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1970: The Oxford philosopher Mary Warnock published...

Women writers item

1970

The Oxford philosopher Mary Warnock published Existentialism a study which traces the common interests of a number of philosophers including Sartre , Kierkegaard , Nietzsche , Husserl , and Merleau-Ponty .
Kersey, Ethel M. Women Philosophers: A Bio-Critical Source Book. Greenwood, 1989.
207-8

Winter 1740-1: Famine in Ireland (later remembered, by those...

Building and people item

Winter 1740-1

Famine in Ireland (later remembered, by those who remembered it at all, as the year of the slaughter) killed nearly half a million people.
Kelly, Matthew. “With Bit and Bridle”. London Review of Books, Vol.
32
, No. 15, 5 Aug. 2010, pp. 12-13.
22

November 1862: American Richard Jordan Gatling developed...

National or international item

November 1862

American Richard Jordan Gatling developed the first machine gun.
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.
333

1889: Queen's College, Belfast, began admitting...

Building and people item

1889

Queen's College, Belfast, began admitting women to medical classes in response to requests from the Belfast Ladies' Institute .
Breathnach, Eibhlín. “Charting New Waters: Women’s Experience in Higher Education, 1879-1908”. Girls Don’t Do Honours: Irish Women in Education in the 19th and 20th Centuries, edited by Mary Cullen, Women’s Education Bureau, 1987, pp. 55-78.
55, 59
Moody, Theodore William, and James Camlin Beckett. Queen’s, Belfast 1845-1949: The History of a University. Faber and Faber, 1959.
342

23 September 2005: A commission from The Guardian to established...

Women writers item

23 September 2005

A commission from The Guardian to established poets to write a contemporary nursery rhyme produced mostly little pieces about doom and gloom.
“Are you sitting comfortably?”. Guardian Unlimited, 23 Sept. 2005.

Alice Oswald

AO is a contemporary poet, the first to hold the historic position of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University . Her work includes multimedia and performance poetry.
Alice Oswald Cover of Weeds and Wild Flowers by Alice Oswald. The cover is blue with a white floral pattern, and the title written on it in black letters, with the author's and artist's names.

By December 1952: Woodcut-engraver Gwen Raverat, née Darwin,...

Women writers item

By December 1952

Woodcut-engraver Gwen Raverat, née Darwin , published Period Piece, her extremely popular memoir of her Victorian childhood in Cambridge; by 1975 it had sold 120,000 copies in Britain alone.
Beard, Mary. “Sun and Strawberries”. London Review of Books, 19 Sept. 2002, pp. 13-14.
13

1949: Richard Strauss's opera Salome, to words...

Building and people item

1949

Richard Strauss 's opera Salome, to words by Oscar Wilde , was performed at Covent Garden, produced by Peter Brook with sets by Salvador Dali .
Drogheda, Charles Garrett Ponsonby Moore, Earl of et al. The Covent Garden Album: 250 Years of Theatre, Opera, and Ballet. Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1981.
136
Harewood, George Henry Hubert Lascelles, Earl of, editor. Kobbé’s Complete Opera Book. 10th ed., Bodley Head, 1987.
806-7

Probably 1888: The Women's Co-operative Guild (WCG) made...

Building and people item

Probably 1888

The Women's Co-operative Guild (WCG) made its first international contact: Emilie Holyoake spoke about the WCG at the French Co-operative congress at Tours.
Blaszak, Barbara J. George Jacob Holyoake (1817-1906) and the Development of the British Cooperative Movement. E. Mellen, 1988.
87
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.
29-30
Holyoake (later Emilie Holyoake-Marsh) was the daughter of George Jacob Holyoake

20 April-12 August 1898: The Spanish-American war was fought (to Cubans...

National or international item

20 April-12 August 1898

The Spanish-American war was fought (to Cubans the second stage of their war of independence): the US succeeded to Spain as major foreign power active in South America.
Netz, Reviel. “Barbed Wire”. London Review of Books, 20 July 2000, pp. 30-5.
33
The World of 1898: The Spanish-American War. http://www.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/1898/chronology.html.

June 1856: Adelaide Ristori, famous Italian actress,...

Building and people item

June 1856

Adelaide Ristori , famous Italian actress, made her British debut in London at the Lyceum Theatre .
Booth, Michael R. et al. Three Tragic Actresses: Siddons, Rachel, Ristori. Cambridge University Press, 1996.
143-4, 153-5, 161

22 November 1976: The Sexual Offences Amendment Act attempted...

National or international item

22 November 1976

The Sexual Offences Amendment Act attempted to make it less daunting for victims to report rape and give evidence, by granting anonymity to women reporting rape and restricting questioning into their sexual past during the...

1863: The Metropolitan Police in London founded...

Building and people item

1863

The Metropolitan Police in London founded its first dedicated vice squad, consisting of a sergeant and two constables employed in the suppression of obscene materials.
Bristow, Edward. Vice and Vigilance: Purity Movements in Britain Since 1700. Gill and Macmillan, 1977.
47

1847: The Faculty of Medicine at Harvard University...

Building and people item

1847

The Faculty of Medicine at Harvard University refused to admit Harriot Hunt .
Blake, Catriona, and Wendy Savage. The Charge of the Parasols: Women’s Entry to the Medical Profession. Women’s Press, 1990.
29

1965: Peter Watson's The War Game, a television...

National or international item

1965

Peter Watson 's The War Game, a television film which imagines conditions in Britain in the aftermath of a nuclear attack, was withdrawn by the BBC in response to government pressure.
Rose, David. “The Closest Call”. The Observer, 3 Mar. 2002, p. Review 15.
Review 15

1868: Sir Edwin Landseer's painting Braemar, Deer...

Building and people item

1868

Sir Edwin Landseer 's painting Braemar, Deer sold for £4,200; the Society of Female Artists ' catalogue of this same year lists prices in the range of £2 to £52 10s.
Nunn, Pamela Gerrish. Victorian Women Artists. Women’s Press, 1987.
82

Later 1928: After the Representation of the People Act...

National or international item

Later 1928

After the Representation of the People Act made women electorally equal, Eva Hubback and Margery Corbett Ashby founded the National Union of Guilds for Citizenship (later the National Union of Townswomen's Guilds).
“Records of the Townswomen’s Guilds: Harrow on the Hill Branch”. AIM25: London Metropolitan University: Women’s Library.

2 September 1891: Nellie Lamount made the first parachute jump...

Building and people item

2 September 1891

Nellie Lamount made the first parachute jump by a Canadian woman, from a hot air balloon in Québec.
Bruno, Leonard. On the Move: A Chronology of Advances in Transportation. Gale Research, 1993.
137

Elizabeth Nihell

EN is a mid-eighteenth-century medical writer, a forceful, though a late voice in the feminist struggle to keep childbirth in female hands.
Elizabeth Nihell Print of an elderly Elizabeth Nihell, published the year she would have turned one hundred. She wears a cap covering her whole head and a heavy shawl. The inscription below reads "Elizabeth Nihel, Sage Femme", and gives her birth date. "Sage femme" is French for midwife: the image comes from "Biographie des Sages femmes célèbrées", 1833.

1646: Sir John Suckling's poetry volume Fragmenta...

Writer or writing item

1646

Sir John Suckling 's poetry volume Fragmenta Aurea (Golden Fragments) appeared in print five years after his death.
English Short Title Catalogue. http://estc.bl.uk/.

27 November 1655: Samuel Hartlib told John Evelyn of a new...

Writer or writing item

27 November 1655

Samuel Hartlib told John Evelyn of a new copying invention: a special ink which enabled extra copies to be damp-pressed off papers written in it.
Evelyn, John. The Diary of John Evelyn. Editor De Beer, Esmond Samuel, Oxford University Press, 1959.
364

23 April 1863: Queen Victoria selected architect George...

National or international item

23 April 1863

Queen Victoria selected architect George Gilbert Scott 's ornate design for the Albert Memorial.
Bayley, Stephen. The Albert Memorial: The Monument in its Social and Architectural Context. Scolar Press, 1981.
40-2, 142, 143-4
Homans, Margaret. Royal Representations: Queen Victoria and British Culture, 1837-1876. University of Chicago Press, 1998, http://Susan Brown.
170

1349: At the height of the first outbreak of bubonic...

National or international item

1349

At the height of the first outbreak of bubonic plague in England, which decimated the population and severely impaired the labour force, the Statute of Labourers bound a labourer to serve under anyone requiring his...

January 1838: Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's first publication,...

Writer or writing item

January 1838

Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu 's first publication, a comic narrative entitled The Ghost and the Bone-Setter, appeared in the Dublin University Magazine.
Browne, Nelson. Sheridan Le Fanu. Arthur Barker, 1951.
20
Sutherland, John, b. 1938. The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford University Press, 1989.
200

Early May 1936: The Italo-Abyssinian War ended with Mussolini's...

National or international item

Early May 1936

The Italo-Abyssinian War ended with Mussolini 's proclamation of Italy's annexation of Abyssinia (today called Ethiopia).
Harvey, Kathryn. "Driven by War into Politics": A Feminist Biography of Kathleen Innes. University of Alberta, 1995.
126-8
Thomson, David, and Geoffrey Warner. England in the Twentieth Century, 1914-1979. 2nd ed., Penguin Books, 1981.
163
Messenger, Charles. World War Two Chronological Atlas: When, Where, How and Why. Bloomsbury, 1989.
16
The Penguin Atlas of the World. Viking, 1987.
159
Diametrically opposed views of the conflict were voiced by British writers Kathleen E. Innes and...