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Forgotten History

The next time you're cycling and curse the local council for not repairing pot-holes, spare a thought for Thomas Stevens.
Starting in 1884, this American-based Englishman set off from Sacramento to circumnavigate the world - on a Penny-Farthing:

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Those "ordinary" bicycles were obviously made to last as, in 20 months and 13,500 miles, the worst damage his machine suffered was when soldiers in Persia temporarily confiscated his bike and disassembled it, breaking spokes on the main wheel which, thankfully, an Afghan handyman was subsequently able to repair.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Stevens_(cyclist)
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
The next time you're cycling and curse the local council for not repairing pot-holes, spare a thought for Thomas Stevens.
Starting in 1884, this American-based Englishman set off from Sacramento to circumnavigate the world - on a Penny-Farthing:

View attachment 56579

Those "ordinary" bicycles were obviously made to last as, in 20 months and 13,500 miles, the worst damage his machine suffered was when soldiers in Persia temporarily confiscated his bike and disassembled it, breaking spokes on the main wheel which, thankfully, an Afghan handyman was subsequently able to repair.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Stevens_(cyclist)
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Female pilots finally celebrated for crucial role in Battle of Britain​

Pioneering female aviators delivered planes wherever they were needed in the second world war – armed with just a notebook

From The Guardian here.

I particularly liked this bit:
A male member of the RAF once made a complaint about Moggridge after observing her reading while she was flying the plane he was on. “He reportedly said: ‘It was dreadful weather and I can’t believe not only was a woman flying me here, but she was reading a book’.”

According to the exhibition, Moggridge’s response was: “Oh no, I wasn’t reading a novel. Those were my ATA notes. I hadn’t flown this type of plane before” – at which point her erstwhile passenger “nearly threw up”.
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I always find it odd that Britain's most famous female aviator of the period (or aviatrix, as they were described at the time) Amy Johnson is so rarely mentioned in articles such as this. She died flying an Airspeed Oxford for the ATA.

From Wikipedia:
On 5 January 1941, while flying an Airspeed Oxford for the ATA from Prestwick via RAF Squires Gate to RAF Kidlington near Oxford, Johnson went off course in adverse weather conditions. Reportedly out of fuel, she bailed out as her aircraft crashed into the Thames Estuary near Herne Bay.

A convoy of wartime vessels in the Thames Estuary spotted Johnson's parachute coming down and saw her alive in the water, calling for help.[27] Conditions were poor – there was a heavy sea and a strong tide, snow was falling and it was intensely cold.[28] Lt Cmdr Walter Fletcher, the Captain of HMS Haslemere,[Note 3] navigated his ship to attempt a rescue.[28] The crew of the vessel threw ropes out to Johnson but she was unable to reach them and was lost under the ship. A number of witnesses believed there was a second body in the water.[27] Fletcher dived in and swam out to this, rested on it for a few minutes then let go. When the lifeboat reached him he was unconscious and as a result of the intense cold he died in hospital days later.[28][29] Johnson's watertight flying bag, her log book and cheque book later washed up and were recovered near the crash site.[30][22]

A memorial service was held for Johnson in the church of St Martin-in-the-Fields on 14 January 1941. Walter Fletcher was posthumously awarded the Albert Medal in May 1941.[28]

Disputed circumstances​

In 1999, it was reported that Johnson's death may have been caused by friendly fire.[31] Tom Mitchell, from Crowborough, Sussex, claimed to have shot Johnson's aircraft down when she twice failed to give the correct identification code during the flight. Mitchell explained how the aircraft was sighted and contacted by radio. A request was made for the signal. She gave the wrong one twice. "Sixteen rounds of shells were fired and the plane dived into the Thames Estuary. We all thought it was an enemy plane until the next day when we read the papers and discovered it was Amy. The officers told us never to tell anyone what happened."[31]

In 2016, Alec Gill, a historian, claimed that the son of a ship's crew member stated that Johnson had died because she was sucked into the blades of the ship's propellers; the crewman did not observe this to occur, but believes it is true.[32]

As a member of the ATA with no known grave – her body was never recovered – Johnson is commemorated (under the name Amy V. Johnson) by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission on the Air Forces Memorial at Runnymede.[33]
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As disturbing as the Nazi atrocities were/are, this man has an astonishing collection of nasty stuff from that era. I wouldn't want to collect any of this stuff myself but ... WARNING ... here's his collection.

 
Swifty said:
As disturbing as the Nazi atrocities were/are, this man has an astonishing collection of nasty stuff from that era. I wouldn't want to collect any of this stuff myself but ... WARNING ... here's his collection.

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I collect strange and weird stuff. A couple of years ago I came across (online) a teaspoon that had been a part of a cutlery set belonging to Hitler. While I do own some things others may find questionable, this item I passed on.
 
Swifty said:
As disturbing as the Nazi atrocities were/are, this man has an astonishing collection of nasty stuff from that era. I wouldn't want to collect any of this stuff myself but ... WARNING ... here's his collection.

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Wow, thats horrific. I found myself thinking the only thing that could drag this even lower is if he had a cannister of Zyklon B. And then...

It reminds me of a certain episode of Father Ted.
 
pandacracker said:
And a cyanide capsule dispenser!
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And those pincer devices for dragging prisoner's corpse's around. I've never even heard of those before until seeing this macabre collection. I'm not enthusiastic about researching whether those were invented because of concentration camps or not. I definitely wouldn't want to own a pair considering what they've been used for in the past so I'm not sure if this bloke's a neo nazi or if he's genuinely not glamorising this stuff but instead revealing it to the world as he claims ?. It is educational we have to admit even though it's horrible. It makes me wonder about the kind of people he knows to even get hold of this stuff.
 
Swifty said:
And those pincer devices for dragging prisoner's corpse's around. I've never even heard of those before until seeing this macabre collection. I'm not enthusiastic about researching whether those were invented because of concentration camps or not. I definitely wouldn't want to own a pair considering what they've been used for in the past so I'm not sure if this bloke's a neo nazi or if he's genuinely not glamorising this stuff but instead revealing it to the world as he claims ?. It is educational we have to admit even though it's horrible. It makes me wonder about the kind of people he knows to even get hold of this stuff.
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I suppose if his exhibits were in a bona fide museum no-one would bat an eyelid (and many of them are), but as a private collection the volume and type are more than a bit disturbing. One Zyklon B canister would be more than enough, but there were a few. He'd better hope they don't corrode anytime soon.

Never heard of a pickelhaube being called a Kaiser helmet before, but there you go.
 
gordonrutter said:
Wow, thats horrific. I found myself thinking the only thing that could drag this even lower is if he had a cannister of Zyklon B. And then...
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Like the nasty store owner in Falling Down?
 
Lord Lucan said:
I collect strange and weird stuff. A couple of years ago I came across (online) a teaspoon that had been a part of a cutlery set belonging to Hitler. While I do own some things others may find questionable, this item I passed on.
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If you have a spare £3½ million you could be in the market for Hitler’s gold watch which was looted from Berghof, his mountain hideout, by a French soldier called Sgt Robert Mignot during the closing weeks of the Second World War.

It has stayed in the soldier’s family ever since but is now set to come up for auction with an estimated price tag of £3.4m.

The watch was manufactured by Swiss luxury watchmaker LeCoultre and features the Nazi leader’s initials, the Swastika and the regime’s notorious eagle.

It also bears three dates, Hitler’s birthday, the date he was appointed chancellor of Germany, and the date of the Nazi party’s 1933 election victory.

The watch will go under the hammer at Alexander Historical Auctions in Maryland, in the United States.
Bill Panagopulos, president of the auction house, said it was the first time a watch belonging to Hitler had been offered for public sale.

‘The watch was given to Hitler probably in 1933 after he was made chancellor of Germany and essentially gained full authority over every aspect of the administration of the country,’ he said.

‘It was given to him most likely by the Nazi party itself in recognition of his achievement and in thanks for elevating the party to power.’

Mr Panagopulos said while other items belonging to Hitler such as pieces of tableware, clothing and furniture had come up for sale in the past, the watch was was unique and came with ‘solid provenance’.

Sgt Mignot, took the watch from the Berghof on May 4, 1945.

His unit, the Regiment de Marche du Tchad, had stormed the building slightly ahead of American troops but found it recently abandoned.

After bringing the watch back to France, Sgt Mignot later sold it to his cousin, whose grandson has now put the heirloom up for auction.
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From here: This is interesting and sadly ironic: And still it did some good ...
https://arnoldkling.substack.com/p/keeping-up-with-the-fits-722

Blockbusting was made illegal in 1968. For a couple of decades before that, it worked like this:
A real estate company would pick out a predominantly white neighborhood in a city. It would start advertising through the neighborhood that it was “changing,” to use a gentle term, or it would be more explicit that blacks were buying houses in the neighborhood. Some of the white residents would sell their houses and relocate. The real estate firm would sell these houses to blacks, often at a considerable mark-up. White residents in these neighborhoods were apparently unwilling or unable to sell to blacks directly, and thus accepted a lower prices for their houses. The process unspooled from there, with the real estate firm increasingly able to play on white bigotry to buy houses cheaply and then to play on limited real estate options for blacks to sell to them at higher prices.

My college economics professor, Bernie Saffran, tried to expose the weakness of the intention heuristic by arguing that rent control is bad and blockbusting is good. The argument against rent control was standard economics. The argument for blockbusting is that it enabled blacks to buy homes that they wanted.
 
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Lord Lucan said:
I collect strange and weird stuff. A couple of years ago I came across (online) a teaspoon that had been a part of a cutlery set belonging to Hitler. While I do own some things others may find questionable, this item I passed on.
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My husband has a big tin box full of stuff from his family history, that his great aunt gave him. Amongst it all is a copy of what we realised was the first ever edition of the Daily Mail. I'd like to kill it with fire but husband thinks we should put it on eBay to raise £s for a cause they'd hate. Only thing is - who'd buy it? Maybe I will kill it with fire...
 
Tales of the WAAF explored in a new exhibition.

Cpl Elspeth Henderson was among three female comrades to be awarded the Military Medal for bravery in the face of the enemy for their efforts during the Battle of Britain. Why was this honour questioned in some quarters, including by the airwoman herself?

As bombs pounded down on to the flimsy huts of Biggin Hill airfield on 30 August 1940, three women working there knew they had to act. Cpl Elspeth Henderson, Sgt Helen Turner and Sgt Joan Elizabeth Mortimer were based at the south-east London fighter station at the height of the Battle of Britain.

That day they were on shift as teleprinter operators in the operations room. As the Luftwaffe began its attack, everyone was ordered to get out and take shelter. Yet the three stayed at their posts, keen to protect their colleagues both on the ground and up in the sky. ...

At its peak, the WAAF had 182,000 members. They would carry out a huge range of activities to aid the war effort across the UK and beyond, from providing weather reports and deploying barrage balloons, to repairing aircraft and intercepting codes and ciphers.

In June 1941, 18-year-old Ann Galley arrived in England, where she was employed as a plotter. Her job was to track aircraft in the sky by moving markers around giant table maps.

By that time Biggin Hill had been flattened by German bombers, so operations had been moved just up the road to Keston.

"There were these lovely houses which had been requisitioned by the air force and all that was in them was a bathroom and an iron bed; there were no furnishings," the 99-year-old said.

The operations room where she worked was based in the local village hall. Later it was moved into the ballroom of a nearby mansion, where Ms Galley would spend eight-hour shifts plotting the movements of planes. ...

As well as focusing on the work of those in the WAAF, the exhibition looks at the efforts of the women of the Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA). The civilian unit was formed at the start of the war to fly new, repaired and damaged aircraft between factories, maintenance units and frontline squadrons.

Initially, only men were considered eligible for such work but as demand increased, women were allowed to join the unit, until, of the 1,250 recruits, 168 were female.

Jackie Moggridge had moved to the UK from South Africa to follow her dream of becoming a commercial pilot, but halfway through her aviation course, when she was aged 18, World War Two broke out.

"Her mum said, 'you've got to come home' and she said, 'no I'm going to fly, I've written to the RAF to offer my services to the war. I'm going to do my bit'," explains her daughter Candy Adkins.

After being turned down by the RAF because of her sex, she joined the WAAF and was posted to a radar station.

"She'd describe how there would be little dots and they'd come together and then you watch… and then one disappears. You'd then wait with bated breath to see whether the little dot headed towards Germany and you'd know you'd lost one of your own. That's how she watched the Battle of Britain," says Ms Adkins.

With the ATA offering a chance for her to take to the skies, Ms Moggridge signed up to become the youngest member of the unit, taking planes including Spitfires, Hawker Hurricanes and de Havilland Mosquitoes across the UK, sometimes making five or six flights a day.

"She flew 83 types of warplane - they had 147 in all," Ms Adkins says, adding that the Spitfire was her mum's favourite, "because it was ladylike and so sensitive". ...

It is such attitudes that the museum hopes to promote by holding its exhibition, while also shining a light on the hidden histories of some of the women who were part of the war effort.

"Obviously, people associate the Battle of Britain with the pilots and the heroic and amazing jobs that they did, but I thought here it would be really important to tell the stories of the ordinary women who just stepped up in extraordinary times," says director Katie Edwards. "It's really interesting to tell that story and perhaps inspire some young women to just think about what you can do."

Women & War: Hidden Heroes of World War Two will run at the Biggin Hill Memorial Museum until late 2023.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-62330141
 
Well, who knew? The Concorde that never was.

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The Historic Qantas Jet ‘That Never Was’​

The Concorde, a ‘supersonic’ passenger aircraft that flew faster than the speed of sound, made its last commercial flight almost 20 years ago.

Since 2015, rumours of the Concorde returning to the skies continue to swirl around and the word Concorde is still the biggest buzzword today when it comes to ultra-fast flights.

Concorde flew its last commercial flight back in 2003, a demise brought upon by financial problems, high maintenance costs and a major Air France crash in 2000 which tragically killed all 113 passengers on board.
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https://www.dmarge.com/qantas-concorde
 
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