Reinhard Heydrich adored classical music and his family
The Early YearsRichard Bruno Heydrich was director of Halle Conservatory of Music and Theatre which he had founded in 1901. He composed and performed choral works, songs, orchestral works and operas...
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Spanish Flu - 50-60 million dead in 1918
The 1889–1890 Flu Pandemic was similar to the great Spanish Flu pandemic and might have prepared doctors and armies in WW1. It was first noted in different countries: China (1888); Athabasca in Canada...
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Hedy Lamarr: Austrian-American-Jewish-Catholic actress and inventor
I’ll soon be seeing Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story, directed by Alexandra Dean, at the Jewish Film Festival. The festival programme says: Known for her striking looks and electric onscreen persona,...
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Australian Impressionist Art exhibition now on in Canberra - don't they...
We were often told that Eugene von Guerard (1811–1901)’s Australian landscapes of the 1860s and 70s were indebted to the romantic art of Caspar David Friedrich, two generations earlier, or that there...
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Smitten by the artist Catherine da Costa
Dr Henry Lew wrote Smitten by Catherine, the story of Catherine Rachel Mendes da Costa (1678-1756). Lew was strolling through an auction house looking at furniture, and noticed a special C18th...
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Bevin Boys - WW2 conscription down the coal mines
Coal was essential for military production during WW2; somehow Britain had to match the quotas needed to keep factories churning out the munitions required at the front. And as Britain was unable to...
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Farewell Gord Downie; commiserations Canada
Michael Barclayinvited us to share his sensitive obituary. Gordon Downie (1964-2017) was born near Kingston Ont, to Lorna & Edgar. He was the 4th of 5 children, the one who played goalie for...
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Le Corbusier's modernist chapel in Ronchamp, Eastern France
I have never been to Romchamp and didn't know that Le Corbusier designed a 1950s chapel. But I was eavedropping on two Francophiles in a Melbourne espresso bar, and after buying them a cheesecake each,...
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