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October 1890: The Normal School of Science was renamed...

National or international item

October 1890

The Normal School of Science was renamed the Royal College of Science .
Gascoigne, Robert Mortimer. A Chronology of the History of Science, 1450-1900. Garland, 1987.
400, 408
Haydn, Joseph. Haydn’s Dictionary of Dates and Universal Information. Editor Vincent, Benjamin, 23rd ed., Ward, Lock, 1904.

Lady Rachel Russell

The reputation of LRR 's letters sprang at first from her husband's political fame, but she was a letter-writer of high quality in her own right. Surviving letters probably represent only a fraction of those...
Lady Rachel Russell Stipple half-length engraving of a young Lady Rachel Russell by Henry Meyer after Samuel Cooper, published 1853. She is wearing a loose-fitting gown with wide sleeves, low round neckline, jewel at the bust and jewelled armband, and a mantle pinned behind. Her hair is swept back to a bun, except for a long curl hanging down her back.

December 1704: Vanbrugh and Congreve were licensed to operate...

Building and people item

December 1704

Vanbrugh and Congreve were licensed to operate a new theatre, the Haymarket , on the grounds that they would help reform and clean up the stage.
Hume, Robert D. “Jeremy Collier and the Future of the London Theatre in 1698”. British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (BSECS) Conference, Oxford, 3 Jan. 1998.

26 April 1798: Francis Lathom's The Midnight Bell, A German...

Writer or writing item

26 April 1798

Francis Lathom 's The Midnight Bell, A German Story, one of the gothic horrid novels mentioned in Jane Austen 's Northanger Abbey, was advertised as newly published.
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press, 2000, 2 vols.
Garside 1: 749-50

1779: Numbers of Irish Volunteers (unofficial paramilitaries...

National or international item

1779

Numbers of Irish Volunteers (unofficial paramilitaries replacing British troops withdrawn from Ireland to fight in America) rose steeply, from fifteen thousand to fifty thousand.
Curley, Thomas. “Johnson and the Irish: A Post-Colonial Survey of the Irish Literary Renaissance in Imperial Great Britain”. The Age of Johnson, edited by Paul J. Korshin and Jack Lynch, Vol.
12
, AMS Press, 2001, pp. 67-197.
151

23 April 1789: A solemn service of thanksgiving for the...

National or international item

23 April 1789

A solemn service of thanksgiving for the recovery of George III was held in St Paul's Cathedral.
Colley, Linda. Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707-1837. Yale University Press, 1992.
158
Walpole, Horace. The Letters of Horace Walpole. Editor Toynbee, Mrs Paget, Clarendon, 1903–1925, 16 vols.
14: 124n1

March 1954: In the USA, Edward Murrow for the first time...

National or international item

March 1954

In the USA, Edward Murrow for the first time exposed the methods of Senator McCarthy on a CBS television programme called See It Now.
Reid, Panthea. Tillie Olsen: One Woman, Many Riddles. Rutgers University Press, 2010.
190

24 April 1769: George Armstrong opened a Dispensary for...

Building and people item

24 April 1769

George Armstrong opened a Dispensary for the Infant Poor in London.
Dolan, Josephine A. History of Nursing. 12th ed., Saunders, 1968.
164

By Summer 1884: Helen Hunt Jackson, activist on behalf of...

Writer or writing item

By Summer 1884

Helen Hunt Jackson , activist on behalf of native Americans, published her novel Ramona, set in California, only a little more than a year before her death of cancer.
American National Biography. http://www.anb.org/articles/home.html.

30 May 1782: The Duke of Portland, Lord Lieutenant of...

National or international item

30 May 1782

The Duke of Portland , Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, announced in the House of Lords a new Bill of Rights for Ireland: the Dublin Parliament was freed from the rule of the British Privy Council

October 1821: The Edinburgh School of Arts was founded...

Building and people item

October 1821

The Edinburgh School of Arts was founded by Leonard Horner , to educate mechanics, that is workmen, in branches of physical science deemed to be practical in their trades.
The World of Learning. 47th ed., Allen and Unwin, 1997.
1525
Scotland, James. The History of Scottish Education. University of London Press, 1969, 2 vols.
I: 304, 306

1826: The Obstetrical Society was founded....

Building and people item

1826

The Obstetrical Society was founded.
Donnison, Jean. Midwives and Medical Men: A History of Inter-Professional Rivalries and Women’s Rights. Schocken Books, 1977.
46
Towler, Jean. Midwives in History and Society. Croom Helm, 1986.
151
Blake, Catriona, and Wendy Savage. The Charge of the Parasols: Women’s Entry to the Medical Profession. Women’s Press, 1990.
17
The sources used show some discrepancy over the date of this founding, as Towler cites 1825 (145). Both Moscucci (62) and Donnison (46) cite 1826 as the founding year.

: Papers announcing geologists' new evolutionary...

National or international item

Spring 1859

Papers announcing geologists' new evolutionary arguments for human antiquity appeared, scant months before Darwin 's Origin of Species was published.
Van Riper, A. Bowdoin. Men Among the Mammoths: Victorian Science and the Discovery of Human Prehistory. University of Chicago Press, 1993.
182

1866: Comic singer Alfred Vance was hired by the...

Building and people item

1866

Comic singer Alfred Vance was hired by the Oxford music hall in London, to compete with the popular swell singer George Leybourne .
Bratton, Jacqueline S., editor. Music Hall: Performance and Style. Open University Press, 1986.
52

Rosita Forbes

RF was a popular travel writer of the earlier twentieth century. Her travel books are often flavoured with adventure, and she also published books of biography, essays, stories, political and social commentary, and memoirs, all...
Rosita Forbes Black and white, three-quarter-length photo of Rosita Forbes by Mendoza. She is seated, gazing at the viewer, in a dark hat with wide brim and large artificial flowers, and a fur wrap thrown over an open jacket and light dress with a full, gauzy or lacy skirt. Library of Congress.

24 August 1929: Martial law was declared in Jerusalem after...

National or international item

24 August 1929

Martial law was declared in Jerusalem after Jewish and Muslim demonstrations at the Wailing Wall and Arab attacks on Jews.
Keller, Helen, editor. The Dictionary of Dates. Macmillan, 1934, 2 vols.
I: 881
Langer, William L., editor. An Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern, Chronologically Arranged. 4th ed., Houghton Mifflin, 1968.
1091

8 January 1940: Food rationing began in earnest in Britain:...

Building and people item

8 January 1940

Food rationing began in earnest in Britain: sugar had been rationed the previous month; now butter and bacon followed.
Minns, Raynes. Bombers and Mash: The Domestic Front 1939-45. Virago, 1980.
86
Turner, Ernest Sackville. The Phony War on the Home Front. Michael Joseph, 1961.
204
Oakley, Ann. Man and Wife: Richard and Kay Titmuss: My Parents’ Early Years. HarperCollins, 1996.
124
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
400

1904: A researcher studying the effects of S-curve...

Building and people item

1904

A researcher studying the effects of S-curve corsets reported that monkeys laced up in these corsets moped, became excessively irritable and within weeks sickened and died!
Bordo, Susan. Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture, and the Body. University of California Press, 1993.
162
Bordo, Susan. Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture, and the Body. University of California Press, 1993.
162

31 December 1804: The Rev. John Darwall, stepson of poet Mary...

Building and people item

31 December 1804

The Rev. John Darwall , stepson of poet Mary Darwall , a teacher at King Edward VI School , Birmingham, wrote to the Board of Governors seeking a ban on Children intended to work...

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...

16 October 1916: Margaret Sanger opened a birth-control clinic...

National or international item

16 October 1916

Margaret Sanger opened a birth-control clinic at 46 Amboy Street in New York (Brooklyn), four and a half years ahead of the first such British clinic, which was the brainchild of Marie Stopes .
American National Biography. http://www.anb.org/articles/home.html.
“On this Day, September 7, 1966”. The New York Times, 7 Sept. 1966.

12 June 1924: Compton Mackenzie presented the first disc-jockey...

Building and people item

12 June 1924

Compton Mackenzie presented the first disc-jockey programme on BBC radio.
Briggs, Asa. The BBC: The First Fifty Years. Oxford University Press, 1985.
366

August 2002: Random House published War Torn: Stories...

Writer or writing item

August 2002

Random House published War Torn: Stories of War from the Women Reporters Who Covered Vietnam.
Tran, Mark. “So what did you do in the war, mommy?”. Guardian Unlimited, 21 Oct. 2002.
“Bowker’s Global Books in Print”. globalbooksinprint.com.

Fanny Holcroft

For most of her life FC (who began publishing her poems in 1797) was driven in her writing by the urgent need for financial survival, but she shared fully in the hopes of the previous...
Fanny Holcroft Opening page, with dramatis personae, of Fanny Holcroft's unpublished two-act drama, "Goldsmith".

1 November 1907: The British Museum's reading room reopened...

Building and people item

1 November 1907

The British Museum 's reading room reopened after being cleaned and redecorated; the dome was embellished with the names of canonical male writers, beginning with Chaucer and ending with Browning .
Harris, Philip Rowland. A History of the British Museum Library 1753-1973. The British Library Board, 1998.
432-3
Woolf, Virginia, and Hermione Lee. A Room of One’s Own; and, Three Guineas. Chatto and Windus; Hogarth Press, 1984.
25
Woolf, Virginia. Jacob’s Room; and, The Waves. Harcourt, Brace, and World, 1959.
106