Badminton Horse Trials
At the 1948 Summer Olympics, the British equestrian team picked up just one bronze medal. This so dismayed the 10th Duke of […]
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.
The White Horse
Our most famous and oldest chalk-cut hill figure is the White Horse near Uffington. Unlike later equine hill figures, this one is […]
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The pedal bicycle
James Starley (1830-81) from West Sussex was the pioneer of the modern pedal bicycle, along with his London-born nephew, John Kemp Starley […]
Read MoreJames Starley (1830-81) from West Sussex was the pioneer of the modern pedal bicycle, along with his London-born nephew, John Kemp Starley (1854-1901). The very first bicycle, nicknamed the ‘bone-shaker’, was made entirely of wood, with no pedals at all, resulting in the rider’s footwear being quickly ruined! The Starleys made the design modifications that led to the much more practical and safe version we have today.
James Starley was very mechanically-minded and began his working career repairing sewing machines and he patented several improvements to their mechanisms. It was while he was manufacturing his own models that he started to look at ways to improve a ‘bone-shaker’ brought to him from Paris. He first of all made a four-wheeled version with suspension, in 1865. In 1870 he patented the spoked wheel and made an all-metal bicycle. In 1871 he invented the Penny-Farthing, with a large wheel at the front and small wheel at the back.
He continued upgrading his design, adding pneumatic tyres, a chain, levers, and inventing the differential gear. In 1876 he patented a tricycle used by Queen Victoria (1819-1901). He even made tandem tricycles. His nephew developed the safety features and experimented with adding motors. His ‘Rover’ line eventually morphed into Rover cars.
(Image: Karen Roe at Flickr.com / CC BY 2.0)
Wallace’s Realms
Alfred Russel Wallace, OM FRS (1823-1913) was born in Monmouthshire and showed a fascination for identifying flora and fauna from a young […]
Read MoreAlfred Russel Wallace, OM FRS (1823-1913) was born in Monmouthshire and showed a fascination for identifying flora and fauna from a young age. This led him to make major explorations of far-flung parts of the world, in which he carried out ground-breaking first-hand observations and discoveries of thousands of species. He also realised, for the first time, that the world is divided into various biogeographic regions, named Wallace’s Realms in his honour. These six regions have only recently been updated to eleven in number.
He spent 1848-52 in Brazil, mapping out the Amazon River and collecting specimens of insects, birds and mammals, many of which were lost when his ship home sank. Undeterred, he then travelled extensively around Malaysia and Indonesia, where he collected 125,660 specimens, of which 5,000 were previously unknown. He noticed the differences in the types of species either side of what is called Wallace’s Line between the islands.
Once in possession of so much data, Wallace then came to the same conclusion as Charles Darwin on the evolution of species by the mechanism of natural selection. In 1858, he sent Darwin an essay on his findings for his opinion, unaware of the similarity since Darwin had not yet gone into print.
(Top image of Wallace statue at the Natural History Museum: Matt Brown at Flickr.com / CC BY 2.0)
Wicca
Wicca, also known as ‘The Craft (of the Wise)’, owes its modern surge in popularity to Lancashire-born Gerald Brosseau Gardner (1884-1964). He […]
Read MoreWicca, also known as ‘The Craft (of the Wise)’, owes its modern surge in popularity to Lancashire-born Gerald Brosseau Gardner (1884-1964). He retired to Dorset in 1938 and became involved in two local groups ~ the naturists and the secret followers of a mystery tradition. Gardner’s ‘Book of Shadows’ is regarded as the ultimate Wiccan manual and Gardner himself as the father of modern witchcraft, although a Wiccan may or may not be a witch.
Potential Wiccans are expected to request initiation rather than being converted. Some covens then give them a year’s grace period before instruction begins. Only adults are accepted. Their rites and rituals generally take place in woods or parks and involve moving in a circle to help generate spiritual energy. The circle features in the Wiccan symbol, the pentagram or pentacle, where it represents the universe and the five points the elements of fire, air, water, earth and spirit.
Today it is possible to take the first steps towards becoming a Wiccan by online correspondence course. It is one of the fastest-growing religions in the UK and other parts of the world. Its reverence for nature and old pagan ways strikes home with many people seeking a spiritual path.
(Top image of Gardner’s Book of Shadows: Midnightblueowl at Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0)
Friday the 13th
The number 13 has long been considered unlucky but its combination with Friday in a double-whammy of doom is a relatively new […]
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Order of the Garter
The Most Noble Order of the Garter is the oldest recognition of outstanding service to the nation or the monarch. It was […]
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An Englishman’s home is his castle
The principle behind the saying “An Englishman’s home is his castle” is that your home is your private territory, which others may […]
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Rights on becoming 21 years old
The Family Law Reform Act of 1969 lowered the traditional ‘age of majority’ from twenty-one to eighteen, as from 1st January 1970. […]
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The Black Death
The years 1348-50 saw the greatest loss of life in British and European history, when 20-50 million people died, both rich and […]
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Status Quo
Rock band Status Quo first formed in London in 1962 as The Scorpions. Co-founder Francis Rossi, OBE (1949-) from London, lead singer, […]
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Boolean algebra
Boolean algebra, or logic, is named after George Boole (1815-64), a gifted mathematician and philosopher. Born in Lincoln, the city honoured him […]
Read MoreBoolean algebra, or logic, is named after George Boole (1815-64), a gifted mathematician and philosopher. Born in Lincoln, the city honoured him with a memorial stained glass window in Lincoln Cathedral. His thirst for knowledge was such that he taught himself advanced mathematics, Latin, Greek, French, German and Italian at a young age. He opened his own school in 1834, then became head of a boarding school in 1840.
This extraordinary man received the Royal Society of London’s first gold medal for mathematics in 1844. From 1849 until his death from pneumonia he was the first professor of mathematics at Queen’s College Cork. He devised a symbolic system for sorting information with binary values, enabling the efficiency of computer programs, databases and electronics. He is therefore regarded as one of the forefathers of the digital age.
The Boolean operators AND, OR and NOT are the most well-known, as they can be used in most search engines to narrow down results. However, Boole also greatly contributed to new areas of mathematics such as set theory, binary numbers, probability and differential equations, and he was the founder of invariant theory. He showed that mathematics, far from being set in stone, still has further creative possibilities.
(Top image: Chris Bertram at Flickr.com / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)