There’s a hole in the world / Like a great black pit / And the vermin of the world / Inhabit it / And it goes by the name of London.
Stephen Sondheim (b.1930)
Monthly Archives: January 2021
London Trivia: A ghostly apparition
On 3 January 1804: When Francis Smith joined a group patrolling the Hammersmith Bridge in the wake of sightings of a ghostly figure and saw a figure dressed in white, naturally he assumed it was a deadly apparition. Shooting Thomas Millwood who was dressed in pale clothes after a day’s plastering. Smith was tried for wilful murder, found guilty the hanging sentence was commuted to a year’s hard labour.
On 3 January 1946 William Joyce, ‘Lord Haw-Haw’, an fascist who had broadcast German propaganda from Germany to Britain during WWII was hanged at Wandsworth
On 3 January 1911 The Siege of Sidney Street, popularly known as the ‘Battle of Stepney’ took place in the East End
No. 1 the Strand was the very first house in London to be numbered, although Apsley House at Hyde Park is now called No. 1 London
According to the burial register at St Leonard’s Church, Shoreditch Thomas Cam died in 1588 at the ripe old age of 207
Carter Lane was once a main thoroughfare through the City and where at the Hart’s Horn Tavern Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators met
When the allegorical novella Animal Farm was published in 1945 George Orwell was living at 27b Cannonbury Square, Islington
When the Can Can was performed at the Alhambra Leicester Square in 1870 the theatre’s dancing licence was suspended
Shergar won the 1981 Derby was so far ahead the short-sighted jockey in second place didn’t see him and thought that he had won the race
From 14th to the 18th century the area occupied by Trafalgar Square was the courtyard of the Great Mews stabling serving Whitehall Palace
As a boy Charles Dickens worked in a boot polish or blacking factory on Villiers Street the Strand. Embankment station now occupies the site
The streets named Savoy take their name from the Savoy Palace where in 1381 thirty-two men trapped in the cellar drank themselves to death
Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.
Test Your Knowledge: January
Ihave had enough of complaining after having whinged every Wednesday last year. I now propose to drop this regular post and introduce ‘Test Your Knowledge’ on the first Friday of the month. In some ways, it’s easier than having to find another nugget about London not already covered, but still means I’ll have my work cut out giving 10 questions for your delectation. As with last year’s Christmas Quiz, the correct answer will turn green when it’s clicked upon and expanded to give more information. The incorrect answers will turn red giving the correct explanation. This month’s quiz has an artistic slant.
1. Of what did actor James Mason give filmgoers a tour of in 1967?
The London That Nobody Knows
CORRECT Based on a book of the same name by Geoffrey Fletcher, this documentary provides a fascinating portrait of pie-and-mash shops and crumbling old music halls. Fletcher’s book also features a drawing of a Holborn toilet with goldfish swimming in the glass cisterns.
The London Dickens Knew
WRONG Based on a book of the same name by Geoffrey Fletcher, this documentary provides a fascinating portrait of pie-and-mash shops and crumbling old music halls. Fletcher’s book also features a drawing of a Holborn toilet with goldfish swimming in the glass cisterns.
London in the Raw
WRONG Based on a book of the same name by Geoffrey Fletcher, this documentary provides a fascinating portrait of pie-and-mash shops and crumbling old music halls. Fletcher’s book also features a drawing of a Holborn toilet with goldfish swimming in the glass cisterns.
2. In the Richard Curtis comedy Notting Hill, the character played by Hugh Grant is the owner of what kind of business?
An antique stall on the Portobello Road Market
WRONG It specialised in travel books and was modelled on the Travel Bookshop at 13-15 Blenheim Crescent, just off Portobello Road.
A bookshop on the Portobello Road
CORRECT It specialised in travel books and was modelled on the Travel Bookshop at 13-15 Blenheim Crescent, just off Portobello Road.
A secondhand record shop on the Portobello Road
WRONG It specialised in travel books and was modelled on the Travel Bookshop at 13-15 Blenheim Crescent, just off Portobello Road.
3. Wardour Street in Soho has been the administrative home of the British movie industry since the 1920s. Which once illustrious film company had offices at 113 Wardour Street?
Hammer Films
CORRECT 113 Wardour Street was home to Hammer House. Hammer produced a stream of popular horror pictures between the late 1950s and early 1970s.
British Lion
WRONG 113 Wardour Street was home to Hammer House. Hammer produced a stream of popular horror pictures between the late 1950s and early 1970s.
London Films
WRONG 113 Wardour Street was home to Hammer House. Hammer produced a stream of popular horror pictures between the late 1950s and early 1970s.
4. Two very different musicians both have blue plaques to their names in adjoining houses in Brook Street. Who are they?
Jimi Hendrix and George Frederick Handel
CORRECT It would be hard to find two musicians more different but Hendrix is said to have been pleased by the coincidence that he was living in a house next door to one in which Handel had composed so much of his music. The Handel & Hendrix in London Museum now occupies 25 and 23 Brook Street respectively.
Noël Coward and Edward Elgar
WRONG It would be hard to find two musicians more different but Hendrix is said to have been pleased by the coincidence that he was living in a house next door to one in which Handel had composed so much of his music. The Handel & Hendrix in London Museum now occupies 25 and 23 Brook Street respectively.
Duke Ellington and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
WRONG It would be hard to find two musicians more different but Hendrix is said to have been pleased by the coincidence that he was living in a house next door to one in which Handel had composed so much of his music. The Handel & Hendrix in London Museum now occupies 25 and 23 Brook Street respectively.
5. What did punk rock legend Ian Dury call his first group?
Kilburn And The High Roads
CORRECT The name apparently derived from a road sign for ‘Kilburn High Road’ that Dury often passed on his way to score dope at the El Rio Club on the Harrow Road.
The Clapham Junction Stranglers
WRONG The name apparently derived from a road sign for ‘Kilburn High Road’ that Dury often passed on his way to score dope at the El Rio Club on the Harrow Road.
Balham and The B-Roads
WRONG The name apparently derived from a road sign for ‘Kilburn High Road’ that Dury often passed on his way to score dope at the El Rio Club on the Harrow Road.
6. In the 19th-century, an as yet unpublished author working for a railway company was tasked with salvaging headstones from a churchyard that was partly in the path of a new line and had them arranged around a tree that today bears his name, where they remain to this day. What is the name of this eponymous mature tree?
The Thomas Chestnut
WRONG An ash in the graveyard of St Pancras Old Church reputed to be the oldest church in Britain. King’s Cross was being regenerated in the 1860s, at this time the exhumation of human remains and the removal of tombs was supervised by the architect Blomfield, although he delegated much of this unpleasant task to his young protégé, Thomas Hardy. The tree is known as “The Hardy Ash” has since grown around the gravestones.
The Hardy Ash
CORRECT An ash in the graveyard of St Pancras Old Church reputed to be the oldest church in Britain. King’s Cross was being regenerated in the 1860s, at this time the exhumation of human remains and the removal of tombs was supervised by the architect Blomfield, although he delegated much of this unpleasant task to his young protégé, Thomas Hardy. The tree is known as “The Hardy Ash” has since grown around the gravestones.
The Dickens Plane
WRONG An ash in the graveyard of St Pancras Old Church reputed to be the oldest church in Britain. King’s Cross was being regenerated in the 1860s, at this time the exhumation of human remains and the removal of tombs was supervised by the architect Blomfield, although he delegated much of this unpleasant task to his young protégé, Thomas Hardy. The tree is known as “The Hardy Ash” has since grown around the gravestones.
7. Rock stars Jimi Hendrix, Rod Stewart and Jeff Beck have a connection with Manor House Station the start of the first Run on The Knowledge. How so?
They all commuted to work from the station
WRONG Manor House was a long-standing coaching house, a tavern that stood at the junction of Green Lanes and Seven Sisters Road from the early 19th-century to the late 20th-century, it was a venue where they all played early in their careers.
They all worked on the Piccadilly Line
WRONG Manor House was a long-standing coaching house, a tavern that stood at the junction of Green Lanes and Seven Sisters Road from the early 19th-century to the late 20th-century, it was a venue where they all played early in their careers.
The station is named after a pub where they all played
CORRECT Manor House was a long-standing coaching house, a tavern that stood at the junction of Green Lanes and Seven Sisters Road from the early 19th-century to the late 20th-century, it was a venue where they all played early in their careers.
8. Berwick Street, once famous for its record shops, featured on the cover of a 1995 album. What are the British band and the seminal album?
Blur – ‘The Great Escape’
WRONG Oasis might have come a cropper against Blur in the big Britpop singles chart showdown, but the Gallagher brothers had the last laugh with their record-breaking second album. ‘…Morning Glory?’ which shifted 347,000 copies in its week of release as the UK went mad for the band’s last gasp of greatness.
Pulp – ‘Different Class’
WRONG Oasis might have come a cropper against Blur in the big Britpop singles chart showdown, but the Gallagher brothers had the last laugh with their record-breaking second album. ‘…Morning Glory?’ which shifted 347,000 copies in its week of release as the UK went mad for the band’s last gasp of greatness.
Oasis – ‘(What’s The Story) Morning Glory?’
CORRECT Oasis might have come a cropper against Blur in the big Britpop singles chart showdown, but the Gallagher brothers had the last laugh with their record-breaking second album. ‘…Morning Glory?’ which shifted 347,000 copies in its week of release as the UK went mad for the band’s last gasp of greatness.
9. Tower House, 29 Melbury Road, Kensington, the turreted Gothuc pile built by William Burgess in 1877 is home to which guitar legend?
Jimmy Page
CORRECT Outbidding David Bowie, Page acquired the property from hell-raising actor Richard Harris in 1974. Occultist filmmaker Kenneth Anger once lived in Page’s basement. In 2015 Page successfully challenged a planning application lodged by his next-door neighbour Robbie Williams.
Eric Clapton
WRONG Outbidding David Bowie, Page acquired the property from hell-raising actor Richard Harris in 1974. Occultist filmmaker Kenneth Anger once lived in Page’s basement. In 2015 Page successfully challenged a planning application lodged by his next-door neighbour Robbie Williams.
Mark Knopfler
WRONG Outbidding David Bowie, Page acquired the property from hell-raising actor Richard Harris in 1974. Occultist filmmaker Kenneth Anger once lived in Page’s basement. In 2015 Page successfully challenged a planning application lodged by his next-door neighbour Robbie Williams.
10. In 1921 English composer Edward Elgar opened which iconic music brand’s first store, and marked by a plaque on Oxford Street near Davis Street?
Pathé
WRONG HMV brought a new look to music buying, with a school within the store. ‘Bright’ young men from the country were encouraged to learn all the fine shades and nice feelings of their profession – how to satisfy varying music tastes, how to pronounce the names of foreign musicians, and generally to understand what they were selling and the idiosyncrasies of those who bought.
His Masters Voice
CORRECT HMV brought a new look to music buying, with a school within the store. ‘Bright’ young men from the country were encouraged to learn all the fine shades and nice feelings of their profession – how to satisfy varying music tastes, how to pronounce the names of foreign musicians, and generally to understand what they were selling and the idiosyncrasies of those who bought.
Columbia
WRONG HMV brought a new look to music buying, with a school within the store. ‘Bright’ young men from the country were encouraged to learn all the fine shades and nice feelings of their profession – how to satisfy varying music tastes, how to pronounce the names of foreign musicians, and generally to understand what they were selling and the idiosyncrasies of those who bought.
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