Posts by venue: Social History

Some Assembly Required

Every so often you come across a story so extraordinary that you can barely believe it really happened.  Such is the saga of the ss Baikal, which I stumbled upon whilst innocently cataloguing a box of old photographs… By 1895… Read more

First World War stories: A Headmaster’s view of the War part 2

In an earlier blog I looked at the first two months of the First World War through the eyes of Alfred Grundy, Headmaster of Whitburn Junior Mixed School. Grundy’s weekly entries in the School log book give us a fascinating… Read more

‘Watercolour Treasures’ at South Shields Museum and Art Gallery

Hi, it has been a while since I have written one of these blog posts. Back in spring last year I was on a work placement, working alongside staff at South Shields Museum and Art Gallery and the Discovery Museum,… Read more

Half Hung or Half Baked?

Amongst the many dark and mysterious secrets of Newcastle’s past, there is one that I have always found particularly fascinating; The Legend of ‘Half-Hung’ MacDonald. The short summary of the story is that Owen MacDonald was a soldier, executed on… Read more

Children fleeing the Spanish Civil War given refuge in Newcastle and the North East

These smiling boys are pictured shortly after their arrival in Newcastle from war-torn Spain in June 1937. They are walking from their new home at St Vincent’s Roman Catholic Orphanage in Brunel Terrace in Elswick to the nearby church, accompanied by the nuns… Read more