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13 July 1687: A woman named Eliza Neale was murdered when...

Building and people item

13 July 1687

A woman named Eliza Neale was murdered when she tried to make peace between wife and violent husband.
Mendelson, Sara Heller, and Patricia Crawford. Women in Early Modern England, 1550-1720. Clarendon Press, 1998.
240

Between 1637 and 1640: John Evelyn, an undergraduate at Balliol...

Building and people item

Between 1637 and 1640

John Evelyn , an undergraduate at Balliol College , Oxford, first saw coffee drunk (by a visiting Greek), thirty years before the custom became established.
Evelyn, John. The Diary of John Evelyn. Editor De Beer, Esmond Samuel, Oxford University Press, 1959.
11

1676: Following the Great Fire of London, Robert...

Building and people item

1676

Following the Great Fire of London, Robert Hooke designed the new Bedlam Hospital in Moorfields, London.
Roberts, Andrew. “Mental Health History Timeline”. Middlesex University: Andrew Roberts Homepage: Mental Health and Learning Disability.
Pope, Alexander. The Poems of Alexander Pope. Editor Butt, John, Twickenham Edition, Methuen; Yale University Press, 1951–1969, 11 vols.
5: 271n31

Fanny Fern

Sara Payson Willis, the journalist and novelist known as FF , was one of the most successful United States writers of the nineteenth century. Author of the best-selling Ruth Hall, she was also widely...
Fanny Fern Oval black-and-white, head-and-shoulders photograph of Fanny Fern. She is sitting with her cheek resting on her left hand. Her dark hair is parted in the middle, done in rigid waves. She is wearing earrings and a dark dress buttoned in front with thin stripes on her sleeves.

1969: The Irish Bernadette Devlin, aged twenty-one,...

Building and people item

1969

The Irish Bernadette Devlin , aged twenty-one, became one of the British Parliament 's youngest-ever elected members.
“Women’s History Timeline”. BBC: Radio 4: Woman’s Hour.

1 January 1910: The Trades Board Act came into effect, establishing...

National or international item

1 January 1910

The Trades Board Act came into effect, establishing a legal minimum wage in four industries all employing women in their homes.
Law Reports: Statutes. Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1866–2025.
(1909): 101
Lorwin, Val R., and Sarah Boston. “Great Britain”. Women and Trade Unions in Eleven Industrialized Countries, edited by Alice H. Cook et al., Temple University Press, 1984, pp. 140-61.
152
Mitchell, Sally, editor. Victorian Britain: An Encyclopedia. Garland Press, 1988.
777

4 June 1940: The twenty-three-year-old Carson McCullers...

Writer or writing item

4 June 1940

The twenty-three-year-old Carson McCullers won a chorus of praise with her first novel, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, centred on a young white girl growing up in the racist American south.
Borne Back Daily. 2001, http://borneback.com/ .
4 June 2008

1875: The Psychological Society of Great Britain...

National or international item

1875

The Psychological Society of Great Britain was founded in London.
Owen, Alex. The Darkened Room: Women, Power, and Spiritualism in Late Nineteenth-Century England. Virago, 1989.
24, 249

17 June 1850: The South Wales Railway opened between Chepstow...

Building and people item

17 June 1850

The South Wales Railway opened between Chepstow and Swansea. Lady Charlotte Guest , one of the travellers on it, reported wonderful speed by the first train on her journey, which covered the distance between...

1848: The Society of Arts annual exhibition attracted...

Building and people item

1848

The Society of Arts annual exhibition attracted 70,000 visitors.
Boase, Thomas Sherrer Ross, editor. English Art, 1800-1870. Clarendon, 1959.
10: 254-5

Sarah, Lady Cowper

SLC is best remembered for the diaries which she kept between 1700 and 1716 and for the eleven volumes of commonplace-books in which, from 1670 till 1700, she recorded excerpts from her voracious and highly...
Sarah, Lady Cowper Photograph of a half-length painting probably of Sarah, Lady Cowper, by one of the circle of Enoch Seeman. She wears an ivory gown with a lace-filled décolleté, and a contrasting blue band at waist and sleeves. Her dark hair is piled on top of her head.

1795: Walter Savage Landor's first publication,...

Writer or writing item

1795

Walter Savage Landor 's first publication, Poems, appeared; he later suppressed this publication.
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 5th ed., Oxford University Press, 1985.
547
Cox, Michael, editor. The Oxford Chronology of English Literature. Oxford University Press, 2002, 2 vols.

1815: The Soho Bazaar in Soho Square, London, became...

Building and people item

1815

The Soho Bazaar in Soho Square, London, became the first of its kind established in the city.
Prochaska, F. K. Women and Philanthropy in Nineteenth-Century England. Clarendon, 1980.
49

By June 1919: The new English Tripos (or BA degree course)...

Building and people item

By June 1919

The new English Tripos (or BA degree course) at Cambridge was declared by Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch to be an established success.
Cannan, May, and Bevil Quiller-Couch. The Tears of War. Editor Fyfe, Charlotte, Cavalier Books, 2000.
133
Cannan, May, and Bevil Quiller-Couch. The Tears of War. Editor Fyfe, Charlotte, Cavalier Books, 2000.
133, 137

2 April 1698: Anne (Mason), Countess of Macclesfield, was...

Building and people item

2 April 1698

Anne (Mason), Countess of Macclesfield , was divorced by Act of Parliament; this was the first civil divorce (not first passed by an ecclesiastical court).
Cokayne, George Edward. The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant. Editor Gibbs, Vicary, St Catherine Press, 1910–1959, 14 vols.

Grace Elliott

GE is not a courtesan memoirist in the usual sense, since her one surviving work, her published journal, is silent on the topic of her love-affairs. It covers exclusively her experience, mostly in Paris...
Grace Elliott Portrait of Grace Elliott by Thomas Gainsborough, c. 1782. She faces the viewer with a neutral expression, wearing a low-necked, high-waisted white gown with a pink bow and blue brooch at the decolletage. Her hair is styled away from her face, frizzed and powdered, and a black ribbon tied under her chin and hangs to her bosom.

September 1896: in Sierra Leone the Human Leopard Society...

National or international item

September 1896

in Sierra Leone the Human Leopard Society (whose members clothed themselves in leopard skins) vowed to kill people in order to eat them .
Keller, Helen, editor. The Dictionary of Dates. Macmillan, 1934, 2 vols.
I: 708-9

1939: Book Club Regulations stipulated, among other...

Writer or writing item

1939

Book Club Regulations stipulated, among other requirements, that book clubs (with the exception of religious and political clubs) could not release cheaper club editions less than a year from their first publication.
Feather, John. A History of British Publishing. Croom Helm, 1988.
188

1888: Attesting to the importance of the newly...

Building and people item

1888

Attesting to the importance of the newly booming mail order trade, Marshall and Snelgrove 's department store reported receiving approximately 1,000 orders daily by post.
Adburgham, Alison. Shops and Shopping 1800-1914: Where, and in What Manner the Well-Dressed Englishwoman Bought Her Clothes. Allen and Unwin, 1964.
231-4

1871: The University Test Act abolished all religious...

Building and people item

1871

The University Test Act abolished all religious tests (of loyalty to the Church of England ) at both ancient universities in England (Oxford and Cambridge ) for admittance to matriculation, degrees, prizes, and fellowships.
Veale, Sir Douglas. “Modern Oxford”. Handbook to the University of Oxford, 1969th ed., Oxford University Press, 1969, pp. 29-50.
32-3
Mitchell, Sally, editor. Victorian Britain: An Encyclopedia. Garland Press, 1988.
xvii

Summer 2005: An installation by Giancarlo Neri entitled...

Writer or writing item

Summer 2005

An installation by Giancarlo Neri entitled The Writer was erected on Hampstead Heath. It takes the form of a gigantic, empty table and chair, which the sculptor calls a monument to the loneliness of...

1625: Hackney coaches (those not privately owned...

Building and people item

1625

Hackney coaches (those not privately owned but available for anybody to hire) went into service in London.
Grun, Bernard. The Timetables of History. 3rd revised, Simon and Schuster, 1991.
280

1872: By this date, women comprised some 54% of...

Building and people item

1872

By this date, women comprised some 54% of all patients in mental institutions across England and Wales.
Showalter, Elaine. The Female Malady: Women, Madness, and English Culture, 1830-1980. Pantheon Books, 1985.
52

January 1762: James Macpherson published Fingal, an Ancient...

Writer or writing item

January 1762

James Macpherson published Fingal, an Ancient Epic Poem, in Six Books., which purported to be the work of the ancient bard Ossian .
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall, 5 series.
13 (1762): 45-53
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.