Clik here to view.
Salutation Inn revisited
In March 2011 - see Salutation Inn - I wrote about an obscure novel I'd discovered through reviews: Richard Gray's Salutation Inn (pub. Michael Joseph, 1941). Gray, I found, was a pseudonym of the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Mystery Devon images #2
Lynmouth, c.1900-1920 Philip Willis, a correspondent, just sent another batch of images to the Devon History Society: early 1900s lantern slides for identification. The focus so far has been North...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Coleridge, Pixies' Parlour, and invented tradition
facing p59, The Story of a Devonshire House, 1905The Western Morning News just had an interesting illustrated feature - Celebrating a cave’s link to Ottery St Mary's most famous son - Samuel Taylor...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A cryptic postcard unlocked
I had a minor Bletchley Park moment yesterday. John McConnell uploaded this postcard image (reproduced here by kind permission) to the Gosport Area Facebook group. It was posted from Portsmouth - date...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Book link purge
Annie T. Benthall's painting of Dawlish Warren inEden Phillpotts' 1920 A West Country Pilgrimage. I tend to accumulate bookmarks to far more Internet Archive books than I can write about. Time for a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Review: Prehistoric Wessex - Towards a Deep Map
I've just finished reading (and properly digesting) a superb book, Prehistoric Wessex: Towards a Deep Map (University of Pennsylvania Libraries, 2013, ISBN 978-0-615-76673-7). It's not a book in the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Exmouth Battery exposed
It was a beautiful and mild afternoon yesterday, so we went for a shop and a potter in Exmouth. It was a good excuse to check out a spot mentioned in the Exmouth Journal on Tuesday February 18th:...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Sea Lawn Gap: déjà vu at Dawlish
Sea Lawn Terrace, Dawlish, 4th March - click to enlargeThe Exeter Express & Echo just featured a report - Dawlish historian: Damage to rail line could have been prevented if Brunel's original plans...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Otterton to Budleigh
Another mild day, bright yet hazy: Clare and I went for the very gentle walk down the River Otter from Otterton to Budleigh Salterton, encountering a mathematican, some birds, and a painter.Handily,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Parson's Tunnel
The Parson from Lea Mount - 4th March 2013I think Network Rail are missing a trick; a lot of people (me included) would be very happy to pay £10 to don a hard hat and walk through the Brunel tunnels on...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Green Man sighting
I rather like beer pump logos. They're an excellent little artform, and on occasion they completely transcend what they are - fairly throwaway advertising artwork - and become truly inspired...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Firing Gatherer
Following on from The Linhay on the Downs, here's another Henry Williamson story hacked out of Google Books snippet view, the 1927 The Firing Gatherer. First published in the magazine Time and Tide, it...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Mysterious superwhatevers #5
They've thinned out lately, but here's a small new crop of "mysterious superwhatevers", weird plants and animals used as minimally relevant teasers for health product ads (this batch mostly appears as...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Pigot's Coloured Views
CarisbrookeThese seven luscious aqua-tint illustrations (click to enlarge) come from Google Books:Pigot's coloured views. The Isle of Wight: illustr. in a series of views engr. from the drawings of F....
View ArticleClik here to view.
It ain't that kind: a year on
As many readers will know, in September 2012 I was diagnosed with cancer of unknown primary. A progress report: Cancer of unknown primary (CUP) is a quite common - but little-publicised - form of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Sandrock Chalybeate Spring
Another example where John Ptak's blog Ptak Science Books category - "History of Blank, Missing and Empty Things" - is applicable: the Sandrock Chalybeate Spring, Isle of Wight.George Brannon's Vectis...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Shanklin Spa ...
The Royal Spa Hotel and seafront, Shanklin, 1928 - EPW024578Further to The Sandrock Chalybeate Spring, I just found a very nice guidebook relating to a similar venture to revive an old Isle of Wight...
View ArticleClik here to view.
... and the mysterious "Monopole"
Further to the previous post, I wonder who was "Monopole" who wrote Shanklin Spa: A Guide to the Town and the Isle of Wight?The preface to the book indicates that the author was from Shanklin, and the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Railway cake
One of my early memories is going with my grandparents to visit their friends at a small Scottish village called Ballinluig. I don't recall much more than a road, a bridge over a river (I now know it...
View ArticleClik here to view.
1000
Me in Oldport1000 today! I'm not that old; this is the thousandth post to JSBlog. Not counting a few backdated puzzle solutions, the first real posts were towards the end of 2006, and I began posting...
View Article