I have always maintained that from a historic perspective the British royals are important. Any group, collection or family, rightly or wrongly, who has maintained a place in history for generations is historically noteworthy. When we look at our history these people have featured in the story of our nation […]
m’Blog
226 posts
Sometimes this researcher accidentally comes across an old British news article that’s really from another world. Illustrated Police News – Saturday 31 October 1896 was reporting the dreadful scene on a London omnibus whereby a lady fell into shock at the sight of the knees of a collection of boys […]
Last week I predicted the UK would drop like a lead balloon at the EuroVision 2012 Song Contest. Gosh! How unpatriotic I am. How can you suggest such a thing? Today the British and international press are full of our humiliation. Ok we were not bottom, we were second from […]
Ok gang! Place your EuroVision 2012 bets. Before you go racing to the bookies read on. According to ABC News, reports about alleged rights violations in Azerbaijan are capturing international attention as the country prepares to host this year’s Eurovision song contest. Eurovision is the most prestigious cultural event in […]
Time to grasp your jewellery with all your life. Gulp down that Gin and tonic. Batten down the hatches. Pull up the drawbridges and let battle commence. This is going to be a tantrum like no other as Queen Sofia of Spain and Queen Elizabeth of Great Britain go head-to-head […]
For the second time in living memory politicians across Europe are fidgeting dangerously in their respective quarters. In the past couple of weeks the political rhetoric between the big beasts of the EU like France, Germany, Spain and even the United Kingdom have become noticeably and diplomatically noisy, even deafening. […]
This is the story of the day when Italy becomes a little less Italian. From the beginning of the 2014 academic year The Politecnico di Milano, one of Italy’s leading technical universities, all MSc and PhD courses will be taught exclusively in English. While the university already offers several courses […]
Today is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Edward Lear. Although a talented illustrator and painter, Lear is best known for his nonsense verse. His poetry demonstrates a defining love of eccentricity, verbal invention and poetic delight in the sound of words. His best known poem is The Owl […]
Weetabix. It’s as traditional as you can get at the breakfast table. For generations the semi-healthy option to Kelloggs Corn Flakes and Quaker Oates. The option to a good old fry up. But now that doyen of the early healthy start has been gobbled up by no other than the […]
Ok, so, well, what can I say? Since the General Election I have on occasions been hammered by some for ‘banging on’ about The Labour Party. For ‘not giving the coalition a chance’. For ‘agreeing to disagree’ (something I would never do). Yet today I open the media to discover […]
It appears I need to take elocution lessons. British Telecom has lost the ability to understand what I say, despite my efforts to use English with as few syllables and complicated words as possible. Three times in as many minutes I asked this telecom giant NOT to publish the telephone […]
Norwegian expressionist Edvard Munch’s The Scream has become the most expensive artwork sold at auction. It fetched an alarming $119.9m (£74m). It’s a tad scary because thats more than I earn in a week. Bidding lasted 12 minutes which is better than a bid on eBay which can last a […]
Today voters are going to the polls for local elections in England, Wales and Scotland – and to elect mayors in London, Liverpool and Salford. In 1890 there seemed little interest in such events. In fact this researcher rummaged through the archive and found very little to stimulate even the […]
When they write the story of Queen Victoria the picture portrayed is generally that of a slightly stubborn, rather unhappy widowed monarch. In a way she had much to be miserable about. After giving birth to 9 children, the love of her life dying in 1861 and then seemingly spending […]
Over the years various individuals have falsely maintained to be related to me. One of them claims to be a nephew – a son of my sister. And the reason for all this weirdness – he said he wanted to know more about his ‘lost uncle’. This guy originally made […]
When they write the story of Queen Victoria the picture portrayed is generally that of a slightly stubborn, rather unhappy widowed monarch. In a way she had much to be miserable about. After giving birth to 9 children, the love of her life dying in 1861 and then seemingly spending […]
I seriously welcome contact from anyone. Friends, colleagues, real members of my family are genuinely welcome . You can send a message here .
I really have to get something off my chest. It’s a presentation matter – on the BBC actually. It’s something that’s seriously driving me up the bleedin’ wall. Some years ago my now 60 year old ears finally retired from UK commercial radio. I could no longer stand the countless […]
I think we forget how immediate news media is today. Here is an edition of The Western Times – Monday 15 April 1912. The editorial feels quite eerie. Whilst Devonians were having breakfast reading their daily ration of news, meanwhile in the Atlantic the worse shipping disaster in history is […]
November 1931 and The Hull Daily Mail were warning its readers of the perils of the dreaded Friday 13th. You have been warned!
As we all know RMS Titanic sank on 15 April 1912 causing the deaths of 1,514 people. However on the 16th April 1912 The Western Times, in a remarkable editorial blunder, was reporting ‘Good News’, Titanic and all on board are safe. “An enormous load of anxiety has been lifted from […]
I found this White Star Line advertisement in The Western Times – exactly 100 years old. Here they are promoting their premium ships, Olympic and Titanic. Three weeks later the sinking of Titanic caused the deaths of 1,517 people in one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history. Meanwhile Olympic‘s […]
It’s 1950 and Mr. Clifford Gwilliam, the manager of the Theatre Royal, Exeter (Devon) is confidently reassuring audiences at nearby Ottery St. Mary British Legion that he thought television was a “passing phase”. By the middle of the 20th century the British cinema and filmmaking industry was heartening audiences and […]
The 50th Jubilee of George III on the 25th October 1810 was a comparatively low-key affair. Two issues overshadowed the possibility of extensive celebrations – the overall mental and physical health of the monarch and the serious illness of the king’s favourite daughter, Princess Amelia who was to die shortly […]
Following the industrial revolution and certainly by the 1850’s pauperism in Victorian Great Britain was at an alarming level. By 1875 one person in six was designated a pauper. From the 1840’s onwards populations of British cities had swollen to an alarming level as thousands left the traditional agricultural life […]
There is no doubt that some Victorians were a tad mad, unquestionably overzealous and darn-right eccentric. One such gentleman was Henry Tracey Coxwell (born 2 March 1819, Wouldham, Kent died 5 January 1900, Lewes, Sussex). Mr. Coxwell was an English aeronaut. His obsession with ballooning knew no bounds, although by […]
Only 8% of Anderson Shelters constructed in Nottingham in 1940 had been ‘satisfactorily fixed’ as this report from the Nottingham Evening Post of Monday 15 April 1940 explains (click the image to read the full story). Anderson air-raid shelters were designed to accommodate up to six people. The main principle […]
As the Victorian age was slowly coming to a close the brave and exciting Edwardian era was to bring a brief and thrilling period for invention and development. Experiments in wireless broadcasting were already underway, cable telegraph transmissions throughout the Empire were already established, the motor car was beginning to […]
The Times of Malta, that bastion of media balance, is in a very boastful mood. An eventful start to 2012 saw over 1.6 million visitors browse timesofmalta.com in the first 10 days of the year – unprecedented figures for a Maltese website. That figure jumps five-fold, to just over 8.5 […]
I love the Internet. Indeed without the World Wide Web that was invented or should I say evolved by some horrible coincidence in my life I think from a personal point of view my existence would be totally different. Just as I was beginning to lose the use of my […]
Apart from uplifting events personally, this has been a rubbish year. Riots, burning, thieving, national political gloom, lies and garbage from those who should know better. Credibility sold for a cent. National pride and a country’s good name kicked in the teeth by those who run it. Good, then not […]
The 23rd October 1880 and one of the leading pen companys are giving good advice to writers whilst promoting their range of products. Macniven and Cameron were a long established company that finally closed in 1964. Macniven and Cameron Ltd., later known as Waverley Cameron Ltd.,was a printing and […]
The Victorians were famously highly inventive. Many business people were keen to add to the community. In 1851 Hodges Distillery Fire Brigade was founded. In 1862 Mr. Frederick Hodges erected a 125 foot iron lookout for fires in the immediate area. Mr. Hodges’ fire service was in fact so advanced […]
The Penny Illustrated Paper on the 17th January 1863 is a reporting a most dreadful matter at The Bank of England. It appears that there has been forgery undertaken involving £10 paper and “fifties”.
The mid 1800’s was boom time for railway companys in Great Britain. Just as today with new technologies businesses were fighting to stay ahead of the game despite endless reports in the press of accidents across the railway system. Travelling between Birmingham and London in 1840 took a staggering eight […]
I have been doing some of my own family research and I have just learned that an unrelated person sharing a family name (Churchward) was found shot dead in a field in Devon in 1886. This though is not (as far as the press is concerned) a dastardly murder but […]
The original Victorian Opera House in Malta’s capital, Valletta was constructed in the 1860′s. These are extracts from The Builder, 2nd May 1863. The New Opera House, Malta was designed by the British architect, Edward Middleton Barry (7 June 1830 – 27 January 1880). Barry’s portfolio to date up to […]
These past few weeks have been the busiest for Old British News with the redevelopment of the site, the transcribing and uploading of a massive new database. I have processed thousands of lines of searchable archive consisting of the names, dates and places of those sentenced to death in the […]
In 2007 I was asked to write a piece on Maltese radio. 20 years after deregulation here is an update. In a medium where “content is king” and where in Malta the Maltese have such choice, in fact all that seems to be on offer is much of the same. […]
The eighth of August 2011 will go down as one of South London’s darker dates. It will stay in our memories probably for ever. As London was burning, the sirens were screaming, as news channels broadcast our hell live to the world, I can remember watching the thick black smoke […]
When I was a boy I remember a scandal in the early 1960s that brought the Macmillan government to its knees. I am of course referring to the Profumo affair, an event so appalling that elderly members of my family refused to discuss it in front of us children. But […]
These last few weeks have been quite extraordinary in a positive and happy way. First there was the build-up and anticipation, then the “big day”, followed by the “getting back to normal” syndrome. I am in fact referring to our civil registration which took place on Saturday as an extremely […]
There is something very creepy that has always in lurked around in this vehicle we call the Internet. There is a grave danger that our lives and indeed our personalities can be penetrated from outside the safety of our keyboards and Internet screens. Human nature seems to have adapted itself […]
I came across this from British Pathé. King George VI opening The Empire Exhibition in 1938. I am actually searching for footage for another unrelated item. Although unused this piece is clearly heavily edited in an attempt to disguise the Kings’ severe voice impediment and nerves. It’s painful to watch […]
I find myself these days are applying myself to the Internet with certain caution for fear of upsetting or shocking the delicate amongst us. So here goes, once more into the breach! In the Mediterranean in the grand old city of Valletta, the capital of Malta, they are having a […]
It has been pointed out to me that I am ‘negative’. To me and many around me, this is real news. The only medium where this claim has been made is Facebook, famous for users to openly express themselves. Several (about half a dozen) people on Facebook take this strange […]
The trouble with having a viewpoint is that invariably there is a danger of alienating half of the recipients of your thoughts. Facebook is the only “social” networking site I use. There are dozens of them out there and all seem to do exactly the same job. I’m not a […]
Since this coalition government has been running the affairs of Great Britain, Prime Ministers Question time (PMQs) scheduled for most Wednesdays has turned into a theatrical fiasco. Yesterday was no exception to the rule. With the Prime Minister and leader of the Conservative party making a total mockery of the […]
If ever a single photograph portrays a scene of dread and sheer disgust then it has to be this one, published last week in The Daily Star in Dhaka Bangladesh. It was taken by chance by a freelance photographer who happened to be in the area on another assignment. While […]
First hitting the streets in colonial Malta in 1935, The Times of Malta is an English-language newspaper with allegedly the highest circulation. In many ways it has been a point of reference to current affairs on these Maltese islands, but in recent times its monopoly and in some ways its […]
On the streets of Malta there is genuine fury, through the pages of Facebook there is indignation and anger. At the offices of RAI there are copious amounts of egg on a great many faces. Emotions are running high in the Mediterranean as it looks like a huge rather ugly […]
This evening I have been filling in my 2011 Census Form. I used my computer, did the process online using the high speed broadband, in my central heated comfortable apartment, lit by electric light whilst listening to some nice music recorded digitally after a rather pleasant dinner. Almost to this […]
A lot of my broadcasting work (especially in the last 25 years) has been in the field of presentation and programming development. Some of this has been to identify talent as a means to improving station output or overall presentation. One such case was in Zimbabwe where I worked for […]
There’s a little story behind this record. I met Marc Almond in the early 80’s when he was the other half of Soft Cell and interviewed Gene Pitney for radio in the mid 80’s. I used to frequent a small bar on the front at Gzira (Malta) opposite the bridge […]
The call for a greater range of real Halal products in our shops and restaurants is growing at a steady and interesting pace. But how do you know that the meat and other products you are purchasing is genuinely Halal? How is it regulated and what measures are in place […]
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At last all the codes are in place! And blogging is underway from my mobile 🙂
In these times of doom and gloom, I think its nice to take time out and remember when we used to do things of a certain greatness.
Its new! It went live today! ICorrect.com is a new portal for those in (and possibly out) the public eye to put the record straight on various accusations that have been made against them over the years. Here is an example — Cherie Blair putting the record straight about her […]
I commented on Facebook to a Maltese friend of mine who lives on the island: “… this whole thing worries me and deep down it must certainly concern the Maltese as a whole. Colonel Gaddafi and his followers are clearly up against it, and as such as we all know […]