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11 April 1871: The Paris Commune established the Union of...

National or international item

11 April 1871

The Paris Commune established the Union of Women for the Defence of Paris , co-founded by Elisabeth Dmitrieff (a contact of Karl Marx ) and Louise Michel , an anarchist schoolteacher and medical worker.
Marlière, Philippe. “Globalisation before Globalisation”. London Review of Books, Vol.
37
, No. 13, 2 July 2015, pp. 21-2.
21

1951: After travelling the world for a few years,...

Writer or writing item

1951

After travelling the world for a few years, Catherine Gaskin published her novel All Else Is Folly, which would eventually be translated into German.
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.

28 April 1974: The Sunday Times published the first bestseller...

Writer or writing item

28 April 1974

The Sunday Times published the first bestseller list to appear in Britain (almost eighty years after the first such list was printed in the USA).
Adams, Tim. “Read ’em and weep”. The Observer, 13 July 2003, pp. Review section 1 - 2.
1
Sutherland, John, b. 1938. “Browse No More”. The Author, Vol.
121
, No. 1, 1 Mar.–31 May 2010, pp. 24-5.
24-5

1843: Scottish neurologist Sir David Ferrier examined...

Building and people item

1843

Scottish neurologist Sir David Ferrier examined the brains of living primates and other animals to locate and map the motor and sensory regions of the brain. He was later tried for vivisection.
Hellemans, Alexander, and Bryan Bunch. The Timetables of Science: A Chronology of the Most Important People and Events in the History of Science. Simon and Shuster, 1988.
311
Collins, Wilkie. Heart and Science. Chatto and Windus, 1883, 3 vols.
15-6

First week in March 1946: Nearly 14,000 babies born this week in Britain...

Building and people item

First week in March 1946

Nearly 14,000 babies born this week in Britain (representing 98% of families canvassed) were tracked by James Douglas in a statistical cohort study for sociological information.
Francis, Gavin. “Get the placentas”. London Review of Books, Vol.
38
, No. 11, 2 June 2016, pp. 21-2.

5 February 1637: At the height of the tulip craze, a single...

Building and people item

5 February 1637

At the height of the tulip craze, a single bulb sold at auction in Amsterdam for 5,400 guilders.
Julius, Anthony. “Bloom Merchants”. Guardian Weekly, 24 Jan. 1999, p. 29.
29

1784: The world's first school for the blind, the...

Building and people item

1784

The world's first school for the blind, the Institution Royale pour les Jeunes Aveugles , was opened in Paris by Valentin Haüy .
“The Catholic Encyclopedia”. New Advent.
“Reading by Touch”. Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB): Publications Archive.

17 June 1843: Julia Charlotte Maitland published, as a...

Women writers item

17 June 1843

Julia Charlotte Maitland published, as a Lady, her Letters from Madras: during the years 1836-1839.
British Library Catalogue. http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo.
The Athenaeum Index of Reviews and Reviewers: 1830-1870. http://replay.web.archive.org/20070714065452/http://www.soi.city.ac.uk/~asp/v2/home.html.
816 (17 June 1843): 568-9

By December 1913: Mary Frances Harriet Dowdall published a...

Women writers item

By December 1913

Mary Frances Harriet Dowdall published a light treatment of domestic life entitled The Book of Martha, with a frontispiece by Augustus John .
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

1803: The Wesleyan Conference decided that their...

Building and people item

1803

The Wesleyan Conference decided that their association (still within the Anglican Church but soon to form the new body of the Methodist Church ) should bar women from preaching.
Ashton, Rosemary. George Eliot: A Life. Hamish Hamilton, 1996.
207

8 June 1730: James Thomson published by subscription The...

Writer or writing item

8 June 1730

James Thomson published by subscription The Seasons as a four-fold poem, with A Hymn on the Seasons and William Kent 's illustrations.
Thomson, James, 1700 - 1748. Winter. J. Millan, 1726.
xxi
Johnson, Samuel. The Lives of the Poets. Editor Lonsdale, Roger, Clarendon Press, 2006, 4 vols.
4: 367n17

March-May 1954: France suffered its final defeat in its military...

National or international item

March-May 1954

France suffered its final defeat in its military campaign (dating from the end of the Second World War) to retain colonial control of Indo-China (now Vietnam); the USA, which had already been largely funding...

Dora Greenwell

A mid-Victorian writer of great versatility, DG published four books of religious discourse, nine collections of poetry, two volumes of essays, and two biographies. She occasionally contributed to periodicals, both her own prose as well...

20 March 1413: Henry IV died and his son succeeded to the...

National or international item

20 March 1413

Henry IV died and his son succeeded to the English throne as Henry V .
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

Charlotte Smith

CS , poet and novelist of the later eighteenth century, continued her output especially of children's books, into the very early nineteenth century. She wrote her poems for pleasure, her remarkable, now edited letters for...
Charlotte Smith Stipple engraving by Pierre Condé of Charlotte Smith, from portrait by George Romney, 1792, in the National Portrait Gallery. The engraving appeared as frontispiece to volume 2 of "Elegiac Sonnets", 8th ed., 1797. This is a head-and-shoulders view. She is looking down, wearing a simple, light, gauzy dress, and a high bonnet with a large bow in front over her curling hair. The portrait is surrounded by a decorative swirl design, and underneath her name is written in block letters.

Mid 1780s: Male investigators of the problem of prostitution...

Building and people item

Mid 1780s

Male investigators of the problem of prostitution were (according to cultural historian Tony Henderson ) convinced that nine out of ten prostitutes were women originally from the middle ranks.
Henderson, Tony. Disorderly Women. Longman, 1999.
188

4 October 1928: The Young PEN Club, designed for beginning...

Building and people item

4 October 1928

The Young PEN Club , designed for beginning writers, held its inaugural meeting, chaired by John Galsworthy ; also present were E. M. Forster and the young Frances Parker (soon to be Bellerby) .
Gittings, Robert, and Frances Bellerby. “Introduction”. Selected Poems, edited by Anne Stevenson and Anne Stevenson, Enitharmon Press, 1986.
15

1 October-8 November 1936: The National Protest March from Coventry...

National or international item

1 October-8 November 1936

The National Protest March from Coventry to London took place; at the concluding rally Maud Brown argued for a housewife's minimum wage.
Bruley, Sue. “A Woman’s Right to Work? The Role of Women in the Unemployed Movement Between the Wars”. This Working-Day World: Women’s Lives and Culture(s) in Britain, 1914-1945, edited by Sybil Oldfield, Taylor and Francis, 1994, pp. 40-53.
49

1892: The Women's Co-operative Guild (WCG) and...

Building and people item

1892

The Women's Co-operative Guild (WCG) and the Women's Trade Union Association worked to unionize factory girls.
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.
34, 107
Scott, Gillian. Feminism and the Politics of Working Women: The Women’s Cooperative Guild, 1880s to the Second World War. UCL Press, 1998.
94-6

3 August 1916: In the aftermath of the Easter Rising, Irish...

National or international item

3 August 1916

In the aftermath of the Easter Rising, Irish nationalist Roger Casement , formerly Sir Roger, was executed for treason at Pentonville Prison in London for attempting to smuggle a shipment of German arms to Ireland.
Forbes, Peter, editor. Scanning the Century. Viking, 1999.
234
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

By September 1779: The supposed nature of women, and the mere...

Building and people item

By September 1779

The supposed nature of women, and the mere idea of having them in parliament , were mocked in a pamphlet: The House of Peeresses: or, Female Oratory.
Clark, Anna. “The Chevalier d’Eon and Wilkes: Masculinity and Politics in the Eighteenth Century”. Eighteenth-Century Studies, Vol.
32
, No. 1, 1998, pp. 19-48.
48n158
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall, 5 series.
48 (1779): 234

By November 2008: The final, posthumous work of Canadian writer...

Writer or writing item

By November 2008

The final, posthumous work of Canadian writer Jane Rule appeared: Loving the Difficult, a volume of essays dating from a period of over thirty years.
Schuster, Marilyn R. “Of Love and Loss”. Women’s Review of Books, Vol.
25
, No. 6, Nov.–Dec. 2008, pp. 27-8.
27

1847: Galoshes began to be used in Britain....

Building and people item

1847

Galoshes began to be used in Britain.
Adburgham, Alison. Shops and Shopping 1800-1914: Where, and in What Manner the Well-Dressed Englishwoman Bought Her Clothes. Allen and Unwin, 1964.
80

By 20 November 1725 : Daniel Defoe published the first volume of...

Building and people item

By 20 November 1725

Daniel Defoe published the first volume of his business manual The Complete English Tradesman; a second volume followed the next year.
English Short Title Catalogue. http://estc.bl.uk/.

2 May 1594: The Taming of the Shrew, a comedy by Shakespeare,...

Writer or writing item

2 May 1594

The Taming of the Shrew, a comedy by Shakespeare , was entered in the Stationers' Register.
Borne Back Daily. 2001, http://borneback.com/ .
2 May 2008
McMullan, Gordon, and John, 1579 - 1625 Fletcher. “Introduction”. The Tamer Tamed, Nick Hern Books, 2003, p. xiii - xvii.
xiii-xvii