Theres a magical romance about train travel that no other form of transport can capture. Unlike other rail-based guides this is not a backpackers manual on how to travel cheaply & quickly & what to do once you get there. Instead this is a leisurely sojourn around the country an indulgent care-free & relaxing journey which notices
- & explains
- what other guides dont. What to see from the train historical anecdotes about the development of the railways explanations of how the rail system works railway traditions branch line explorations descriptions of the most scenic routes & a whole lot more are covered in a style which makes for a perfect armchair read whether from home or on the rails.

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The war was over new technologies & fashions were springing up; it was to be the beginning of a new & prosperous era & all was to be bright & joyous in Britain again. In many ways it was: women were granted new freedoms & rights motorcars became more accessible & houses were filled with electric gadgets. But that was only one side of the story. High unemployment led to extreme poverty workers were badly done by & inflation was high. However there was a cure for all: jazz that new upbeat music from across the Atlantic with its infectious rhythms & sensuous tones. Jazz took Britain by the hand & swung it well & truly into the twentieth century. This book explores many different aspects of an amazing decade through its highs & lows; from innovations in swimwear to the invention of Winnie-the-Pooh from the Great Strike of 26 to the Wall Street crash of 29 & the beginning of the Great Depression. Whether your interests are in fashion or politics there is something of interest for everyone in this accessible & entertaining work on all things related to Britain in the 1920s. ...

As in ' Britain B.C.' & ' Britain A.D.' (also accompanied by Channel 4 series) eminent archaeologist Francis Pryor challenges familiar historical views of the Middle Ages by examining fresh evidence from the ground. The term ' Middle Ages' suggests a time between two other ages: a period when nothing much happened. In his radical reassessment Francis Pryor shows that this is very far from the truth & that the Middle Ages (approximately 800-1550) were actually the time when the modern world was born. This was when Britain moved from Late Antiquity into a world we can recognize as more or less familiar: roads & parishes became fixed; familiar institutions such as the church & local government came into being; industry became truly industrial; & international trade was now a routine process. Archaeology shows that the Middle Ages were far from static. Based on everyday often humdrum evidence it demonstrates that the later agricultural & industrial revolutions were not that unexpected given what we now know of the later medieval period. Similarly the explosion of British maritime power in the late 1700s had roots in the 15th century. The book stresses continuous development at the expense of 'revolution' though the Black Death (1348) which killed a third of the population did have a profound effect in loosening the grip of the feudal system. Labour became scarce & workers gained power; land became more available & the move to modern farming began. The Middle Ages can now be seen in a fresh light as an era of great inventiveness as the author examines such topics as 'upward mobility'; the power of the Church; the role of the Guilds as precursors of trade unions; the transport infrastructure of roads bridges & shipbuilders; & the increase in iron production. ...

Primary History: Britain since 1948 encourages pupils to examine the developments in post-war Britain & to consider how they have contributed to today's society. Stimulating activities cover economic developments & industrialisation recreational & religious choices & Britain's relations with other communities & countries. * Choose from a range of activities to suit your class. * Differentiate using a variety of writing-based tasks. * Explore history topics through creative role-plays & art & design work. * Ideal as accessible research resources for topic work. ...

The third in this series on the history of British airlines since the Second World War this volume starts with the return of Harold Wilson in 1964 & continues through the Thatcher years to deregulation in 1992. As the government the state-owned airline corporations & the independent airlines all jostled for position in a demanding & unforgiving world Guy Halford-Mac Leod explains how the airlines made & remade themselves ducking & diving in a slippery & difficult ring & records the exploits of some well-known heavyweights Harold Bamberg Richard Branson & of course Freddie Laker. This readable book offers both structure & expert analysis of the dramatic events of the time: the collapse of Court Line; the rise & fall of Laker & his Skytrain; the protracted saga of the governments attempts to privatise British Airways; the demise of the second force airline British Caledonian; & the passing from the scene of a few favourites like Air Europe British Eagle BUA & Dan-Air. This book concludes with a chapter that tells what happened to the players new & old as they tried to adapt to the new freedoms that deregulation gave them. Guy Halford-Mac Leod a veteran of twenty-five years in the airline industry & four British airlines now works as a researcher in the Smithsonians National Air & Space Museum in Washington DC. ...

This revelatory new history punctures the still widely held belief that the British Empire was an enlightened & civilizing enterprise of great benefit to its subject peoples. Instead Britains Empire reveals a history of systemic repression & almost continual violence showing how British rule was imposed as a military operation & maintained as a military dictatorship. For colonized peoples the experience was a horrific one
- of slavery famine battle & extermination. Yet as Richard Gott illustrates the empires oppressed peoples did not go gently into that good night. Wherever Britain tried to plant its flag there was resistance. From Ireland to India from the American colonies to Australia Gott chronicles the backlash. He shows too how Britain provided a blueprint for the genocides of twentieth-century Europe & argues that its past leaders must rank alongside the dictators of the twentieth century as the perpetrators of crimes against humanity on an infamous scale. In tracing this history of resistance all but lost to modern memory Richard Gott recovers these forgotten peoples & puts them where they deserve to be: at the heart of the story of Britains empire.
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The story of Isleworth Studios is essentially that of the British film industry from 1914 to 1952. Beginning with the first British Sherlock Holmes screen adaptation & ending with its Oscar-winning swansong The African Queen in the intervening years it was one of the most technically advanced studios in the country & home to some of the best & the worst examples of British cinema. It experienced the transition from silent films to talkies. Britains only movie mogul Alexander Korda arrived looking to rival Hollywood followed by Douglas Fairbanks Jnr looking to rival Korda. Buster Keaton struggled with alcoholism; Richard Burton made his screen debut; Bogart Hepburn & Huston made a classic; & Emeric Pressburger directed his first & only film at Isleworth. Little by little the dream factorys physical shape is now crumbling or altered or is disappearing altogether. Soon it may be gone. Isleworth Studios has a history worthy of more than just an addendum in the annals of the British film industry. This is its story told for the very first time ...

What kind of Royal Navy does Britain need now? The 21st century promises to be one of huge uncertainties & challenges for the senior service. Does Britain have the right naval strategy to cope with emerging threats (does it have a naval strategy at all & should it?) & if so does the Navy have the right ships & enough of them to implement it? Given the time taken to introduce changes & develop new systems policymakers naval chiefs & designers are confronted with 50-year decisions. But future choices are likely to be clouded by economic uncertainties produced by the current crisis which could have implications for decades. Nick Childs looks at the changing strategic environment (including ever greater maritime trade & the growth of other navies such as China India South Korea revolutions in North Africa & the Middle East). He asks what Britains role in the world could or should be
- is she still interventionist? (Libya says yes). If so should our forces be designed purely to work with US UN or Western European forces? What are the options for a naval strategy? The author then considers what kind of navy would be needed to support such options. What kind of ships are needed & how many? What of aircraft carriers & the nuclear option? What are the technological developments affecting current & future warship design projects? Is the new Type 45 destroyer what is needed & worth the cost? Given the depths to which the RN has shrunk in terms of numbers public profile & strength relative to its peers this probably is a critical period in terms of determining the RNs future.
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British TV comedy in its glorious forms
- from sitcom to sketch shows -is a much-loved highlight of the small-screen schedules.
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Britain fought in the Second World War to save the world from fascism. But just a few years after the defeat of Hitler came the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya
- a mass armed rebellion by the Kikuyu people demanding the return of their land & freedom. The draconian response of Britains colonial government was to detain nearly the entire Kikuyu population of one-&-a half-million
- to hold them in camps or confine them in villages ringed with barbed wire
- & to portray them as sub-human savages. From 1952 until the end of the war in 1960 tens of thousands of detainees
- & possibly a hundred thousand or more
- died from the combined effects of exhaustion disease starvation & systemic physical brutality. Until now these events have remained untold largely because the British government in Kenya destroyed most of its files. For the last eight years Caroline Elkins has conducted exhaustive research to piece together the story unearthing reams of documents & interviewing several hundred Kikuyu survivors. Britains Gulag reveals what happened inside Kenyas detention camps as well as the efforts to conceal the truth. Now for the first time we can understand the full savagery of the Mau Mau war & the ruthless determination with which Britain sought to control its empire.




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