London Lives 12 London archives – digitised, marked up and tagged – to "create a comprehensive electronic edition of primary sources on criminal justice and the provision of poor relief and medical care in eighteenth-century London".
The
Lives page is a good place to start browsing.
[related]
posted by unliteral
on Jun 8, 2010 -
8 comments
Kamal Chunchie charts the history of the black and Asian community in Canning Town, east London, in the 1920s and 1930s. It tells the story of the Coloured Men's Institute and its founder, Kamal Chunchie, a man who can rightly be called east London's first black and Asian community leader. One of the many excellent East London
history projects at Hidden Histories.
posted by Abiezer
on Jan 16, 2009 -
2 comments
Forty years ago, Swinging London was yet to swing. Everything was in black and white and, in class-bound Britain, fashion photographers were trades-men – polite, smart, seen but not heard. A new breed of snappers changed all that – Terry O’Neill, Brian Duffy, David Bailey and Terence Donovan. Bailey and Donovan started their careers in the West End studio of the doyen of fashion photographers – John French. [more inside]
posted by nickyskye
on Sep 1, 2008 -
11 comments
Collage is an online image database from the collections of the City of London Libraries and the Guildhall Art Gallery. Images cover the last five centuries. You can search by key word or browse by theme, artist/engraver, person or place.
[more inside]
posted by paduasoy
on Dec 22, 2007 -
7 comments
Tom Vague's History Walk (PDF downloads) of the Notting Hill district is an evocative roll call of books, films, personalities, restaurants, anecdotes and a timeline strung together to cover the period 1950 to 2005.
[whet your appetite inside]
posted by tellurian
on Sep 30, 2006 -
9 comments
London's 'flushers': "If you really thought about where you were going and what you were doing you'd either be shit scared or you wouldn't go there. We're shit shovellers. Some of the jobs I do a high percentage of the country would turn around and say: 'Poke that up yer arse mate as far as you can put it.'" The history of
London's sewers. The craptacular
sewerhistory.org. More entries in the
Night Haunts series.
posted by OmieWise
on Jul 13, 2006 -
14 comments
Sir John Soane (1753-1837) was responsible for the design of quite a few of
London’s public buildings (and to some extent, its
phonebooths). His home, now a
museum, is filled to the brim with architectural relics, sculptures, paintings, drawings, stained glass, and assorted curiosities. Almost unchanged since his death, it also contains the
gravesite of his wife’s beloved dog Fanny, a mummified rat, an
Egyptian sarcophagus, and an imaginary monk named Padre Giovanni. Best of all, on the first Tuesday of every month the museum has a candlelight tour which enhances the
spooky splendor of the rooms.
posted by annaramma
on Dec 15, 2005 -
18 comments
The story of "St. James Infirmary." You thought it was a piece of old New Orleans? Turns out St. James Hospital was in London (and treated lepers), and the song goes back at least to the 18th century (though it used to be sung to the tune of "Streets of Laredo"). Rob Walker's Letter From New Orleans #13 describes the results of his obsessive researches. If you have more info, he wants to hear from you! (Via
Wordorigins, a site any word lover should know.)
posted by languagehat
on Jun 11, 2004 -
9 comments
