Posts by Geri Walton
The History of Goody Two-Shoes
The History of Goody Two-Shoes (with or without a hyphen) was a children’s story written anonymously in 1765, published by John Newbery, and a variation of the story of Cinderella. Goody Two-Shoes was the nickname of a poor orphan named Margery Meanwell who goes through life with one shoe until a rich gentleman gives her…
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The Executioner’s Rope of the 1700 and 1800s
The executioner’s rope of the 1700 and 1800s was one the hangman’s most important tools as no hanging could be accomplished without it. All executioners relied on a good rope, chief among them was William Marwood. He was known for having developed the hanging technique known as the “long drop.” It ensured a prisoner’s neck…
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Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey
Before Jane Austen published Sense and Sensibility, her father had tried to get her book Susan (the original version of Northanger Abbey) published. He failed and then her brother Henry took over and through his business partner, William Seymour, who was also a lawyer, it was sold to a London publisher, Crosby & Company. Austen…
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The boy Jones Who Broke into Buckingham Palace
Edward Jones was nicknamed “the boy Jones” by newspapers and became notorious for breaking into Buckingham Palace multiple times between 1838 and 1841. His first break-in occurred in 1838 when he entered disguised as a chimney sweep having gained admission by squeezing through a hole in the March Arch at the principal entrance of the…
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Three Paris Gardens in the late 1700 and early 1800s
Paris has always been a city of many types of public recreations. Among these recreational places were three Paris gardens in the late 1700 and early 1800s that were more popular than others. These gardens — Tuileries Garden (Jardin des Tuileries), the Garden of the Plants (Jardin des Plantes), and the Garden at the Palais-Royal…
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How Napoleon Controlled His Image
It is interesting how Napoleon controlled his image to become a “master of spin.” He realized that to gain power and to stay in power, his popularity depended not only on his ability to achieve military success but also on his ability to ensure that he was politically popular with French citizens too. One way…
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The Cold or Catarrh in the Late 1800s
Many doctors of the late 1800s wrote about and investigated the cold, or at it was often called, catarrh. Nineteenth-century doctors also had advice about the best ways to avoid or prevent a cold. Of course, that was not always possible and so when a cold happened, doctors and even quacks wanted to cure it…
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Nice’s Promenade des Anglais or the Avenue of the English in the 1800s
First called the Camin deis Anglés (the English Way) by the Niçois, it was rechristened Promenade des Anglais or the Avenue of the English in 1860. Its origins began in the eighteenth century when rich English aristocrats began to winter in Nice for their health. Water cures were popular at the time and people thought…
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Fans Related to Napoleon
The popularity of fans coincided with Napoleon’s popularity of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. In fact, there were numerous fans related to Napoleon, and in France, “of the two hundred engravings deposited in the Biblothéque Nationale in … [1796] a hundred and fourteen were fan-designs mostly in praise of Napoleon.”[1] These fans also…
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Frances Nelson the Wife of Horatio Nelson
Frances “Fanny” Herbert Woolward was born on the small prosperous Caribbean island of Nevis that functioned under a slave economy on its sugar estates. Her parents were members of the colonial elite: Her mother, Mary Herbert, died while she was a child, and, her father, William Woolward, died of tetanus in February 1779.
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