11th October 1957.

In Biblical scripture Joshua is represented as ‘stopping the sun in its course‘, and the Psalms speak of the earth as ‘not to be moved’.

Today in 1957 the Jodrell Bank, Cheshire, 250 ft, Mark 1, radio telescope came into operation using the gun-turret, track pinion gearing of the de-commissioned HMS Revenge.

Jodrell Bank 1957.

Our view of the earth in the context of the universe was being founded at the time of Aristotle in the 4thc BCE who like other ancient Greeks with their questioning minds, had discovered the theory of eclipses, the sphericity of the Earth and its revolution, like other planets, around the centre of the solar system.

Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Emperors symbolised their earthly power by putting their hands on an orb and in the Anglo-Saxon 8thc the Venerable Bede compared the earth to a ball.

Later King Alfred imagined the world as the yolk in the middle of an egg; in spherical terms. However he was wrong in thinking that the sky travelled round the earth a pre-Renaissance misconception.

Later under the influence of the medieval church dogma the view of the world is reflected in the Mappa Mundi of which there is a copy at Hereford Cathedral, which demonstrates the theocentric thinking of the universe as earth centred with Jerusalem at the centre.

The daily rotation of the heavens was explained by the notion of the ‘Primum mobile’ situated beyond the fixed stars and between them and the Empyrean Heaven where God and the Angels dwelt.

It was a notion not corrected until Copernicus in his De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, and Galileo which brought conflict with the Catholic Church.

Mappa Mundi.

Conflict arose after Galileo’s propositions, which the Church thought both heretical and erroneous resulting in his persecution, causing his recantation, and condemnation in 1616 by the Inquisition of his belief that; ‘the sun is the centre of the cosmos’, and that, ‘the earth is not the centre of the cosmos, nor immovable’.

The writer C.S. Lewis somewhere makes the point that, ‘there were medieval ditchers and ale wives who did not know the earth was spherical-not because they thought it was flat but because they had not thought about it at all; the more educated would not have been flat-earthers’.

In fact it was the 19thc Washington Irving who spread the myth that all medieval men thought the earth was flat in his ‘Voyage of Columbus’.

In 2008 it was revealed by the 95 years old, Sir Bernard Lovell, physicist and astronomer, who founded Jodrell Bank, that he was ordered by the Chief of Air Staff in the late 1950.s, to adapt the facility to provide a ‘four-minute warning of an impending nuclear attack’. He said, ‘it was the only instrument  that could detect a Soviet missile’.

References:

ikimasho.net/Pic.

10th October 1731. The Mystery of Water.

Water is unusual in that in its liquid state it is denser that in its solid: ice floats. It does things which liquids are not supposed to do. It expands on freezing; it is densest at 4c°. It also has an enormously high heat capacity and odd viscosity.(1)

One born Today in 1731 who made a significant contribution to our understanding of the constituents of water was the eccentric and reclusive aristocrat, Henry Cavendish, which included his discovery that a gas was produced when zinc or iron was dropped into acid. This ‘inflammable’ air, as he called it, was later known as Hydrogen.

Water defines our terrestrial environment being central to life, to atmospheric science, biology and technology, but though two thirds of our planet is water the more its molecular structure is studied, the more problems are met.

Certainly water doesn’t conform scientifically, for normally as a liquid expands as it gets hotter, and shrinks when cooler, as in a thermometer where Mercury expands as it heats up, water being different, expands (anomalous expansive), as it freezes as the molecules move closer together.

However at 4c° (39°f) the molecules are as close as they can get, having reached its maximum density. Further cooling sees the molecules rearrange in open structure, so ice-bergs float.

It takes a lot of energy to turn ice into water and water to steam, where the temperature doesn’t increase, but where energy is pushing molecules apart to a gas, to steam, to become Latent Energy, a reservoir of energy locked up and used effectively in steam power.

Then Specific Heat Capacity shows water holding more heat per kilogram (pound) than virtually any other substance, practically it means that radiators deliver more heat relatively, though the water takes time to heat up.

Where water is not fully understood is in the field of pharmaceuticals, as some inhibitors are designed to bind via water, some to exclude water, but their design is not based on water molecules as their role is not fully understood.

Then coming to DNA as our view as a double-helix relates only to its structure in water; in the gas phase it is flat. So hydration-changes such as removing water from the surface of the molecule can induce switches in DNA conformation.

(1) One element of its molecular structure that sets it apart is the fleeting nature of its Hydrogen bonds which link the molecules  and constantly break  and form above melting point.

The standard picture of liquid water posits a picture of each molecule having on average bonded to 4 others in a tetrahedral shape.

References:

chemistryexplained.com/henry-cavendish.

howstuffworks.com.

academia.edu. Water the Enduring Mystery. Nature. Vol. 452. 20.3.2008. Philip Ball.

9th October 1841. Pocklington to HSBC.

In 1841 two scoundrels William Gregory Bigg and Joseph Ralph Paybody were indicted Today for forging and uttering an Order for the payment of 200l.(pounds).

One of the banks involved and named in the trial at the Old Bailey, was Pocklington and Lacy of West Smithfield, London which had been founded in the 18th century; the oldest record in the Hong-Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) archives is an account book of the company of 1775.

Benjamin Pocklington along with representatives of Jones’ Bank and ‘master banker’ J. Biggerstaff, all banks in the environs of the London, Smithfield Meat Market on which the case against Biggs and Paybody centred, relating as it did to fraud and deception regarding trading in cattle. Both were to be convicted and transported for up to 20 years.

The Pocklington and Lacey was to be acquired by the Birmingham and Midland which by 1851 bought its first branch, the Stourbridge Bank of Bates and Robbins, and in 1891 became established in the capital after buying the Central Bank of London.

Later in 1923, as the Midland Bank, it became one of the largest in the world, only to be swallowed in 1992 by the HSBC originally founded by a Scot for the benefit of the opium trade of Hong Kong.

In 2012 it was discovered that HSBC had been involved in wide-scale drug laundering operations, particularly in Mexico, and it is not surprising that with the billions coming in from illegal operations they didn’t require any government bail-out in the financial collapse, neither did Barclays who were fixing Libor Rates.

The boss of HSBC whilst their illegal operations were in full spate, Lord Green became one of David Cameron’s Trade Ministers. At the local level, people such as the Author are now treated with suspicion when paying in large amounts.

The proving of the case against those charged in 1841 centred on the numbering and recording of 10/-(shillings) by banks on issue, a practice to continue with higher denomination notes well into the 20th century.

HSBC were fined nearly $2m for involvement in money laundering, those involved escaped Transportation or indeed any penalty.

ADDENDUM:

In the new Millennium the five big banking players were: Lloyds TSB, Barclays, RBOS, and HSBC and HBOS an ex Building Society which in 2001 amalgamated with the Bank of Scotland to form the 3rd largest bank in Britain in terms of group assets, later to go bust!

Ref: hsbc.co.uk/Pics.

Ref: wikipedia.org.

Ref: Proceedings of the Old Bailey 1674-1913. P.134.

Ref: oldbaileyonline.org. Article Head ‘Deception and Forgery 29/11.1841’.

 

8th October 1789. Halcyon Days.

Halcyon is the mythological term for calm, coming from the ancient Greek myth of Halcyone (Alcyone) the daughter of Aeolus, ruler of the winds, who threw herself in the Aegean Sea after her husband drowned. She was carried to her husband by the wind with both being transformed into kingfishers. 

Halcyon was a term used by ornithologist William John Swainson FLS. FRS., born Today in 1789, when he introduced the genus Halcyon for the European kingfisher.(1)

He named the type species as Woodland Kingfisher (Halcyon Seleganensis), from the bird in Greek myth, as it was associated with the Kingfisher, in the ancient belief that the bird nested at sea which it calmed to enable egg- laying. So two weeks, starting around the winter solstice calm weather was expected.(2)

River Kingfisher.

The myth was introduced to the English-speaking world in 1398 by John Trevisa who translated Bartholemew de Glanville’s De Propietatibus Rerum, into Middle English.

By the 16thc it had lost its association with the bird  and regarded figuratively with calm days as in Henry VI (1592) : ‘Expect of St.Martin’s Summer Halcyon Days’, and in King Lear (1605) ‘Renege affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks with every gale and vary of their masters’.

This referred to the hanging of dead kingfishers whose beaks would  turn to the direction of the wind.

Swainson a Fellow of the Linnean Society was the first naturalist and illustrator to use lithography which required no engraver and his monochrome illustrations were later hand-coloured.

However his reputation was somewhat tarnished when he became a proponent of the Quinarian System stemming from the publication in 1819 by William Sharp Macleay of his ‘Quinarian System of Biological Classes.’

Nicholas Aylward Vigor’s, Quinarian Bird Classes showing missing entries supposedly representing Groups expecting to be discovered.

In this system all taxa are divided into 5 sub-groups, if fewer it was believed those missing awaited to be discovered. The system was later discredited by botanists who considered Swainson was being too presumptuous, as a mere naturalist, and it was rendered obsolete after Darwin’s evolutionary taxonomy.

(1) He died 6.12.1855.

(2) The genus Halcyon has 11 species with the common bird we see by rivers known as River Kingfisher (Alcedo althis).

References:

scienceblogs.com/Pic.

wikipedia.org. quinarian_system/Pic.

phrases.org.uk.

7th October 1337. End of the French Dream.

Gascony formed the nucleus of our French possessions until the end of the 100 Years War in the 15th century.

The War though punctuated by short periods of uneasy peace actually lasted for 116 years from 1337 to 1453 and was essentially a struggle for the throne of France between the rival houses of Valois and Plantagenet (also kings of England).

Edward III who ruled over Gascony had a good legal claim as his mother Isabella was the sister of the last French king Charles IV, but was still a boy of sixteen. His rival Philip of Valois was only Charles’ cousin, but a grown man and already regent, and unlike Edward away in England, was on the spot. He thus had himself crowned.

The history of England would undoubtedly have been different if Edward’s claim had prevailed with England and France under a single crown.

France at the time of the 100 Years War.

Amicable relations between the two countries weren’t helped by the fact that Edward had invaded France’s old ally Scotland. Thus in 1337 Philip confiscated Gascony, ‘on account of the many excesses, rebellions and acts of disobedience committed against us and our royal majesty by the King of England, Duke of Aquitaine’.

This was the last straw for King Edward who Today in 1337 formally claimed not only Gascony, but France as well, declaring himself, ‘King of France and England’: the 100 Years War had begun.

Wars need money to pay for them  but his attempt to raise an army provoked a domestic crisis because of the sums needed to be raised in tax. The proceeds of 30,000 sacks of wool was loaned and money was borrowed from the Bardi and Peruzzi Banks, with his demands becoming increasingly intolerable in his last ten years.(1)

BH0TR6 Philippa of Hainault Queen of Edward III alabaster effigy on tomb in Westminster Abbey, London England. Image shot 1992. Exact date unknown.

Edward’s French campaigns coincided with his war in Scotland and broke the friendly relations which had existed for a 100 years. If there was any consolation with the 100 Year War taking place in France, there were no casualties in England: France’s population was to drop dramatically.

Another consolation for Edward was his genuine regard for his wife Phillippa, remarkable in an age of formal dynastic marriage, and to whom he regaled with sumptuous gifts.

By the end of the War against France the only territory we owned was Calais.

(1) Edward III died in 1377.

References:

A History of England in 100 Places. J.J.Norwich. P 118.

faculty.history.wisc.edu/summerville/Map.

historyextra.com/BBC History Magazine. 21.6.2017/Effigy.

6th October 2009. Red Menace.

Today in 2009 the Sunday Times reported that Jack Jones, the influential  Transport and General Workers Union Boss, was regarded by the KGB as a Soviet Agent between 1964 and 1968.(1)

By November 1969 Sir Martin Furnival Jones, Director-General of MI5 discussed with Labour Home Secretary, James Callaghan to discuss telephone scrutiny of Jack Jones, but was turned down.

However it appeared that Jones’ manipulation by the Communist Part of Great Britain (CPGB) was now ceasing and contact with the KGB was broken in August 1968 after the ‘Prague Spring’ uprising. Later ‘Bugging’ of the CPGB August 1969, discovered contact by Jones had been resumed.(2)

However another request was made in 1970 to, by the now Tory Home Secretary, Reginald Maudling, to which Prime Minister Edward Heath gave permission for one year.

Since the Russian Revolution in 1917 many with Socialist tendencies, which included many intellectuals and Trade Unions had become enamoured with Communism.

Post-war the Communists took control of Electricians Trade Union (ETU) and had covert influence in many others. By the 1970.s many MP.s were cited, by a defecting Czech Agent, as having affiliations to his country including Will Owen (18.2.1901-3.4.1981).

A miner MP who had gone down pit at 13  he was forced to apply for The Manor of Northstead, after being charged and arrested on charges under Official Secrets Act 1911.

It appears that he was suspected of passing information of a parliamentary nature to a Czech agent for monthly cash amounts, but was found not guilty on all charges in May.1970.

However according to Christopher Andrew in his Defence of the Realm, he was ‘guilty as charged’.(3)

Then in 1979 a defecting Czech agent said that John Stonehouse MP  had been giving information to the then Soviet-Communist controlled Czech Government.

However this was only one of the mysteries regarding Stonehouse as later his clothes were found on a beach in Florida, suggesting he had drowned. After press obituaries had appeared, he eventually was found in Melbourne, Australia with his mistress, where it was thought he was the recently disappeared Lord Lucan.(4)

Stonehouse had been Aviation Minister and Post-Master-General in Harold Wilson’s Government and had introduced First and Second Class Stamps. He refused to resign the Whip and eventually quit in April 1976, leaving Labour in a minority government.

His excuse for his bizarre activities was his having trouble with companies he controlled. Charged and convicted on forgery, fraud and wasting police time he was given seven years, but served only two owing to heart trouble.

Another Labour Party casualty was Bernard Floud, Granada Executive and Wartime Civil Servant, who was a member of the Communist Party in 1930.s. He was MP for Acton from 1964 and when Wilson considered him for a post, an MI5 check revealed his Soviet sympathies.

He committed suicide in 1967 caused according to ex MI5 Agent, Peter Wright in his book ‘Spycatcher’ (1987), by his being investigated by MI5. (5)

It is difficult today to understand the fear of Communism in the ‘Cold-War’  period with its undertones of nuclear war, so anyone remotely associated with any contact with Russia was suspect producing widespread paranoia. This was especially so after many British Agents had defected to Russia.

(1) Authorised history of MI5: Christopher Andrew. Defence of the Realm. Allen Lane. 2000. p.413 re Will Owen.

(2) Jones was a member of the CPGB between 1932-1941.

(3) MP.s have to apply for certain quaint offices in order to resign.

(4) Lucan was never found.

(5) Source: The Guardian, Monday, 5th October 2009. James Meikle reporting a book by David Leigh: The Wilson Plot: The Intelligence Service and the Discrediting of the PM.

Leigh says Floud was suicidal and depressed and Wright could have been too zealous in his interrogation.

 

5th October 1792. Soap and Hydrogenation.

14 ton tank used to transport liquid products in the early days.

Today in 1792 the Quaker, Joseph Crosfield of Warrington was born, later to make his name in soap and chemicals.

Joseph Crosfield and Sons started as wholesale grocers and sugar refiners using the communications of canals and Mersey River.

In the Autumn of 1909 the company commenced production of Hydrogenised liquid oils based on the discovery by the German Dr. Wilhelm Normann, as outlined in his Patent 1515 for the ‘Process for the Conversion of Unsaturated Fatty Acids, or their Glycerides, into Saturated Compounds.(1)

Crosfield works in 1886.

In 1908 the Patent had been bought by Crosfields and from autumn 1909 hard fat was being produced by the company at Warrington in large amounts. However when rival Lever Bros. started to produce by the same process, Crosfield took them to court, but lost the case.

Hydrogenation of unsaturated vegetable oils results in hardening by reacting with Hydrogen at c 60°c using a Nickel catalyst to speed up the process, where unsaturated double bonds are converted to saturated fatty-acids of single bonds and where all ‘spaces’ are taken up by hydrogen atoms. (2)

Why Hydrogenate fats? Well they increase shelf life, giving greater product stability, requiring less refrigeration being the right consistency to replace animal fats and also the inexpensive alternative to palm-oil.

Saturated vegetable oils are solid at room temperature and have higher melting point than unsaturated oils, and so industrially suitable for making snacks, cakes and pastries.

Basically the increase in the size of retail outlets couldn’t have happened but for the industrialisation of food in the 1920.s with its associated increase in the distance between field, production and shop and the problem of rancidification.

Manufactures thus anticipated the changes of mishandling and poor storage with more processing, freezing and additives, with Hydrogenation being a vital link.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(1) British patent 21.1.1903.

(2) Only unsaturated fats can be trans-fat or Cis. Saturated fats are never trans-fats as they have no double bonds. Natural unsaturated fatty acids have several double bonds between the adjacent carbon atoms.

References:

pinterest/Pic of tank.

warrington.photographs.co.uk/Pic of Works and Glitter.

forums-warrington-worldwide/Pic of Perfection Soap and Carbosil.

jmprotech.com.

 

4th October 1535. From Septuagint to Coverdale.

Flavius Josephus a former Zealot who went over to Rome wrote his History of the Jewish Revolt in Greek, which constituted the language of the Catholic Church until the 5th century, when Latin became the dominant language of the educated.

A thousand years later saw the printing of Miles Coverdale’s first complete version of the Bible in English finished today in 1535, which had a text which offered a dedication to Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, to be changed in the next edition after Anne’s execution.

Coverdale Bible 1535.

Going back to the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE.,  translation goes back to the Septuagint, a Greek version of the Old Testament including the Apocrypha, for the Greek speaking Jewish communities in Egypt.

The early Christian Church whose language was Greek used the Septuagint as its Bible and is still used as a standard version of the Old Testament in the Greek Church.

The earliest Bible manuscripts in book form (rectangular) as opposed to scroll were the Codex Sinaiaticus and Codex Vaticanus of the 4th century CE.

Then came St Jerome, Doctor of the Church encouraged by Pope Damasus to create a new Latin version, to counter the various translations which were circulating.

The result was the Vulgate Bible, the first Latin translation to include the Old Testament from the Hebrew, completed in about 404 CE though not to be authorised until the 1546 Council of Trent.

Though Aramaic was the lingua-franca of Israel and Greek, the Hellenistic culture had become that of educated Romans. Thus the earliest version of the New Testament was written in Greek. However Latin was eventually to become the language among educated clergy and set to be the language of the Catholic Church.

ADDENDA:

In 1888 an Arabic translation was discovered of the Diatesseron, a book which strung together quotations from the four Gospels to form a single narrative which according to the 4thc historian Eusebius was compiled by Tatian some time before 172 CE.

No copy had been found and the discovery of the text gave a definite date by which the complete text of the Gospels must have been in circulation. This confounded the late 19thc German textual scholars who said it had taken a couple of centuries for a Christian mythology to grow.

The oldest complete Latin Bible is one of three which were commissioned by Abbot Ceolfrith from an English artist for Bede’s Church at Jarrow, St Paul’s, Monkwearmouth and one a gift for Rome. Each weighed 75 lbs. and took the skin of 500 sheep to make the vellum pages.

References:

British Library, London. Pic of Coverdale Bible.

 

 

3rd October 1352. Chapel of St. Stephen.

In 1348 Edward III established a chapel of secular canons at St. Stephen’s in the Palace of Westminster.

Today in 1352 saw an order to Peter Bocher (Butcher) ‘to supply for 8lbs of suet for soldering glass windows 8d.’

Westminster in Medieval Times. St. Stephen’s Chapel is in middle with Thames at bottom.

The suet was needed for the new windows for the new St. Stephen’s Chapel at Westminster in the time of Edward III where ‘columns of Purbeck marble were elaborately coloured.’

Scenes from Old Testament from the old Chapel.

The materials used in decoration covered, ‘all manner of pigments which needed grinding and some were positively dangerous such as red and white lead and arnement-orpiment or yellow arsenic for glass painting as well as silver filings, geet’ (?jet).

The designer for windows was master glazier John de Chester paid 7 shillings a week. Stencils using tin along with 30 peacocks’ and swans’ feathers and squirrels tails for painters pencils as well as hogs’ hair for painting the windows which were also stained. Cervis (ale or wort) was ordered to wash painting tables.

Michael of Canterbury was the King’s Master Mason and his designs were said to have inspired the Gothic style of architecture. Hugh de St. Albans appeared to have been Principal Master of Painters as cited in The Precepts of Patent Rolls.

He selected assistants to work at the King’s wages from 5d to 1 shillings per day, though a John Barnaby in 1355 was paid 2 shillings a day; general wages seem to have been 8-10d; assistants grinding and tempering colours got 4 ½ d.

Money accounts for decorating and painting contains reference to a pigment extracted from cloth dyed with kermes red. Payments included 2/7d for ‘unum scarlet blanketum also 8d for pro raparatione brushorum.’

By 1363 the project was unfinished and an imperative precept was issued to all Sheriffs: ‘Know ye, that we have appointed our beloved William de Walsyngham to take so many painters in our City of London as may be sufficient for our work in St. Stephen’s Chapel and to bring them to our Palace aforesaid for our works at our wages there to remain as long as may be required… [then it gets nasty]… and to arrest all those who shall oppose or prove rebellious..and commit them to our prisons until we shall otherwise order their punishment’.

After the Reformation and Edward VI’s abolition of the Chantries in 1547 the Chapel became the Commons’ Debating Chamber which continued its configuration and one ideal for an adversarial two party system in opposition across an aisle.

One can only speculate what the consequences for a future House of Commons would have been if it had continued to meet in the octagonal Chapter House.

The screen was kept which is now the situation behind the Speaker’s Chair where the altar would have been with steps to it; still today Members bow to where the altar would have been. On voting, ‘Ayes’ lead right of the screen and ‘Nays’ to the left.

St. Stephen’s Chapel and Speaker’s House 1832.

Destruction of St. Stephen’s Chapel in 1834.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ref: Gentlemans’ Magazine Volume 160. Record of building and decorating of St. Stephen’s from extant Rolls of Account.

Ref: alamy.com/Pics.

Ref: yahcs.york.ac.uk. st-stephen’s-chapel/Top Picture.

Ref: wikipedia.org/St_Stephen’s_Chapel.

2nd October 1852. Rare Gases.

In 1904 chemist (Sir) William Ramsay born Today in 1852 was awarded the Nobel Prize for ‘the discovery of the stable gaseous elements in the air’.

Neon is used in lighting, Krypton and Zenon in camera, trigger-flashes and Radon a toxic gas which causes problems for those living near granite out-crops.

In effect Ramsay was famous for introducing a new Group O to the Periodic Table: the inert, rare or Noble Gases: Neon, Argon, Krypton, Xenon and Radon, all having eight electrons in the outer quantum shell, except for Helium, ( in 1868 it was only thought to exist in the sun), which has two. (1)

Noble Gases sealed in ampoules. e-Bay.

Ramsay in looking to solve the apparent discrepancy between the density of Nitrogen synthesised in the laboratory and that in the air, looked for unknown gases which could be in the atmosphere to account for this.

It was in 1894 that along with John William Strutt (Lord Rayleigh) he isolated Argon (nicknamed the ‘lazy-one’), owing to its lack of activity and constitutes the 3rd most common gas. It is used in incandescent lights, gas discharge lamps and in blue laser lights.(2)

The Noble Gases are Monatomic and very unreactive, all forming Diatomic molecules in their elemental state, unlike metals which in the elemental state don’t form molecules.(3)

Nobel gases have a full valence of electron of eight, are tightly bound and tend not to form bonds by acquiring or losing electrons.

One chemist linked with Ramsay in the discovery of xenon, neon and krypton, was Morris William Travers (24.1.1872)-25.8.1961) and known at the time as ’Rare-Gas-Travers’.

(1) Group O of the simplified Periodic Table.

(2) Rayleigh (12.11.1842-30.6.1919).

(3) Monatomic elements include Oxygen and Nitrogen; Water (H2O) and Carbon-Dioxide (CO2), are diatomic; a few elements are Polyatomic. Some elements are Diatomic: Hydrogen, Iodine, Fluorine, Bromine (Greek for great stench of he-goat) and the only liquid non-metal element.

Ref: e-bay.com/Pic of ampoules.

Ref: bbc.co.uk How ions form?

Ref: googleimages.com.

Ref: sciencedaily.com.