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19 November 1999: At the conclusion of the parliamentary session,...

National or international item

19 November 1999

At the conclusion of the parliamentary session, the House of Lords came to an end as a hereditary legislative chamber, at 5.32 p.m.
White, Michael, and Ewen MacAskill. “Tears and praise as Lords shown door”. Guardian Weekly, 18–24 Nov. 1999, p. 11.
11

Late 1939-1944: For the duration of the second World War,...

Building and people item

Late 1939-1944

For the duration of the second World War, Covent Garden was converted into a dance hall; no opera, ballet or theatrical performances took place there.
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.
126
Nettel, Reginald. The Orchestra in England: A Social History. Jonathan Cape, 1956.
247

25 January 1896: Lord Leighton of Stretton died: he was a...

Building and people item

25 January 1896

Lord Leighton of Stretton died: he was a leading classical painter and President of the Royal Academy .
Ford, Boris, editor. The Cambridge Guide to the Arts in Britain. Vol. 9 vols, Cambridge University Press, 1988–2026.
8: 119

Autumn 1791: Anti-slavery campaigners William Wilberforce...

National or international item

Autumn 1791

Anti-slavery campaigners William Wilberforce and Henry Thornton launched the Sierra Leone Company , which sought to resettle former slaves on the west coast of Africa, and to promote legitimate trade with the region.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
under Wilberforce

5 June 1929: James Ramsay MacDonald, Labour leader, formed...

National or international item

5 June 1929

James Ramsay MacDonald , Labour leader, formed a minority government in the UK for the second time, following the first general election with full women's suffrage.
Fryde, Edmund Boleslaw. Handbook of British Chronology. Editors Greenway, D. E. et al., 3rd ed., Offices of the Royal Historical Society, 1986.
115
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
491

Sarah Fyge

SF 's career as a feminist poet began when she was very young, in the late seventeenth century, and continued into the eighteenth century. Her letters, although they were printed, seem not to have been...

1966: Three women in the UK died after attempted...

Building and people item

1966

Three women in the UK died after attempted clinical abortions by the saline injection method, in which amniotic fluid is replaced by hypertonic saline.
Hindell, Keith, and Madeleine Simms. Abortion Law Reformed. Peter Owen, 1971.
45
Hordern, Anthony. Legal Abortion: The English Experience. Pergamon, 1971.
98

1895: F. F. Montrésor began her publishing career...

Women writers item

1895

F. F. Montrésor began her publishing career this year with two novels, of which The One Who Looked On went through six editions in three years.
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.

23 July 1796: Horrid Mysteries. A Story, translated by...

Writer or writing item

23 July 1796

Horrid Mysteries. A Story, translated by P. Will from Karl Friedrich August Grosse (one of the gothic horrid novels of Austen 's Northanger Abbey), was advertised as just out.
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press, 2000, 2 vols.
Garside 1: 675

Jane Austen

JA 's unequalled reputation has led academic canon-makers to set her on a pedestal and scholars of early women's writing to use her as an epoch. For generations she was the first—or the only—woman to...
Jane Austen Photograph of a colourized print of Jane Austen, from a drawing by a Mr Andrews commissioned by Austen's nephew James Edward Austen Leigh as frontispiece to his "Memoir of Jane Austen", 1870 (fifty years after she died). She is shown seated, with a book on her lap, wearing a blue dress and light brown bonnet.

Mrs Showes

This obscure author, whose full name remains unknown, published at least four works at and just beyond the end of the eighteenth century. All her work, novels and shorter tales, either makes the claim to...

Mid-August 1960: The US space programme NASA launched the...

Building and people item

Mid-August 1960

The US space programme NASA launched the pioneering communications satellite known as Echo 1. Working on the principle of a mirror, it reflected radio signals between two points on earth.
“Dispatches”. Guardian Weekly, 13 Aug. 2010, p. 33.
33

1869: The London Society of Lithographic Printers...

Writer or writing item

1869

The London Society of Lithographic Printers founded.
Clair, Colin. A Chronology of Printing. Cassell, 1969.
156

1882: Henry Varley began his popular Lecture to...

Building and people item

1882

Henry Varley began his popular Lecture to Men Only tour, which preached chastity.
Bristow, Edward. Vice and Vigilance: Purity Movements in Britain Since 1700. Gill and Macmillan, 1977.
131

5 November 1857: At a meeting of the London Philological Society,...

Writer or writing item

5 November 1857

At a meeting of the LondonPhilological Society , James Chenevix Trench (son of the poet and diarist Melesina Trench ) proposed the compilation of what eventually became the Oxford English Dictionary.
Winchester, Simon. The Meaning of Everything. Oxford University Press, 2003.
39

Margaret Hoby

It is fair to say that the fame of MH 's diary rests less on its literary qualities than on its early date: no women's diary in English is known to precede it. It is...

9 April 1793: The Traitorous Correspondence Act made it...

National or international item

9 April 1793

The Traitorous Correspondence Act made it a treasonable offence for Britons to supply the French government with arms, etc., or to purchase (or lend money to purchase) land or funds in France.
Emsley, Clive. British Society and the French Wars, 1793-1815. Macmillan, 1979.
21

Monica Furlong

MF was a Christian feminist who began as a journalist and went on to a prolific late-twentieth-century output of books. She published poetry, a couple of novels, stories for children, biographies of remarkable Christians, collected...

11 March 1917: Field-Marshal Haig agreed in principle that...

National or international item

11 March 1917

Field-Marshal Haig agreed in principle that women could be employed with the army fighting in France. The first notices for the recruitment into the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) appeared this month throughout Britain.
Crosthwait, Elizabeth. “The Girl Behind the Man Behind the Gun: The Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps, 1914-1918”. Our Work, Our Lives, Our Words: Women’s History and Women’s Work, edited by Leonore Davidoff and Belinda Westover, Tiptree, 1986.
162
Marwick, Arthur. Women at War, 1914-1918. Croom Helm, 1977.
88
Stanley, Jo. “Women’s History Month: Parliamentary debate: Should women work on warships? Army accepts women in principle, for first time”. Women’s History Network Blog, 10 Mar. 2010.

By 2000: The number of liberal democracies in the...

National or international item

By 2000

The number of liberal democracies in the world had almost doubled since 1972, from forty-four to eighty-five.
Anderson, Perry. “Confronting Defeat”. London Review of Books, 17 Oct. 2002, pp. 10-17.
14

Mary Collier

MC , writing during the earlier eighteenth century, is the first of the known proletarian women poets. Her best-known work is a powerful modern georgic; she also published occasional poems, some of them proto-feminist, and...
Mary Collier A painting that depicts just one aspect of the gruelling women's work that Mary Collier wrote of: "The Washerwoman" byJean-Baptiste Siméon Chardin.

21 December 1846: Robert Liston, a Scottish surgeon working...

Building and people item

21 December 1846

Robert Liston , a Scottish surgeon working in England, performed a leg amputaton which was the first major operation in Britain under anaesthetic (which he called [t]his Yankee dodge).
Pennington, Hugh. “Can you close your eyes without falling over?”. London Review of Books, 11 Sept. 2003, pp. 30-1.
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“Time Machines Exhibition”. Museum of the History of Science,, Oxford, 2012.

22 November 1951: Syntex, of Mexico City, patented norethisterone,...

National or international item

22 November 1951

Syntex , of Mexico City, patented norethisterone, an oral progestational agent, which became the basis of later oral contraceptives.
Asbell, Bernard. The Pill: A Biography of the Drug that Changed the World. Random House, 1995.
110
Hordern, Anthony. Legal Abortion: The English Experience. Pergamon, 1971.
48

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

21 April 1907: The Cumann na nGaedheal and Dungannon Clubs...

National or international item

21 April 1907

The Cumann na nGaedheal and Dungannon Clubs merged to form the Sinn Féin League in Ireland.
Foster, Robert Fitzroy. Modern Ireland 1600-1972. Allen Lane, 1988.
611
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
339