Edwardian Ladies And The Manchester Ship Canal

This is a scan of a glass negative I acquired on eBay, and for once I have a little information about it, as it arrived with the description "Edwardian ladies with decorative hats in Hastings". The hats are indeed spectacular (one is almost reminded of African ladies who carry great jugs of water on their heads), but it is the faces that capture my immediate attention.

And then, once I focus in, my attention is grabbed by the municipal instruction, crafted in finest brass and screwed into place: "Please Do Not Spit". I remember someone once telling me about the public announcements that used to be featured on the upper deck of trams in Manchester. Some were public health announcements whilst others would urge to public to make full use of the municipally controlled transport infrastructure. On one such tram, two such notices had appeared next to each other at the front of the tram. "Do Not Spit" declared one, whilst its' neighbour admonished people to "Use The Ship Canal".

For Everything There Is A Season In The Sun

For everything there is a season and it just so happens that the season for producing enough 2017 calendars to fill the Christmas stockings of a range of friends and family members is the last week in November (especially if you are a tight-fisted Yorkshire chap and want to take advantage of the Black Friday deals from the digital publishers). That is the reason why my various blogs have been neglected for the last couple of weeks. Now the calendars are designed and the orders have been submitted, so I have time to return to the pressing business of the pointless and inconsequential. 

And what can be more inconsequential that old photographs of unknown people. Here are two old photographs I bought from the same second-hand stall. I have no idea who either group are or where they were when they had their photographs taken. Quite clearly, they inhabited different levels of the Victorian or Edwardian social spectrum - but I suspect that the photographs were taken at around the same time.

Other than that, they are not related in any way. But they have most probably sat next to each other in the box on the counter of the second-hand shop for years. Maybe they had time to get acquainted, to share experiences, to swap hopes and fears. Their pigments faded and their corners got creased and folded, but they would eventually share a season in the sun.

A Tidy Room And A Tired Brain

I am still trying to come to terms with all that has been happening in the world this year - and I have decided that the most logical response is to tidy my room. I suspect that this might have been the genetic response to times of stress and danger of us Burnetts and Beanlands over the centuries. When the lights were going out all over Europe, Fowler Beanland probably sorted out his postcard collection. When Hitler's tanks pounded their way through the low countries, Enoch Burnett would have been tidying up his tool shed. 

During my bout of tidying, I rediscovered the pack of early snap cards produced by Spears Games. They are advertised as "a most diverting game with beautiful coloured cards of grotesque characters", and one card seemed to be particularly appropriate for the events of 2016. I will leave it up to you to identify the snake - there are enough potential candidates about.

Another discovery was an old advert for Sanaphos. I have not been feeling quite 100% recently and I have put it down to a cold (manflu).  But now I know what the problem is - I am suffering from a tired brain. Once I have rested it with a short afternoon nap, I will start trying to track down a supply of Sanaphos.

A History Of My Family In 100 Images : 4. What God Will And The Missing Berries

The fourth cardinal point of my family history is Isobel's father's family - the Berrys. As with most family trees, there is a branch that yields fewer easy pickings for the amateur genealogist, and with my family - despite the branch name - it is the Berrys. From the point of view of where we now live, they are the most local family - the local parish records show a WhatGodWill Berry being born in 1730 no more than a mile from where we now live - and it is still a family name that is well represented locally. It is just that nobody in the family seems to have saved family photographs, or if they did, they got handed down to someone else. My photograph is a Berry by marriage: it shows Sarah Ann Shaw, the mother of Raymond Berry, who was Isobel's father. In 1905, she married Kaye Holroyd Berry, Isobel's grandfather, and they lived together in the local town of Elland until their deaths over fifty years later.

Despite the shortage of photographs, the Berry/Shaw line is a fascinating element of the wider story of my family, containing some of the most colourful characters and some of the most tragic stories. There are, however,  a further 96 images to go so I will save some of these stories for further down the line.

Let us limit ourselves for the moment to some very basic facts about Sarah Ann Berry. She was born in Ripponden in 1876 and shortly after that, her family moved the few miles over the moors to settle in Elland. Like so many of the young people from these parts at the end of the nineteenth century, she worked in the local woollen mill, and by the time she was twenty-five appears to have given birth to at least two illegitimate children. Following her marriage to Kaye Berry - who himself had a somewhat colourful background - she had two further children, one of whom, Raymond Holroyd Berry, born in 1916, was Isobel's father.

It is a fascinating family history, and one I look forward to exploring in greater depth in the future. The ways that family fortunes ebb and flow over the generations is always an interesting story in itself. When I have looked back at  the parish records and seen that distant relative of the Berry family being christened "WhatGodWill", I have always assumed it was the result of some misunderstanding at the baptism ceremony - "What do you name this child? Oh, what God will". However, on reflection, considering the fortunes and misfortunes that were to await the family in the centuries to come, those ancient forebears were, perhaps, wiser than I thought.

Sunset Over Rational Enlightenment

SUNSET OVER GRAN CANARIA

That will teach me. Earlier this year, in June, I took a couple of weeks out to sail around the Baltic and when I got back I discovered that the UK had decided to conduct an experiment in suicidal idiocy.  Three or four months later I take a couple of weeks out to sail around the Canary Islands and when I get back I discover that the United States has signed up for Idiocy 101 as well. Well, that's it: a nod is as good as a wink to a blind donkey. All future holidays have been cancelled.  Sunset over Gran Canaria is a beautiful sight to behold, but sunset over rational enlightenment is a fearful sight indeed.

All At Sea

For the next two or three weeks I am going to be all at sea. Our ship, alas, is not the delightfully named "Fako", but the good ship Oceana. We are sailing south from Britain in search of the sun, with stops in Madeira, the Canaries, Spain and Portugal. Whilst we are away, News From Nowhere will be celebrating it's tenth birthday with a quiet party, a few drinks, and a decent lie-in. When it returns - in the middle of November - it will be in its eleventh year. Happy birthday to my blog, best regards to all of you, and - calm seas for me.

Four Pubs And A Tram-shed

The Bull’s Head, Mexborough, South Yorkshire

A TRAINER OF IRON

“Mr William Biggs, or 27, Wood Street, Mexborough, a highly prominent figure in variety of sporting circles at Mexborough upwards of 40 years ago, died yesterday at the age of 68. He was formerly licensee of the Bull's Head Hotel for 20 years, and there were very few sports in which he did not indulge with a considerable measure of success. Outside Mexborough he was perhaps most widely known as the man who trained “Iron” Hague to the heavyweight championship of England”.

Sheffield Independent, 23 September 1938

The Falcon, Mexborough, South Yorkshire

GOOD CLEAN MAID

The Falcon was previously called “The Old Mason’s Arms”

“Wanted good clean maid for private work; age 35 to 40: good references - Apply Mrs Neath, Old Mason’s Arms, Mexborough, Near Rotherham”.

Yorkshire Post, 31 August 1929

The Noose And Gibbet Inn, Sheffield

HANGING AROUND

The pub stands a few yards away from the site where the body of the highwayman, Spence Broughton, was left hanging for some thirty years as a deterrent to others who might be tempted to rob the mail coach. In 1792, Broughton’s body was brought from Tyburn in York and attracted considerable crowds - 40,000 people were reported to have viewed the body on the first day. Such crowds, of course, soon became hungry and thirsty and the local pubs did very well indeed from the spectacle. Broughton’s body was finally removed in 1827 after a complaint by the local landowner who was fed up of trespassers on his land.

Carbrook Hall, Sheffield

HAUNTED HISTORY

"Carbrook Hall is a historic house in Sheffield, England. Located in the Attercliffe district of the city, the original building was owned by the Blunt family from 1176. This was rebuilt in 1462, and was bought by Thomas Bright (Lord of the manor of Ecclesall) in the late 16th century. His descendant, John Bright, was an active Parliamentarian during the English Civil War, and the building was used as a Roundhead meeting place during the siege of Sheffield Castle. Most of the building was demolished in the 19th century, what survives is a Grade II listed stone wing that was added c. 1620. It is now used as a public house that claims to be "Sheffield's most haunted public house”. (Wikipedia)

Tinsley Tram-sheds, Sheffield

THE END OF THE LINE

"Built in 1874 for the first horse-drawn tram service in Sheffield. In 1899 they were extended to house electric trams. In 1960 the last Sheffield tram terminated here". (Text of Blue Plaque)

Who Knows Where The Time Goes

Today's agenda featured a trip to the Meandowhall Shopping Centre in order to stock up with whatever will be needed for the next phase of our holidays. But four hours in what non-shoppers often call "Meadowhell" was too much of an undertaking for me, and therefore I managed to escape for a couple of hours and take a walk along the tow-path of the South Yorkshire Canal.

Some thirty-five years ago I undertook a few weeks teaching Economic and Social History at Rotherham College, a couple of miles east of what today is Meadowhall. Very quickly I realised that trying to teach the subject in a sterile lecture-room was a bit pointless and eventually took the entire class for a walk along the canal, in the belief that the existence, so close, of a living laboratory of British Economic and Social history was too good an opportunity to miss. And we saw it all: the steelworks, the little workshops, the large factories, the railways, roads and canals. I was anxious to discover how much had changed in thirty-five years.

And there were many changes. The rotting bedsteads had been replaced by pretty barges and the dark factories had become lush leisure opportunities. Sheds were now shops, cobbled tracks were now tiled malls. I walked for mile after mile along the tow-path, thinking about change and listening to Sandy Denny singing "Who Knows Where The Time Goes". It was my idea of a nice day out.

Buildings Ancient And Modern In Regent's Park

We were in London last week to celebrate The Lad becoming a Member of the Royal College of Physicians. It was a glorious few days: the weather was kind, the accommodation was excellent, the company was thoroughly enjoyable, and we had the benefit of being transported everywhere upon a cloud of intense pride. The ceremony itself was held in the headquarters of the Royal College of Physicians which is in Regent's Park. Whilst the Park is bordered by a ring of fine Georgian mansions, the RCP building stands out as being startlingly modern. Designed in 1964 by the architect Sir Denys Lasdun, it is one of the few post-war Grade 1 listed buildings in Britain. Feelings amongst our party about it were mixed, but as soon as I got into the building I was converted - the spectacular lines of the interior blended wonderfully with the immediate surroundings.

Before going to the ceremony, we walked in Regent's Park and paid a sentimental visit to St John's Lodge which used to be part of London University and was were Isobel studied back in the late sixties and early seventies. I managed to find an old photograph I took of the college back in those days, when it served as the Latin and Greek Departments of Bedford College. Later it was leased to the Sultan of Brunei and it is currently undergoing substantial renovations. 

Designed in 1812 by the architect John Ruffield, it was the first house to be built in the Park. Despite all that, the building has only ever achieved a Grade II listing status, making it very much second division when compared the glass and concrete of the physicians on the other side of the park.

A HISTORY OF MY FAMILY IN 100 IMAGES : Fending For Yourself In Liverpool

A HISTORY OF MY FAMILY IN 100 IMAGES

3. Fending For Yourself In Liverpool

For this third image we are switching from my immediate family to that of Isobel, my wife - specifically, her mothers' family, the Ushers of Liverpool. This is a partially repaired scan of an old memo sheet from what was the family firm - Usher Brothers, Ship's Fender Experts.

I cannot be entirely certain of either who features in the photograph or when it was taken: but I suspect that the older of the four men (second from the right) is Charles Frederick Usher, Isobel's maternal grandfather.

If that is indeed Charles Frederick ( 1867-1940), then it is likely that the other three are his eldest sons - in no particular order - Charles Frederick McKernon Usher (1892-1943); William Henry Whittingham Usher (1893-1949); and John Usher (1896-1954). 

The date is likely to be either just before or just after the first World War. The memo has been amended to remove the Dryden Road address - and we know that the firm was still listed at that address in Gore's Directory of 1911. Such dates also fit in with the perceived age of the four men: if the photograph had been taken in, for example 1914, Charles Frederick Senior would have been 47, and the three boys would have been 22, 21 and 18.

The "W H Usher" of whom the firm is descended from is William Henry Usher (1846-1905), Charles Frederick's father. William Henry had been a rope-maker with connections to both this part of Liverpool and Great Crosby, a town a few miles north of the city. When his father, Henry Usher, died in 1888, the firm seems to have split between the Great Crosby side of the family and the Liverpool side, and later Charles Frederick appears to have shifted the firm into rope fender making as distinct from rope-making itself.

All this is a little unclear and - like any good seafaring rope - the story consists of numerous strands that have been woven together with a fair degree of uncertainty and then coated with a rich layer of the pitch tar of time. It may be possible - before I reach the end of my 100 images - to unravel the story a little.

Such skilfully woven rope fenders have long been replaced by generations of rubber and plastic devices which can stop ships crashing into docks. In a few weeks time I will be getting on a large ship and sailing south to find some sun. As we dock in some semi-tropical paradise, I will look down at the harbour walls and spare a thought for those ancestors sat astride their ship's fender in dark and drizzly Liverpool. .... Then I will go and have a pleasant drink in the bar and give thanks for being born when I was.

Sepia Saturday 344 : The Fellow Travellers

Our Sepia Saturday theme this month is travel, and the odd chap who thinks these things up has given it the title "From Here To There". This is most appropriate for me, as I am in the process of travelling from here to there, and have been doing so for weeks. Of course the "here" and the "there" are constantly changing (today “here” is Huddersfield and tomorrow “there” will be London), and that feeling of not knowing quite where you are or where you are going to, is nicely summed up in this old photograph. It is a selective scan of an old photograph I acquired somewhere on my travels, and - as with all the best photographs - I have no idea who the people are. In the finest meaning of the phrase, they are fellow-travellers.

Have a look what everyone else is doing from here to there by following the links on the Sepia Saturday Blog