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13 May 1886: The National Association for the Repeal of...

National or international item

13 May 1886

The National Association for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts held its last meeting. It considered its work completed following the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts.
Walkowitz, Judith R. ’We Are Not Beasts of the Field’: Prostitution and the Campaign Against the Contagious Diseases Acts, 1869-1886. University of Rochester, 1974.
133
Walkowitz, Judith R. Prostitution and Victorian Society: Women, Class, and the State. Cambridge University Press, 1980.
99

10 April 1974: The Annan Committee began work on its enquiry...

Building and people item

10 April 1974

The Annan Committee began work on its enquiry into the structure, funding, and future of British broadcasting.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
under Annan

1570: The Scholemaster was published, by Roger...

Building and people item

1570

The Scholemaster was published, by Roger Ascham , who had been tutor to Princess Elizabeth .
Ascham, Roger. The Scholemaster. Editor Mayor, John E. B., AMS Press, 1967.
105

2 October 1862: Dion Boucicault wrote to The Times pointing...

Writer or writing item

2 October 1862

Dion Boucicault wrote to The Times pointing out the widely varying rents for West End theatres.
Booth, Michael R. Theatre in the Victorian Age. Cambridge University Press, 1991.
32, 37

November 1980: A new Irish bill permitted the sale of contraceptives...

National or international item

November 1980

A new Irish bill permitted the sale of contraceptives (with certain restrictions).
Francome, Colin. “United Kingdom”. International Handbook on Abortion, edited by Paul Sachdev, Greenwood, 1988, pp. 458-61.
461

Mary Russell Mitford

MRM , poet, playwright, editor, letter-writer, memoirist, and—in just one work—novelist, is best known for her sketches of rural life, especially those in the successive volumes of Our Village (whose first appeared in 1824). Her...
Mary Russell Mitford Painting of Mary Russell Mitford by John Lucas, c. 1853, based on another by Benjamin Robert Haydon, 1824, which was disliked for its assertive look. Here an oval frame is painted in; Mitford wears a white ruffled cap around her face, a white collar pinned with a cameo, a grey gown and brown shawl.

1487: Abduction and rape, hitherto defined as separate...

Building and people item

1487

Abduction and rape, hitherto defined as separate crimes, were legally merged; this did not lessen Parliament's emphasis on the financial effects of violating a woman of property.
Schwarz, Joan I. “Eighteenth-Century Abduction Law and Clarissa”. Clarissa and Her Readers, edited by Carol Houlihan Flynn and Edward Copeland, AMS Press, 1999, pp. 269-08.
275-7

1956: Alva Myrdal and Viola Klein, in Women's Two...

Building and people item

1956

Alva Myrdal and Viola Klein , in Women's Two Roles, examined the entrance of women into masculine jobs, and secondly the ongoing struggle for women to combine family and work.
Oakley, Ann. Man and Wife: Richard and Kay Titmuss: My Parents’ Early Years. HarperCollins, 1996.
205-6

8 November 1952: Maria Callas made her London debut at Covent...

Building and people item

8 November 1952

Maria Callas made her London debut at Covent Garden in Giuseppe Bellini 's opera Norma.
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
404
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.
142

28 April 1945: Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci...

National or international item

28 April 1945

Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci were executed by members of the Committee of National Liberation .
Messenger, Charles. World War Two Chronological Atlas: When, Where, How and Why. Bloomsbury, 1989.
225
Weinberg, Gerhard L. A World At Arms: A Global History of World War II. Cambridge University Press, 1994.
818

8 April 1825: Lucy Townsend hosted a meeting at which the...

National or international item

8 April 1825

Lucy Townsend hosted a meeting at which the first British slavery association for women was formed, the Birmingham Ladies Society for the Relief of Negro Slaves (which later changed its name to the Female Society for Birmingham

1 February 1956: In the Declaration of Washington (one of...

National or international item

1 February 1956

In the Declaration of Washington (one of a number of statements to bear this title), the US President and British Prime Minister pronounced together on relations between the Free World and the Soviet Union.
Robertson, E. Arnot. “Letter to the Editor: Declaration of Washington”. Times, 4 Feb. 1956, p. 7.
7

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

EBB was recognized in her lifetime as one of the most important poets of mid-Victorian Britain. She wrote a significant corpus of poetry which ranges from the lyric through the closet drama or dramatic lyric...

July 1875: Hercegovina (at this date part of Bosnia),...

National or international item

July 1875

Hercegovina (at this date part of Bosnia), rebelled against rule by Turkey; in 1876 Bulgaria, Serbia, and Montenegro also rose.
Eliot, George. Daniel Deronda. Editor Cave, Terence, Penguin, 1995.
824

Natalie Clifford Barney

Natalie Clifford Barney , though American, is best known as a Paris salonnière. She specialized in memoirs and pensées, though she also produced poetry, drama, novels, essays, and dialogues. Writing primarily in French but also...
Natalie Clifford Barney Half-length painting of Natalie Clifford Barney by her mother, Alice Pike Barney, 1896. She faces the viewer directly: blonde, blue-eyed, wearing a black dress, fur cape, and blue velvet hat with a tall feather. Her hair, divided in the centre, is roughly brushed back.

27 March 1998: The US Food and Drug Administration authorised...

Building and people item

27 March 1998

The USFood and Drug Administration authorised the use of a drug called Viagra to treat male erectile dysfunction.
“National News”. CBC Television.
27 March 2013

December 1958: Boris Pasternak was awarded the Nobel Prize...

Writer or writing item

December 1958

Boris Pasternak was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. He initially accepted the prize, but was quickly forced by the Soviet government to decline it.
Nobel Prize in Literature. http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/.

Gillian Clarke

GC , a Welsh poet who began writing in the later twentieth century, has been called by the Literary Reviewone of the leading poets and poetry teachers of her generation.
Clarke, Gillian, and Sheenagh Pugh. “Poems”. The Literary Review: Re-Imagining Wales, edited by Tony Curtis and Christopher Meredith, Vol.
44
, No. 2, Fairleigh Dickinson University, 1 Dec. 2001–28 Feb. 2002.
389
She has also...
Gillian Clarke Somewhat blurry colour photo of Gillian Clarke standing at a lectern with a microphone. She is wearing something dark, with glasses, and has loose shoulder-length blonde hair.

28 November 1727: After elections and the dissolution of the...

National or international item

28 November 1727

After elections and the dissolution of the previous parliament on 5 August, the new parliament (obligatory on the accession of a new sovereign ) was called for this date.
Sedgwick, Romney. The House of Commons, 1715-1754. Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1970.
1: 132

23 November 1552: Christ's Hospital was founded in London to...

Building and people item

23 November 1552

Christ's Hospital was founded in London to supply meat, drink, clothes, lodging, learning, and attendants for children of the poor, both boys and girls.
Pedersen, Joyce Senders. The Reform of Girls’ Secondary and Higher Education in Victorian England: A Study of Elites and Educational Change. Garland, 1987.
38
Borer, Mary Cathcart. Willingly to School: A History of Women’s Education. Lutterworth Press, 1976.
58, 56-64, 133-4

1904: The London Symphony was established by departing...

Building and people item

1904

The London Symphony was established by departing members of Henry Wood 's Queen's Hall Orchestra after Wood revoked the deputy system.
Ford, Boris, editor. The Cambridge Guide to the Arts in Britain. Vol. 9 vols, Cambridge University Press, 1988–2026.
8: 120
Nettel, Reginald. The Orchestra in England: A Social History. Jonathan Cape, 1956.
211, 212, 214

1968: At the end of Edmund Blunden's tenure of...

Writer or writing item

1968

At the end of Edmund Blunden 's tenure of the Professorship of Poetry at Oxford , Roy Fuller was elected to follow him.
Watts, Janet. “Kathleen Raine”. The Guardian, 8 July 2003, p. 25.
25

17 December 1867: The first three of the eventual four volumes...

Writer or writing item

17 December 1867

The first three of the eventual four volumes of Tolstoy 's epoch-making historical novel War and Peace were announced in a Moscow newspaper as available.
Noyes, George Rapall. Tolstoy. Dover Publications, 1968.
134-5
Gifford, Henry. Tolstoy. Oxford University Press, 1982.
22
Borne Back Daily. 2001, http://borneback.com/ .
17 December 2008

October 1651: A Navigation Act passed by the English parliament...

National or international item

October 1651

A Navigation Act passed by the English parliament challenged Dutch shipping trade, and helped cause a war (the First Dutch War) which lasted from early 1652 until April 1654.
Pincus, Steven. Protestantism and Patriotism: Ideologies and the Making of an English Foreign Policy 1650-1668. Cambridge University Press, 1996.
12-14, 44, 86, 181-2
Worden, Blair. “Conviction on the High Seas”. London Review of Books, 6 Feb. 1997, pp. 12-13.
12-13

13 November 1715: The Duke of Argyll fought the rebellious...

National or international item

13 November 1715

The Duke of Argyll fought the rebellious Jacobite forces at Sheriffmuir in Scotland.
Grun, Bernard. The Timetables of History. 3rd revised, Simon and Schuster, 1991.
328