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1987: The Tate Gallery bought Sonia Boyce's drawing...

Building and people item

1987

The Tate Gallery bought Sonia Boyce 's drawing entitled Missionary Position II. Boyce was the first black female artist to enter the collection and, she later discovered to her shock, only the fifth woman.
Higgins, Charlotte. “’The vitriol was really unhealthy’: artist Sonia Boyce on the row over taking down Hylas and the Nymphs”. theguardian.com, 19 Mar. 2018.

12 April 1945: President Roosevelt died, and Vice-President...

National or international item

12 April 1945

President Roosevelt died, and Vice-President Harry S. Truman became President of the US.
Messenger, Charles. World War Two Chronological Atlas: When, Where, How and Why. Bloomsbury, 1989.
220
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
395
Keegan, John. The Second World War. Viking, 1990.
536

By 1 October 1853: Charles Reade published his second novel,...

Writer or writing item

By 1 October 1853

Charles Reade published his second novel, Christie Johnstone.
Sutherland, John, b. 1938. The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford University Press, 1989.
Athenæum. J. Lection.
1353: 1156-8

19 May 1662: The Act of Uniformity made use of the revised...

National or international item

19 May 1662

The Act of Uniformity made use of the revised Book of Common Prayer compulsory in England and Wales; it came into use within three months.
Collinson, Patrick. “Holy-Rowly-Powliness”. London Review of Books, 4 Jan. 2001, pp. 33-4.
33

August 1862-March 1863: Charles Kingsley's The Water Babies: A Fairy...

Writer or writing item

August 1862-March 1863

Charles Kingsley 's The Water Babies: A Fairy Tale for a Land Baby was serialised in Macmillan's Magazine.
Sutherland, John, b. 1938. The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford University Press, 1989.
661

31 January 1910: An Imperial edict abolished slavery in C...

National or international item

31 January 1910

An Imperial edict abolished slavery in China.
Keller, Helen, editor. The Dictionary of Dates. Macmillan, 1934, 2 vols.
I: 796

8 November 1602: The Bodleian Library, Oxford, first admitted...

Writer or writing item

8 November 1602

The Bodleian Library , Oxford, first admitted readers (nearly five years after Sir Thomas Bodley 's original offer to restore Duke Humfrey's Library).
Trim, David J. B. “Sir Thomas Bodley and the International Protestant Cause”. Bodleian Library Record, Vol.
xvi
, No. 4, 1998, pp. 314-40.
315

February 1993: Two eleven-year-old boys, Robert Thomson...

Building and people item

February 1993

Two eleven-year-old boys, Robert Thomson and Jon Venables , were convicted of the murder of two-year-old James Bulger in Liverpool.
Williams, Neville et al. Chronology of the 20th Century. Helicon, 1996.
515

By 11 May 2002: John Murray, publishers of Austen and Byron...

Writer or writing item

By 11 May 2002

John Murray , publishers of Austen and Byron among many others, and one of the few independent publishers remaining after rapid change in the industry, sold out to bookselling chain W. H. Smith .
Reynolds, Nigel. Last chapter as oldest publisher is bought out,, 11 May 2002. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/05/11/nmurr11.xml.

9 August 1842: The Webster-Ashburton Treaty defined the...

National or international item

9 August 1842

The Webster-Ashburton Treaty defined the border between Canada and the US state of Maine.
Steinberg, Sigfrid Henry. Historical Tables: 58 BC-AD 1985. 11th ed., Garland Publishing, 1986.
196
Cook, Chris, and John, 1946 - Stevenson. The Longman Handbook of Modern British History, 1714-1995. 3rd ed., Longman, 1996.
330

1925: Eleanor Barton became the General Secretary...

National or international item

1925

Eleanor Barton became the General Secretary of the Women's Co-operative Guild (WCG).
Webb, Catherine. The Woman with the Basket: The History of the Women’s Co-operative Guild 1883-1927. Co-operative Wholesale Society’s Printing Works, 1927.
190

By March 1810: George Crabbe published The Borough, a poem...

Writer or writing item

By March 1810

George Crabbe published The Borough, a poem in twenty-four letters about life in a country town.
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall, 5 series.
3rd ser. 19 (1810): 335
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

May 1930: Factory-produced television sets (the Baird...

Building and people item

May 1930

Factory-produced television sets (the Bairdtelevisor) went on sale for 25 guineas in the UK.
Briggs, Asa. The History of Broadcasting in the United Kingdom. Oxford University Press, 1961, 5 vols.
2: 549
Harris, Melvin. ITN Book of Firsts. Michael O’Mara Books, 1994.
126
Singer, Charles et al., editors. A History of Technology. Clarendon, 1958, 8 vols.
7: 1260

May 1671: John Milton published, together, Paradise...

Writer or writing item

May 1671

John Milton published, together, Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes: a small-scale religious epic and a blank-verse tragedy.
Cox, Michael, editor. The Oxford Chronology of English Literature. Oxford University Press, 2002, 2 vols.
Johnson, Samuel. The Lives of the Poets. Editor Lonsdale, Roger, Clarendon Press, 2006, 4 vols.
1: 400n144

1828: Thomas Moore published his satirical and...

Writer or writing item

1828

Thomas Moore published his satirical and (Irish) nationalist Odes upon Cash, Corn, Catholics, and Other Matters.
“Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
96

15 January 1896: The Anglo-French Convention guaranteed the...

National or international item

15 January 1896

The Anglo-French Convention guaranteed the independence of Siam, which is now Thailand.
Keller, Helen, editor. The Dictionary of Dates. Macmillan, 1934, 2 vols.
I: 898
Langer, William L., editor. An Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern, Chronologically Arranged. 4th ed., Houghton Mifflin, 1968.
906

21 June 1712: Joseph Addison wrote in the Spectator that...

Writer or writing item

21 June 1712

Joseph Addison wrote in the Spectator that a man of refined taste would take more pleasure from looking at a landscape than from owning the land.
Addison, Joseph et al., editors. The Spectator (1711-1714). Clarendon Press, 1965, 5 vols.
411 (1712): 538
Addison, Joseph et al., editors. The Spectator (1711-1714). Clarendon Press, 1965, 5 vols.
414 (1712): 552

23 August 1960: The satirical review Beyond the Fringe, launched...

Writer or writing item

23 August 1960

The satirical review Beyond the Fringe, launched at the Edinburgh Festival, inaugurated a new style of surreal and irreverent topical comedy in Britain.
Bennett, Alan. “What I did in 1999”. London Review of Books, 20 Jan. 2000, pp. 3-8.
3
Borne Back Daily. 2001, http://borneback.com/ .
23 August 2010

1822: A new Vagrancy Act was the first to use the...

Building and people item

1822

A new Vagrancy Act was the first to use the word Prostitute in the modern sense; before that, the most commonly used legal term had been disorderly woman.
Henderson, Tony. Disorderly Women. Longman, 1999.
97-8

1882: Longfellow's In the Harbor, composed of a...

Writer or writing item

1882

Longfellow 's In the Harbor, composed of a few previously published verses and those poems left uncollected at his death, was published posthumously.
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 5th ed., Oxford University Press, 1985.
Robertson, Eric Sutherland. Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Kennikat Press, 1972.
170

1993: Following the Net Book Agreement, Random...

Writer or writing item

1993

Following the Net Book Agreement, Random House became the first publisher in Britain to install an automated packing line in warehousing at Tiptree in Essex. Though it was not a success, this did not...

January 1855: Piedmont joined the Allies in the Crimean...

National or international item

January 1855

Piedmont joined the Allies in the Crimean War.
Cowie, Leonard W., and Leonard Woolfson. Years of Nationalism: European History 1815-1890. Edward Arnold, 1985.
207

1881: The Land Nationalisation Society was founded...

National or international item

1881

The Land Nationalisation Society was founded by Alfred Russel Wallace and others to work for the abolition of private ownership of land.
Wallace, Alfred Russel. “Introduction”. Alfred Russel Wallace: An Anthology of His Shorter Writings, edited by Charles H. Smith, Oxford University Press, 1991, pp. 1-8.
4, 7

7 May 1915: The Cunard liner Lusitania was sunk by a...

National or international item

7 May 1915

The Cunard liner Lusitania was sunk by a German submarine.
Bruno, Leonard. On the Move: A Chronology of Advances in Transportation. Gale Research, 1993.
167, 186
Reynolds, David. “Too Proud to Fight”. London Review of Books, 28 Nov. 2002, pp. 29-31.
29

1984: US advice columnist Ann Landers conducted...

Building and people item

1984

US advice columnist Ann Landers conducted a poll of her readers and found that 72% of married women preferred hugging to The Act of intercourse.
Toth, Emily. “Common-sense columnist”. Women’s Review of Books, Vol.
xix
, No. 12, Sept. 2002, pp. 6-7.
6