John Welford
Bio
I am a retired librarian, having spent most of my career in academic and industrial libraries.
I write on a number of subjects and also write stories as a member of the "Hinckley Scribblers".
Stories (501/0)
Sir George Cayley's flying machine
The first man to take off from the ground and fly was not Orville Wright in 1903 but (it is believed) John Appleby, a coachman who was a highly reluctant pioneer of aviation fifty years earlier. He had his employer, Sir George Cayley, to thank for that.
By John Welford3 years ago in FYI
The Three Strangers: a story by Thomas Hardy
“The Three Strangers” is one of the stories included in Thomas Hardy’s collection of “Wessex Tales”, originally published in 1888, but the story first appeared on its own in “Longman’s Magazine” and bears the date of March 1883. Its first readers in Hardy’s native Dorset would have been well aware of the hard times then being experienced in the rural areas and would therefore have related sympathetically to the conditions hinted at in the story, which was set in the 1820s during a similar period of agricultural distress.
By John Welford3 years ago in Geeks
The Self-Denying Ordinance, 1644-5
The self-denying ordinance was a short bill passed by Parliament at the height of the English Civil War (1642-49), and which turned out to be instrumental in the eventual victory of the Parliamentary forces over those of King Charles I.
By John Welford3 years ago in FYI
The Shakers
The Shaking Quakers, better known as Shakers, were a remarkable group of Christians that flourished in the United States during the late 18th and early to mid 19th centuries. Although their numbers were never all that large their name lives on mainly because of the artefacts they left behind them.
By John Welford3 years ago in FYI
- Top Story - July 2021
The Seven Sisters, East SussexTop Story - July 2021
The Seven Sisters are a series of sheer chalk cliffs, up to 500 feet high, on the coast of East Sussex between Newhaven and Eastbourne. Geologically they are part of the South Downs and are now included in the South Downs National Park that was created in 2011.
By John Welford3 years ago in Wander
The Shaftesbury Byzant
If you pay a visit to the Museum in the Dorset town of Shaftesbury you are quite likely to see a very strange exhibit that looks a bit like a cross between an open umbrella and a May garland. It is a metal structure that has been gilded to make it look like solid gold, although that is not the case. This is the Shaftesbury Byzant (which is a corruption of “besom”, a type of sweeping brush). It has a fascinating history.
By John Welford3 years ago in FYI