Tag: British

Revisiting the “Knickerbocker” Origin Story of Santa Claus

Revisiting the “Knickerbocker” Origin Story of Santa Claus

by | Dec 16, 2024 | | 0

Reading time: 6 minutes
In December 1953, Dr. Charles W. Jones, a University of California professor hailed as one of the world’s foremost scholars on St. Nicholas of Myra, gave a speech to the New-York Historical Society that was published the following year in the society’s quarterly under the title “Knickerbocker Santa Claus.” The premise of Jones’ speech was that author Washington Irving invented Santa Claus in an 1809 satire, A History of New York, that was purportedly written by a completely fictional Dutch historian, Diedrich Knickerbocker. “Without Irving there would be no Santa Claus,” Jones wrote. “Santa Claus was a parasitic germ until the Knickerbocker History in 1809; after 1809 Santa Claus spread like a plague which has yet to reach its peak.”

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A History of Drinking with the World’s Oldest Pubs

A History of Drinking with the World’s Oldest Pubs

by | Dec 11, 2024 | | 0

Reading time: 7 minutes
Alcohol is one of humanity’s oldest inventions.
Our earliest evidence of humans brewing and drinking alcohol comes from 8th Century BCE China – over 9,000 years ago.
Across the world, from China and India to Mesopotamia and Europe, we’ve brewed many different types of alcoholic drinks, and almost as old as the drinks are the places we drink in.
While most of the world has a long history of drinking establishments, Europe is the home of the pub, which comes from the Roman tradition of establishing tabernaes or wine shops everywhere they went.

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How Florence Nightingale David saved lives during the Blitz – with statistics

How Florence Nightingale David saved lives during the Blitz – with statistics

by | Dec 9, 2024 | , | 0

Reading time: 6 minutes
In 1939, Florence Nightingale David was living in the village of Bledlow in Buckinghamshire, alongside a number of her female academic colleagues at University College London (UCL). This included Eileen Evans, a phonetics lecturer, Elizabeth Bigg-Wither, a lecturer in Italian, and Joyce Townsend, research assistant, secretary, and illustrator to the zoologist DMS Watson. Born in Herefordshire in 1909, David’s parents had been friends with the Crimean War nurse Florence Nightingale, who she was named after. She would complete her degree in Mathematics at Bedford College for Women in 1931, and joined UCL as a research assistant in statistics, before completing her doctorate in 1938 and continued her work at the college until 1939.

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The Worst Predictions Throughout History

The Worst Predictions Throughout History

by | Nov 27, 2024 | , | 0

Reading time: 9 minutes
It’s often said that predicting the future is like betting against God.

Despite this, humans have always loved to try and predict the future -whether it’s dismissing new technology or predicting the end of the world, throughout history there have been some interesting predictions made.

Some have been correct. Most have not.

And then there are those predictions that are so spectacularly wrong they make you laugh. Collating some of the worst predictions throughout history, here’s the most interesting, the most incorrect, and the most ironic.

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The enduring lessons of the Iraq War

The enduring lessons of the Iraq War

by | Nov 18, 2024 | , | 0

Reading time: 7 minutes
The US-led overthrow of the government of Saddam Hussein in Iraq marked the beginning of a series of events that reshaped the strategic environment of the Middle East. It also had enduring consequences for Iraqi society, and for Arab societies and Arab governments beyond its borders. There was no reason to doubt that the military defeat of Iraq could be achieved. But there were larger questions involved—including what a successor regime should look like; whether such a regime, initially established and maintained under US protection, would prove sustainable; and if not, what the consequences would be.

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They Shall Not Grow Old poignantly illuminates the human face of the Great War.

They Shall Not Grow Old poignantly illuminates the human face of the Great War.

by | Nov 7, 2024 | , | 0

Reading time: 6 minutes
Although these feelings of remembrance are now used to commemorate the fallen of all global conflict, it was the First World War (1914-1918), or “The War to End all Wars” , that inspired these heartbreakingly eloquent words and forever enshrined the memory of a lost generation for all time; with this spirit of remembrance and in further recognition of the 1918 Armistice comes director Peter Jackson’s, They Shall Not Grow Old, a striking, immersive and emotionally powerful documentary feature unlike anything ever seen before.

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Why we don’t hear about the 10,000 French deaths at Gallipoli

Why we don’t hear about the 10,000 French deaths at Gallipoli

by | Nov 6, 2024 | | 0

Reading time: 6 minutes
With almost the same number of soldiers as the Anzacs – 79,000 – and similar death rates – close on 10,000 – French participation in the Gallipoli campaign could not occupy a more different place in national memory. What became a foundation myth in Australia as it also did in the Turkish Republic after 1923 was eventually forgotten in France.

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Where are All the Medals? Racial Bias in Military Bravery Awards

Where are All the Medals? Racial Bias in Military Bravery Awards

by | Sep 26, 2024 | | 0

Reading time: 7 minutes
For service or for gallantry, almost all modern militaries – especially Western militaries, have issued war medals for a very long time.
But who decides who gets these medals and awards, and how?

Recent examination has brought to light a distinct lack of minority soldiers within Western militaries winning bravery awards, across many different countries, all throughout the 20th century and beyond.

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