The winners of the first Cliopatria Awards for the best history blogs have been announced. Congratulations to all the winners! On the theory that they are the best of the best, the Top Guns of the historioblogosphere if you will, I have added Frog in a Well (Best Group Blog), BibliOdyssey (Best New Blog)Airminded was surprisingly nominated in this category, but boy was the competition stiff!, The Rhine River (Best Series of Posts) and Easily Dist...
Today, it's a hundred years since voting began in the 1906 general election, in which the ruling Conservatives lost in a landslide to the Liberal Party. The new government, with Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman as PM (followed in 1908 by H.A. Asquith), had 400 seats; the Conservatives and Liberal Unionists managed only 156 between them.As a percentage of the national vote, however, it was much closer: 49% to 44%. This ushered in a most interesting ti...
Via Early Modern Notes comes the news that Gordon Brown wants to turn Remembrance Sunday into British Day. Aside from Sharon's remarks to the effect that this would obscure what is supposed to be remembered on that day - the human costs of war - to me, it seems like a pretty negative choice for a day to celebrate what it means to be British (or whatever they would be supposed to do on such a day). Admittedly, in Australia we come close to somethi...
I noticed that I had a few inches of spare shelf space last week, so ... Claude Grahame-White and Harry Harper. The Aeroplane in War. London: T. Werner Laurie, 1912. A big survey of military aviation before the First World War - keeping the reading public informed about such innovations as the 'engine-in-front biplane'. Grahame-White was the premier British flyer at this time. Major Helders. The War in the Air 1936. London: John Hamilton, 1932. A...
Can any better sport or amusement be imagined that could be obtained with an airship of the Zodiac type, endowed with a speed of 40 miles an hour for four hours, or 20 miles an hour for eight times this period, and so on in cubic proportion? Always able to reach a desired goal, but with the ever changing wind to add an element of interest to the journey; free from dust and the dangers of the road; always able to stop and enjoy the still air. An a...
It's been way too hot this week to blog, whatever energy I could muster I put towards that thesis thing. Instead, there's this: David Edgerton. Warfare State: Britain, 1920-1970. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Expands upon the suggestion put forward in England and the Aeroplane that the fabled British welfare state is more aptly described as a warfare state. DID YOU KNOW: Monty Python's Ministry of Silly Walks sketch is a take-off o...
A flying machine is an aeroplane (qv). A dirigible balloon (or just dirigible) is an airship (qv). An aeroplane is the wing of a flying machine (qv). Airship collectively describes both flying machines and dirigible balloons (qqv). Get it? (Got it.) Good! Seriously, I'm glad the meanings of these words were rationalised within a few years: what a head-ache it would be to have constantly qualify them all through my thesis! Sources: R.P. Hearne, Ae...
Among other things, the Fathom Archive has an online seminar on Early Contributions to Aviation. Of most interest to me is this 1960 oral history interview with Sir Thomas Sopwith (of Sopwith Camel fame, among other things): he highlights the role of the First World War in forcing aviation technology. Whoever transcribed the interview clearly didn't know much about the history of British aviation, as there are all sorts of strange goofs in it (mo...
