20th Century
’59 Trail, Part Four
Part 4 of my uncle, John Alldridge’s 1959 report from Canada’s Far North for the Birmingham Mail – Jerry F Churchill, on Hudson’s Bay Life in Churchill — as in all frontier townships — gravitates [more…]
Arts
Arts
F for Fake (1973)
What is art if not a forgery of the real world. A reflection of what we see in our lives, and then try to convey to others, a form of primeval communication. This is the [more…]
Arts
Last Night Of The Proms 2023 – A Puffin’s eye view
This particular night has been a very long time coming; pretty much forty years to be precise. I remember first watching the Last Night as a yoof and taking in the spectacle on TV in [more…]
20th Century
Scout Camp at …?
Holland, 1949 We shall interrupt my grandparents’ 1947 West Country road trip (to which I shall return) to dip into my father’s 1949 Scout trip to Holland. En route the troop passed a stricken vessel [more…]
Arts
Fabulously Flamboyant Fridays: Elton John
Greetings pop pickers and welcome to this week’s Fabulously Flamboyant Friday, our weekly tribute to the rainbow and glitter world of music produced by artistes who are simply fabulous darling. This week we’ll be examining [more…]
Arts
Always Worth Saying’s Question Time Review
Question Time 5th October 2023 The Panel: Richard Holden (Conservative) Shabana Mahmood (Labour) Jon Ashworth (Labour) Emma Dabiri (Writer and Academic) Richard Walker (Iceland supermarkets) Tony Parsons (Author and Journalist) Venue: Wolverhampton As the programme [more…]
20th Century
A Postcard from Petrolhead Paradise
A Postcard from Petrolhead Paradise Well, Stone the crows! A sunny Saturday in September saw a bit of a surprise. Although we’d noticed the colourful banner advertising the event often enough as we wandered hither [more…]
20th Century
The ’59 Trail, Part Three
Part 3 of my uncle, John Alldridge’s 1959 report from Canada’s Far North for the Birmingham Mail – Jerry F Churchill, on Hudson’s Bay Until you have spent a day and a night in Churchill, [more…]
20th Century
Buried Treasure: An Acropolis on The Frontier
Amongst a century of detritus at the BBC, there lies some buried treasure. Between layers of fake news, preachy left-wing documentaries and un-funny comedy, the BBC’s iPlayer hides a gleaming gem of an old archaeology [more…]