J. J. Bell

From the papers of L R Reeve* this affectionate portrait of a minor character in British education. He does not have a Wikipedia page and is unknown to the DNB, but WorldCat record books on history especially a few text books in the Piers Plowman Histories series which were in print from 1913 - 1957. The other author involved in the series and covered by Reeve was also from Goldsmiths - Ethel Howard Spalding

J. J. BELL

I cannot possibly take an objective view of the late J. J. Bell; for his presence in any circumstances always exhilarated me, and other people seemed to be similarly affected, because there was invariably a rustle of anticipation whenever he joined an assembly. He was not a conscious showman, yet his demeanour was that of a laughing cavalier, a manner perfectly suitable, as he was morally and physically one of the bravest men of his generation.
  For some years before 1914, he was a lecturer at Goldsmiths' College. At one period he had to face an exceptionally high-spirited and restless group of young men. During one lecture his students were particularly troublesome.
  "You are a lot of rebels and hooligans!” he finally shouted, as he walked out of the lecture room.

E.H. (Ethel Howard) Spalding

From the papers of L R Reeve* this affectionate portrait of a minor character in British education. She does not have a Wikipedia page and is unknown to the DNB, but WorldCat record many books on history and education by her, some of which were continually reprinted into the 1960s. Her first book The problem of rural schools and teachers in North America (London : Stationery Office) was published in 1908 and she is noted as revising a book in 1960, so one could speculate her dates were something like 1880 - 1965. Her text books Piers Plowman Histories were in print from 1913 - 1957.

Miss Spalding

Miss Spalding was a most astonishing historian who still makes me feel google-eyed when I remember some of her activities.

In appearance she seemed so fragile that one would think a gentle summer breeze would blow her over. Yet when she lectured at Goldsmiths' College, London, cheeky men students, immediately after ragging unmercifully an instructor in physical training, would sit in her presence during a history lecture hardly daring to flicker an eyelid.

The other John Lennon

A curious find in a box of old poetry -- the completely unknown John Lennon's Rossall Hall. A Poem (Printed for the Author, Preston 1834.) It was bound up with 6 other books including a book of Epicurean Recipes (1832) and Memoirs of Madame Malibran de Beriot by Isaac Nathan author of The Hebrew Melodies. All in a small rust coloured moiré cloth-bound book with a leather label on the spine with the word 'Miscellanies' lettered in gold. Decent condition with some occasional foxing to text. The John Lennon book appears to be, like its author, completely unknown-- no copies at WorldCat, Copac or the vast Karlsruhe database which has the complete catalogues of many worldwide libraries.


It is a mere 36 pages and is mostly devoted to unadulterated praise of the great local landowner and philanthropist Sir Peter Hesketh-Fleetwood (1801 - 1866) who founded the town of Fleetwood, in Lancashire and was squire of Rossall Hall. At the time he also owned most of Southport. The work is dedicated to him and some of the verses may have been used in his election campaign. At the 1832 general election, Fleetwood was elected M.P. for Preston, in the first parliament following the Reform Act. The poem's style is very slightly thumping, far better than McGonagall, but Swinburne he was not: 

Hail Rossall Hall! thou stately dome,

With heavenly virtues blest:

Where learned sages find a home,

And weary traveller's rest.

Lennon, however, was no sycophant, his backing of Fleetwood was based on the politician's promise of work in the reform parliament for the rights of a million hand-loom weavers '...who, for a series of years have been labouring under the most unjust privations ever yet recorded in the annals of England's domestic history.' Lennon was campaigning in his poems for a minimum wage of a pound a week for the weavers. Fleetwood's many good works are recorded in his lengthy Wikipedia entry. He was also responsible for starting the development of the new resort town of Fleetwood built on a rabbit warren at Rossall Point near his stately pile. Initially he had considered naming his new town New Liverpool or Wyreton. There are a few traces of Lennon's campaigning work in transcripts and histories at Google Books but research is hampered by myriad references to the great Beatle. Politically he was on the side of the working man and a dogged campaigner for worker's rights- that and a certain facility for rhyming connect him to his illustrious namesake. 

Other compelling connections appear with a bit of searching online. Rossall Hall later became a private school and was attended by Stan Parkes, John Lennon's cousin. A fan site has this:

Honey Water formula

Typed pages from the working papers of Aytoun Ellis's for his book Essence of Beauty. Published by Secker in 1960. A litre of brandy?

Fragrant waters have been in use for thousands of years, Theophrastus mentioning them nearly 400 years before the Christian era.

Oldest of all, if one excepts rose-water from this category, is HONEY WATER (which) there seems little doubt, was used in this country from an early date but it was in the reign of JAMES II that it really became popular, George Wilson making it for the King to such a formula as the following:

100 Honey

100 Coriander fruit

9 Clovers

6 Nutmegs

6 Gum benzoin

6 Storax

6 Vanilla pods

10 Yellow lemon rind

-----

243

-----

The directions were to:

"...bruise the cloves, nutmegs, coriander-seed and benzoin, cut the vanilla pods in pieces, and put all into a glass alembic with a litre of French brandy, and after digesting 48 hours, distill.

To one litre of the distillate add:

150 Damask rose water: 150 Orange flower water:

0.1 Musk: 0.1 Ambergris.

Grind the musk and ambergris in a glass mortar, and afterwards put all together into a large matrass and let them circulate three days and three nights in a gentle heat; let them cool.

Filter and keep the water in bottles well stoppered."

Whether the King used Wilson's preparation for his hair or his complexion is uncertain but it certainly had some merit and reveals the perfumer as knowing a great deal about his craft.

    In that age of quackery when many harmful ingredients were being used, it is interesting to see in his recipe a rational approach to the subject. With such innocuous ingredients the HONEY WATER could not have harmed His Majesty even if it had found its way into his mouth. A very different case was that of a Belgian singer, M. Zegler, less than a century ago when, during a performance of William Tell at the Royal Italian Opera House, some of his make-up trickled into his mouth. Being a deadly poison it cost him his life.

The Penny Universities - coffee quiz

From a publicity leaflet for  The Penny Universities  a history of the coffee-houses. 'Penny University' is a term originating from the 18th-century coffee houses in London, England. Instead of paying for drinks, people were charged a penny to enter a coffeehouse. Once inside, the patron had access to coffee, company, various discussions, pamphlets, bulletins, newspapers, and the latest news and gossip. Reporters called "runners" went around to the coffeehouses announcing the latest news. No need for a runner in modern java joints- all you need now is the Wi-Fi code… I do not have the answers, the only one I can get is 5 (clue the R of the L)

1. Who was the famous physician who experimented with coffee as a possible antidote to melancholia and alcoholism ?
2. What was the "wooden oracle", referred to by Pepys and where was it ?
3. How did the Royal Society come into being ?
4. Who gave Nell Gwyn her first part on the stage and who wrote the play ?
5. A great poem grew out of coffee-house gossip. What was it and who wrote it ?
6. Who was Angier and what was "Angier's Fume" ?
7. Who was the privateering doctor whose adventures inspired Robinson Crusoe ?
8. Which notorious coffee-house in Covent Garden was kept by an old Etonian ?
9. A fantastic instance of wagering through the medium of an insurance policy concerned the sex of a distinguished diplomat. Who was he and what was the outcome ?
10. Who was the Aberdeen tailor who turned quack and was knighted ?

BOOKS, THEATRES & BOMBS.

From the papers of Ifan Kyrle Fletcher, sometime book dealer, Edward Gordon Craig specialist, theatrical history and dance expert. Published in a somewhat revised form in 'London Calling' (BBC Overseas service journal) June 5 1941. 6 million books lost in blitz at Paternoster Square - unimaginable treasures.

BOOKS, THEATRES & BOMBS.

by Ifan Kyrle Fletcher

February 7, 1941.

Nearly eight years ago, as we can now see, the Nazis revealed themselves in their true colours. What happened on the night of May 13 1933 was no obscure diplomatic or political more, unknown to all but statesmen. It was a simple act of destruction which has profoundly effected the lives of us all. Do you remember? Twenty-five thousand books were made into a bonfire outside the University of Berlin and were destroyed in the presence of about forty thousand people.

    At the time it may have seemed nothing more than the triumph of one political party over another but we know now that all the violence and suffering of the interviewing years are, as it were, lit up by the flames of that bonfire. By its light we see and understand another fire seven and a half years later - the fire of the night of December 29, 1940, when, in the district around St Paul's Cathedral, nearly six million books were destroyed and some of the most precious treasures of our architecture were wrecked. By its light we see and understand other events, the destruction of the library of University College, London; the destruction of the library at Holland House and the partial destruction of this lovely and historic mansion, for which the people of West London had feelings of the warmest affection. We see and understand the destruction of the library of the city of Tours and the looting of the museums and art collections of Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Holland, and Belgium. Recently, the Louvre and the famous chateaux of France have been plundered, not to satisfy artistic craving for possession but to provide funds from the art markets of neutral countries for more weapons of destruction.

Coffee Then and Now

Press cutting (Sunday Times, London?) dated 1960 found in a copy of Aytoun Ellis's book Essence of Beauty. Interesting how the modern Mocha is no longer a food drink...

SIR,–No meals were served in the seventeenth-century coffee-houses. The serving of coffee after dinner was however an established practice before that century ended, although only in the nobility. Richard Hoare, the goldsmith, who had removed from Cheapside to Fleet Street in 1690, made " a plain coffee port " for Lord Derby, to be sent to Knowsley with " six pounds of coffee berries." (The coffee doubtless came from Hoare's neighbor at Temple Bar–Thomas Twinning.)

  By the mid-eighteenth-century, when most of London's 2,000 coffee-houses had closed down or become clubs, taverns, or chop-houses, coffee was served with meals in certain of the inns and eating-houses, particularly in provincial towns like Chester, Exeter, Liverpool, and in Edinburgh and Glasgow.

  Anyone who has tasted Mocha coffee as made in the early coffee-houses–" the bitter black drink " (as Pepys called it)–will agree that it was food and drink in one! The only complaints appear to have come from " the trade," jealous of this new and formidable rival, and from the women, who complained that they were neglected by their husbands whose addiction to this " enfeebling " drink made them " as unfruitful as the desert from where that unhappy berry is said to be brought."

                J. A. Aytoun-Ellis

    Sussex.

                        *                        *                        *                        *                        *

SIR,–In " The Cook's Oracle " by Dr. Wm. Kitchiner (seventh edition, 1823) you read:-

  Coffee, as drank in England, debilitates the Stomach, and produces a slight nausea. In France and in Italy it is made strong from the best coffee, and is poured out hot and transparent. In England it is usually made from bad coffee, served out tepid and muddy, and drowned in a deluge of water, and sometimes deserves the title given to it in " The Petition against Coffee," 4to, 1674, p. 4, " a base, black, thick, nasty, bitter, stinking Puddle Water." . . . . No coffee will bear drinking with what is called milk in London.

Has the situation changed very much?

                W. H. S. Williams.

    Tenterden.