heaviside layer

On this day in 2006, with its seven-thousand-four-hundred-eighty-sixth performance Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera over took the composer and impressario’s other long-running stage piece Cats with the most iterations on Broadway in the latter’s eight-year run, twice-revived in the West End for twenty-one mostly parallel years in London. The establishing megamusical phenomenon, the piece has proved polarising and defining for the entertainment industry and arguably introduces quite a bar to entry.

the mousetrap

The murder mystery stage play by Agatha Christie debuted on this day in 1952 in London’s West End and ran continually until 16 March 2020, temporarily sidelined due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the work first presented as a radio drama as a birthday present for Queen Mary in 1947 under the title Three Blind Mice. The author had requested, due to its twist ending that theatre audiences are asked not to divulge—that the short story not be published, nor adapted as a film, until it was off the West End, a wish that has been respected all these years.

this is 2 emma toc

The call sign enunciated as above in the spelling alphabet of the day followed by “Writtle testing, Writtle testing,” was announced regularly starting on 14 February in 1922 by presenter and station manager Captain P. P. Eckerseley from a transmission tower near the Marconi laboratory outside of Chelmsford in Essex, marking the launch of the first British radio broadcaster, the first commercial station with entertainment programming. Its immediate popularity led to the establishment of its sister station—repairing from the exurbs into central London (Marconi House) as 2LO—which on 14 November 1922 became the BBC with Arthur Burrows (Uncle Arthur on the wireless) presenting news bulletins (see also). The original 2MT did not join (though its legacy lives on) the network and folding in January of 1923.

pause for station identification

Reflagged as BBC1 in 1964, the British Broadcasting Corporation launched its television service, the first regular and “high-definition” (a resolution of two hundred lines at the time) on this day in 1936. It has been continually airing programming (see also) since with the exception of a nearly seven-year hiatus during World War II, the station being taken off air with little warning just under three years later due to concerns that transmissions would act as a homing beacon for enemy aircraft and bring the fighting right to the heart of London. The final programme aired before the suspension was a Disney short (the cartoon Mickey’s Gala Premier) and reshown once transmissions returned one June day in 1946, preceded with one of the original presenters coming on the air: “Good afternoon everybody. How are you? Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh?”

les mis

Formally opening at London’s Barbican Centre on this evening in 1985 after a week of preview performances to mixed critical reception, the stage musical collaboration of Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables from Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boublil and Jean-Marc Natel—translated by Herbert Kretzmer is one of the West End’s and the world’s longest-running performance—in good company with Cats (previously) which coincidentally saw its Broadway premiere on the same day three years prior. Following the storyline of Hugo’s 1862 novel, informed and inspired by the Artful Dodger and company of street urchins’ song and dance routine in Oliver! (Twist), doggedly determined police inspector Javert (relatedly) pursues Jean Valjean for breaking parole (sentenced and having served nineteen years hard-labour for stealing a loaf of bread for his sister’s staving baby) and are carried away with a cast of characters to a Paris on the brink of revolt and revolution. 

 

ravenmaster

Via compatriot internet caretaker Nag on the Lake, we learn that troublingly the Tower of London’s resident corvids (see previously) are straying from their home, uncaptivated and driven to distraction by the lack of tourist traffic.
While lore holds that Charles II in 1675 just after the restoration of the monarchy (I wouldn’t take any chances either) first ordered the ravens to be cared for after receiving the prophesy that the crown and tower would both crumble if the birds departed, others source the mythology as a Victorian bit of whimsy, whom were rather probably more morbidly attracted to the spot in the first place due to all the executions and encouraged to remain because their scavenging habits that kept the place tidy. Whatever the case, I hope they’re not compelled to stray too far and that the crowds can return soon.

wedding of the century

Witnessed by thirty-five hundred guests, throngs of over two million Londoners lining the streets to watch the procession and a television audience of upwards of three-quarters of a billion people, the royal matrimonial ceremony of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer with all its ornate trappings and circumstance was held on this day at St. Paul’s Cathedral in 1981. The couple separated in 1992 and divorced in 1996 after fifteen years of wedlock.

eking out an existence or the best of the rest

Definitely a consolation better than the crumbs that these mice are literally, cinematically at each other’s throats over, the people’s choice award for Wildlife Photographer of the Year was captured by dint of good-timing plus a lot of patience by commuter and documentary filmmaker Sam Rowley (previously) was just announced when out of an embarrassment of quality submissions, the sponsoring organization and jury asked fans to look through the images and elevate some of the outstanding pictures that they failed to recognise. Fascinated with urban wildlife, Rowley became absorbed with the lives of the mice that inhabit, invest the London Underground, staking out this shot over the course of a week, wanting to highlight the plight of these opportunists that share our infrastructure.

style, wit and snack-sized bits

To celebrate moving into two districts in London, Soho and Spitalfields, with a long history of being forerunners in creativity and movements, a co-working space firm called Fora commissioned a fun and visually striking promotional animation on the historic character of these neighbourhoods, Via Stash magazine, Soho is featured below and check out the link above to learn more.

radishes or lettis tow bunches a peny

Inspired by gentle author’s own piece on the cries and criers of London, Spitalfields Life hosts an article from one of the trustees of the city’s Garden Society focusing on itinerant florists and green-grocers. It’s really fascinating what sort of detail about trade and the economy that one can glean from a few sparse particulars that one took a moment to notice and document (the pictured from the scrapbook of Samuel Pepys), especially how the nature of empire and imports redefine luxury goods—bringing them from expensive, exclusive shops to street markets.