Category: Social History

Bradford, Social History, West Yorkshire

Panorama: journal of travel place and nature, and Hinterland: journal of creative non-fiction

I am pleased to announce that Panorama has today published ‘They pass and smile, the children of the sword’, and that Hinterland published ‘Bradford’s unlikely literary road’ earlier this year. Both feature Bradford’s literary geography. https://panoramajournal.org/issues/issue-16-encounters/encounters-they-pass-and-smile-the-children-of-the-sword https://www.hinterlandnonfiction.com/shop/issue-16-digital-edition Continue reading Panorama: journal of travel place and nature, and Hinterland: journal of creative non-fiction

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Social History, West Yorkshire

The Essential West Riding

Herbert Whone (1975). Review by John Bromley. The Essential West Riding is a pleasing mix of photographs and texts by J.B. Priestley, Emily Brontë and Phyllis Bentley, among others, with a foreword by ex Labour Prime Minisiter, Harold Wilson. The photographs are monochrome and starkly characterful of countryside, street settings, factories, rivers and canals. Purposely Whone has not included people as he wanted the book … Continue reading The Essential West Riding

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Rotherham, Social History

S66: Journey into the English mind

If you’re on the M18 you are probably lost. Weren’t you on the way to ‘Bronte country’ and its bleak, dramatic moors, or maybe James Herriot’s vibrant limestone dales? What literary association could possibly draw you to the unexceptional countryside and post industrial sheds peppering the urban sprawl on the east side of Rotherham? Julian Baggini began his ‘Journey into the English mind’ here in … Continue reading S66: Journey into the English mind

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Jarrow, Social History

Ellen Wilkinson, in 1932, described the Boris Johnson playbook

Ellen Wilkinson could be describing Boris Johnson when she paints a picture of the fictional Home Secretary in her 1932 crime novel“…he had marched by well-signposted stages to the place which was obviously his due…Very regrettably, as he had considered, certain newspapers had been encouraging the low craft of the caricaturist. These fellows had seized with joy on such magnificent copy he provided… Continue reading Ellen Wilkinson, in 1932, described the Boris Johnson playbook

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Social History

The Division Bell Mystery (1932)

In 1924 Ellen Wilkinson became MP for Middlesbrough. She was Labour’s first female MP. Previously a trade union official and a constant campaigner and activist, she became MP for Jarrow in 1935 and authored ’The Town that Was Murdered: the life story of Jarrow’ (1939). She wrote two novels, “Clash’ (1929) and a whodunnit, ‘The Division Bell Mystery’ (1932) where the hero is Robert West. ‘West tried to shake off the thought that so often came into his mind in these days – that this was all a facade… Continue reading The Division Bell Mystery (1932)

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Sticky Post
Psychogeography, Social History

Cultural Traces from Ordinary Places

Welcome to my blog. I’m the editor and new to this sort of writing, off the cuff, in the moment. I’m going to enjoy writing it. I hope you enjoy reading it. placesandculturaltraces.com is at heart a desire to link our past to our present. The dominance of the industrial era, for this country at least, appears to be over – for now. As industries … Continue reading Cultural Traces from Ordinary Places

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