This edited article about County Durham originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 705 published on 19 July 1975.

At Jarrow Bede taught children the message of the Gospel, by Peter Jackson

On September 27, 1825, a steam engine was standing on a newly-built railway line near the little Durham village of Shildon. It would have looked ridiculous to us today, for it was very small, and had a tall funnel that was quite out of proportion to the rest of its size. It looked rather like a present-day tar-boiler, and was coupled up to a string of trucks and improvised carriages.

“This is a fine engine,” said a man with a tall, shiny stovepipe hat and a green brocade waistcoat.

“Aye,” replied the friend who stood beside him. “Our Mr. Stephenson’s done a right good job!”

Suddenly a man appeared, struggling through the crowd towards the engine.

“There he is!” called the man in the stovepipe hat. “Mr. Stephenson!”

George Stephenson smiled at the excited crowd, then climbed on to the engine tender. The man in the stovepipe hat, his friend, and the rest of the assembled crowd, climbed aboard. Although tickets had only been issued to 300 people, nearly 200 more scrambled on to the train!

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This edited article about protecting and conserving Britain’s heritage originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 705 published on 19 July 1975.

Londinium as the Romans built it, by Ralph Bruce

The occupant of an earth-satellite poised in space over Britain at the right altitude, would be able to see almost at a glance, if he knew what to look out for, evidence of man’s existence here during more than 5,000 years. This would be the record of his way of life, at first agricultural and then industrial, from the time when he originally established himself and laid his ‘signature’ upon the land. From Muckle Flugga at the tip of Shetland to the granite crags of Land’s End, history and prehistory would be spread out beneath his gaze. This is what we call our heritage.

His eye would be caught by the greatest prehistoric monument within our shores, Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, the masterpiece of Stone Age Man which may have taken 1,000 years to build and was completed perhaps 3,500 years ago. Its true purpose is still not known. Not far from it, he would see the Avebury Stone Circle, the largest of its kind in all Europe, and the avenue of giant stones leading to Silbury Hill, the largest man-made mound in Europe. He would see, too, the hundreds of round and oval burial-mounds, especially in Wiltshire, marking the last resting-places of chieftains who died over 3,000 years ago.

All these are impressive relics of Stone Age and Bronze Age Man, the earliest inhabitants of Britain. The hills and ridges of Berkshire, Dorset, Derbyshire and elsewhere carry the relics of their successors. These are the great earth ramparts and ditches of the hill-forts established by Iron Age Man. They may be seen from the air, but you can see and explore them on foot. All are prehistoric sites. All were there when, in the last years B.C., the Romans arrived in Britain.

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This edited article about the Great Fire of London originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 701 published on 21 June 1975.

The Great Fire of London by Peter Jackson

It was between one and two a.m. in the morning of September 2, 1666, when the fire broke out which was to lay London in ashes. It occurred in a baker’s shop in Pudding Lane, in the City, and at first it was not taken seriously, least of all by the Lord Mayor of London, Sir Thomas Bludworth. He was annoyed at being summoned from his bed on so slight a matter. “A woman might put it out,” he exclaimed scornfully. It was this “small” fire which was to destroy 13,200 houses in four days, and render some 200,000 citizens homeless.
When the fire began, a strong north-east wind was blowing, and before daybreak, the flames had spread to the adjacent streets, consuming the ancient buildings like paper. As street after street were engulfed, the panic of the population mounted to hysterical proportions. Rich people dug pits in their gardens to store their plate or jewels. Others went out into the streets to offer huge sums for the removal of their goods by horse and cart, before joining in the mad rush for the Thames which was soon covered with boats and barges laden with people and furniture. The booksellers who were then congregated in Paternoster Row rushed their volumes, valued at £150,000 in all, into the crypt of St. Paul’s, where in a few hours they were buried beneath thousands of tons of burning ashes.

By daybreak, the fire had reached the river quays, where the conflagration spread because of the large stocks of oil, tallow, timber, spirits and other highly inflammable goods. After this, the flames drove westward along the river bank. Thousands of people had now fled to the heights of Hampstead and Highgate, from where they watched the fire consume their city.

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This edited article about Nottinghamshire originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 699 published on 7 June 1975.

Robin Hood by James E McConnell

From Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire has come one of the most stirring and romantic legends in English history – the tale of bold Robin Hood who, with his band of Merry Men, roamed the greenwood in the Middle Ages.

But did Robin ever exist? The answer, unhappily, is probably not. The jolly outlaw who made the county, its castle and vast forests famous, may be just a legend.

Ballads and poems have celebrated his daring exploits down the ages. But there are no historical records to prove he lived.

He may have been the Earl of Huntingdon, unjustly banished by bad King John, and Maid Marian may have been Count Fitzwalter’s daughter who followed him to the greenwood.

He could have been another form of the superstition of Robin Goodfellow, a kindly, woodland spirit who was supposed to haunt the forests of England.

Or he may have been just a common outlaw. There were plenty of yeomen in forests like Sherwood, forced to live as robbers after banishment. Heavy punishments were often imposed upon ordinary men for very petty crimes.

Fact or legend, Robin has always represented the yeoman’s love of freedom and hatred of tyranny. And he has made Sherwood Forest immortal.

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This edited article about Warwickshire originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 698 published on 31 May 1975.

A picture history of Kenilworth Castle, one of the great historic buildings of Warwickshire, by C L Doughty

“Up school! Up school!” “Come on, Headmaster’s House!”

Supporters of both teams stood in groups round the football pitch, loudly urging their schoolfellows on to one last effort. The match was nearly over, the players muddy and tired. And still there was no score.

The scene was Rugby School, Warwickshire’s famous public school. On the football field that day in 1823 one boy was to make sporting history. His name was William Webb Ellis.

A dozen boys crowded round the ball. A deft flick of the foot, and the ball sailed towards Ellis. “Come on Ellis, now’s your chance!” roared the boys on the side-lines. A straight kick, and the match would be won.

But William Ellis did not kick the ball. At the side of the pitch, spectators gasped in astonishment as he gathered the ball in his hands, and ran, twisting and weaving, towards the goal.

Astonishment turned quickly to anger. “Foul! Foul! Drop the ball, Ellis! Shame!” yelled the watching boys, as Ellis, the ball tucked firmly under his arm, crossed the goal line and triumphantly touched down the ball there.

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This edited article about Cumbria originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 696 published on 17 May 1975.

William Wordsworth at Dove Cottage by Harry Green

John Paul Jones, his cocked hat set firmly on his head, his sword swinging at his waist, ran up the companion way of his ship, “Ranger”, as it swept smoothly before the breeze into a quiet English harbour.

A number of British vessels were at anchor and Jones could just see them in the moonlight.

He rapped a sharp order to the gunners to prime their cannons and take aim. Suddenly, there was a succession of loud reports, and red flashes illuminated the ships gently straining at their anchors.

“Fire,” shouted Jones again. And once more the cannons boomed, their projectiles striking their targets squarely. Suddenly, as if a switch had been thrown, the ships burst into flames one by one, and the red glow lit up the guns of the shore battery.

At a command from Jones, the gunners switched their aim to the shore cannons and soon put them out of action.

By now, the whole town was aroused, and ships which had not been hit in the earlier attack began putting to sea. Realising that he was about to be very speedily outnumbered, Jones turned and ran – and peace once again returned to the quiet harbour.

Jones was an American privateer who created havoc around the coast of Britain during the American War of Independence. And this attack in 1778 was upon Whitehaven, a town upon the coast of Cumbria, a county created in April last year.

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This edited article about Cleveland originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 694 published on 3 May 1975.

George Stephenson’s successful locomotive on its inaugural run on the Stockton and Darlington railway

It was a proud day for the directors of the Stockton and Darlington Railway when George Stephenson climbed into the cab of his Locomotion No. 1, the steam engine that was to pull the first train in the world carrying passengers.

Although the coaches were little more than boxes on wheels, and the steam and smoke from the locomotive billowed over the passengers, it was an historic occasion. But before this opening on 27th September, 1825, there had been a board room battle between directors who wanted horses to pull the coaches and those who wanted to use steam.

Although steam locomotion was new and untried, the go-ahead members of the board won the day. George Stephenson, the pioneer railway engineer of his day, was appointed “motive engineer” and proudly drove the first train at a speed of about 15 miles an hour over the new track.

Since that day, railways have spread all over the world. But they had their beginning in the town of Stockton, which is in the new county of Cleveland.

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This edited article about Humberside originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 693 published on 26 April 1975.

Wilberforce watching a slave-master mistreating his slaves on the dockside in Liverpool

by C L Doughty

Turmoil filled the mind of the boy who, in the sequestered calm of his study in an ancient public school, sat at his desk writing a letter.

In his mind’s eye, the writer envisaged negroes, their bodies gleaming with sweat, packed into the filthy holds of ships sailing from Africa to America.

He saw among them the sick and the dying, and he shuddered when he thought of the bodies of the dead being tossed mercilessly to the waves by the hard-faced crew. And he knew that those that survived the journey would be set to work on the plantations of the American south.

For these were slaves being shipped to the New World by ruthless traders. And the boy who had read about them, and was writing a plaintive plea to a newspaper for their release, was William Wilberforce. Writing from his school at Pocklington, Humberside, he ended his letter with, “Will no one do anything to stop this odious traffic in human flesh?”

No one, it seemed, was willing to do very much until the boy himself grew up to become an ardent campaigner for the abolition of slavery, a campaign which continued until his death. For three days before he died, Wilberforce had the satisfaction of knowing that a Parliamentary bill, which had resulted from his political efforts, was given a second reading in the House of Commons. And in due course, it became law.

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This edited article about Yorkshire originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 692 published on 19 April 1975.

A typical townscape in the industrial heartland of Yorkshire by Andrew Howat

Yorkshire . . . biggest group of counties in Britain, heart of our great woollen trade . . . cornerstone of all things British . . . wild country, rolling seas, heavy industry – and cricket.

No area languishing in the past is this. For high over the bleak moors towers the missile warning station of Fylingdales, built above rocky coast and sea. In the event of a nuclear attack on Britain, this up-to-the-minute radar station would flash an early warning of the nation’s peril to all our defence bases.

In no other area could you find a remote enough spot for Britain’s closely-guarded warning station. Yet, by contrast, Yorkshire is chiefly known as the throbbing, humming hive of British industry, where for centuries thousands of Yorkshiremen have woven wool and hewn coal to keep us warm.

Most of the industry is crowded into hilly West Yorkshire, formerly called the West Riding, where chains of industrial towns scar the countryside. The original county was so big – more than three million acres – that it was divided into three Ridings – from the old English ryding, meaning a clearing. Since April, last year, it has become the separate counties of North, West and South Yorkshire. Other parts are Humberside and Cleveland, which includes a portion of what was formerly Northumberland.

In the days when the Romans ruled Britain, the wool trade of the world was centred on Yorkshire’s lonely West Riding. Celtic tribes pastured their herds of short-haired sheep on the green slopes of the Pennine hills and wove cloth from the wool on rough handlooms in their huts.

The many streams of soft water flowing down the hillsides helped in the process of cleaning and softening the wool for spinning and weaving.

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This edited article about St Paul’s Cathedral originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 691 published on 12 April 1975.

Sir Christopher Wren watches as the huge golden cross is placed on the top of St Paul’s Cathedral, by Peter Jackson

At the top of Ludgate Hill in the middle of the City of London, stands the architectural masterpiece of Sir Christopher Wren.

This magnificent domed building, called St. Paul’s Cathedral, was erected to Wren’s designs during the years from 1673 to 1711.

Wren had already submitted two other designs before the Church Commissioners finally accepted his third design, which was a compromise between the architect’s insistence on a Classical cathedral with a dome, and the clergy’s preference for a cross-shaped plan.

A great Gothic cathedral once stood on the site of the present building. This, the Old St. Paul’s, was one of England’s largest and finest Gothic buildings.

In September of 1666 it was almost completely destroyed by the Great Fire Of London, and it was then that Wren submitted his first design for the replacement cathedral.

In his later years, the great architect would love to visit the building and spend hours standing inside looking up at the great dome he had designed, and on which are the paintings by Sir James Thornhill.

Above is the climb to the Whispering Gallery, which picks up a whisper from the other side of the dome, then to the Stone Gallery, giving a view out across the city, and higher to the Golden Gallery at the top of the dome and finally into the Golden Ball.

The crypt of St. Paul’s is so large it is almost a cathedral in itself. It contains massive tombs of Nelson and Wellington, including Wellington’s 18-ton funeral carriage.

One monument which survived the Great Fire, was the monument to John Donne, built in the year of the great poet’s death, 1631, and re-erected in St. Paul’s.

In recent years the exterior has been cleaned of two and a half centuries of soot, revealing the beautiful carved decoration by Francis Bird, Edward Pierce, Caius Gabriel Cibber and Grinling Gibbons.