Clay Lane

The Puritans said it was unfit for God-fearing men, but George I thought it fit for a King.

The Sunday before Advent is known as ‘Stir Up Sunday’, after the opening words of a Church prayer on that day. Appropriately, it is also the day for stirring up your Christmas plum pudding.

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The story of an unexpected escape through the heart of a hill.

This tale is not as far-fetched as it may sound. The hills about and the ground beneath the chapel of St John are riddled with spectacular caves and passages leading away from the church.

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In England’s brief but dismal experiment as a Republic, Playford saved traditional English dance music from destruction.

For eleven years, 17th century England experimented with being a republic. Unsurprisingly, elected politicians turned out to be just as corrupt and oppressive as unelected ones, and but for John Playford, they would have robbed us of the country’s musical heritage.

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‘Goodwill’ was on everyone’s lips, but the Roman Emperor and the God of Israel had very different ideas about it.

Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the ancient birthplace of his distant ancestor King David. He would have been born in Nazareth, had Joseph not been summoned to Bethlehem to swear loyalty to the Roman Emperor.

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The loss of the heir to the throne threw England into crisis.

William Adelin was the only male heir to the throne of his father, King Henry I. On a journey back from France in 1120, William was lost at sea, throwing the country into turmoil.

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A Victorian children’s book inspired the birth of modern electronics.

Sir Ambrose Fleming (1849-1945) was a Lancashireman who invented the vacuum-tube diode or ‘valve’, for fifty years the essential component of modern electronics.

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