Hampton Court Palace
King Henry VIII (1491-1547) owned dozens of castles, mansions and palaces. One that remains today is the magnificent Hampton Court Palace in […]
Read MoreAuthor: Purple Brolly
My aim is to give a flavour of these precious islands we call 'the UK'. All research is based on a minimum of two publicly available sources, usually more.
Common law
Common law embodies the natural instinct towards knowing what is right (‘lawful’) and wrong (‘unlawful’) and the appropriate degree of punishment that […]
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School-leaving qualifications
While some children in the UK do unfortunately finish their time at school without any or very few qualifications, most will breathe […]
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Rawlplugs
When the British Museum asked their local building contractor, Rawlings Brothers, to attach electrical fittings to the walls with minimal damage to […]
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The Commonwealth Games
Having a similar format to the Olympics, the Commonwealth Games began life in 1930 as the British Empire Games and went through […]
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Individual liberty
London-born philosopher and social reformer John Stuart Mill (1806-73) published his most famous work, ‘On Liberty’ in 1859, in which he defined […]
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British Antarctic Territory
Britain’s two tallest mountains by far ~ Mount Hope (10,627ft.) and Mount Jackson (10,446ft.) ~ sit within the British Antarctic Territory (BAT), […]
Read MoreBritain’s two tallest mountains by far ~ Mount Hope (10,627ft.) and Mount Jackson (10,446ft.) ~ sit within the British Antarctic Territory (BAT), a sector at 20°-80°W radiating out from the South Pole. Opposite are two other British Overseas Territories, namely the Falkland Islands and S.Georgia & S.Sandwich Islands. It is also seven times bigger than the UK itself, at 660,000 square miles. However, there are no permanent residents, no trees, no land mammals and more than 99% is under snow and ice.
Englishmen William Smith (1790-1847) first spotted some of the islands in 1819 and John Biscoe (1794-1843) the Antarctic Peninsula in 1832. Britain has the oldest claim on the continent, including a huge swathe on the east which was subsequently transferred to Australia and New Zealand.
The BAT is governed from London. Tourism is by official permission and one attraction for hardy couples is that weddings can be arranged to take place during a visit. BAT stamps and coins are a source of income for Royal Mail’s four most southerly outlets, of which the most accessible is the ‘Penguin Post Office’. This is inside BAT’s single gift shop, offering plenty of penguin, whale and seal souvenirs during its summer season of November-March, when temperatures may rise to 3ºC.
(Top image of Mount Hope: euphro at Flickr.com / CC BY-SA 2.0)
The Bee Gees
Sir Barry Gibb (1946-) and his twin brothers Maurice Gibb (1949-2003) and Robin Gibb (1949-2012) knew instinctively as children that they were […]
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The 1922 Committee
In 1922, Conservative MPs voted to end the coalition with the Liberals and have a General Election. This they won decisively but […]
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Silicone
It is hard to imagine life today without the multitudinous ways in which silicone is employed, from shampoo to contact lenses to […]
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Tyndale’s New Testament
William Tyndale (c.1491-1536) from Gloucestershire was a martyr to the English language in his self-appointed though ultimately fatal mission to produce an […]
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The Hundred Years War
European and British monarchies’ intertwinement led to an incongruous English claim on parts of a disunited France in the 14th and 15th […]
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