Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷

Ex-health librarian relaxed & reading loads of local and Medieval history. Volunteer Curator of Thorney Heritage Museum. Tour Guide. Cheese lover. Beekeeper

[The Huguenot Society @HuguenotSociety]

The Huguenot Society of Great Britain and Ireland would like to wish everyone a peaceful and prosperous New Year.
##twitterstorians #huguenots

[Yorkshire Tea @YorkshireTea]

Happy 2024! May your kettle boil swiftly and your biscuit tin always be full.

[SaveOurSuffolkSwifts @SoSSwifts]

This roof had Swifts nesting under the bottom row of tiles, but leaked. It has now been repaired but the bottom roof batten has been trimmed to maintain the Swifts access, and in many more locations to provide space to boost this colony’s population.

[Reforest Britain @ReforestB]

Luton Orchards is asking residents to uncover the town's fruit-growing history and map where fruit trees remain today in a citizen science project.

They believe only 10% of Luton's historic orchards remain - 15 out of the 150 orchards that once existed

https://t.co/tpf11qPw0c

[Jim Pickard 🐋 @PickardJE]

BREAKING:

Vote Leave has dropped its appeal against the Electoral Commission, the elections watchdog has announced

[Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷 @dot_thorney]

@pborocathedral

[WinnieTheShit /// @WeRtheMods]

I once had to go to Peterborough to get a same day passport. While waiting I walked about and found the Cathedral. I hadnt realised Catherine of Aragon was buried there. Her grave was covered in pomegranates and messages from a school trip. She was instrumental in the right of education for girls. I like her.

[St George's Hydrotherapy Users @pbhydro_users]

Dear @PeterboroughCC @CllrChrisHarper @docshab @christian_138 @NicolaDay78 @CllrJulieS @Cllrfitzgerald @paulbristow79 @andrewpakes_
A succinct explanation of the importance of pools ⬇️ So many of #Peterborough's residents are now in desperate need. We need to do all we can 🙏🏼

[Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷 @dot_thorney]

@bwallower El Greco's View of Toledo (loved by @Alan_Measles too, according to his tweet

[Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷 @dot_thorney]

@Bob_Gann @TravelscribeUK I hope you feel better soon, Bob

[Jay Rayner @jayrayner1]

Because nothing says Christmas better than a Boursin Christmas tree with almonds and pomegranate seeds. And yes I did Nick this idea off an Instagram reel. Have a good one, people.

[Toby Wood @TobyWoody]

A poem for Christmas Eve on the day that some of the lights went out in Oxney Road, Peterborough
@sainsburys

[Chocoholics anonymous 🍫 @SendThorntons]

Plz share the heck out of the #JoinIn ,be sure all ur follower know about it ,not everyone who looks fine is fine, there be ALOT of people seriously struggling behind a painted smile ...share share share

Lets get it trending so vulnerable people see it !!!!!

[Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷 @dot_thorney]

@TobyWoody @PTdavidlowndes2 @NYCES_ @peterboroughtel A stopping off point on the way to Thorney?

[Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷 @dot_thorney]

@SophiaEasey

[Dr Julia Grace Patterson💙 @JujuliaGrace]

This is what our Christmas cake looks like.

This is what happens when a 6 and 7 year old take charge!! 🥰🤣🎄

[Dr Lacey Bonar Hull @LaceyBonarHull]

A medieval Christmas hedgehog for your Christmas Eve 🎄🦔

This little guy dates from around 1302 and can be found in Verdun, Bibliothèque Municipale MS 107, fol. 8

[Northern Soul @Northern_Soul_]

It's time for this absolute classic - Angel of the Morph.
@AmazingMorph

[Peterborough Women's History Group @PboroWomensHist]

The real Mrs Christmas was a suffragette from Peterborough, you heard it here first!

A blog from @beautifulpen https://t.co/jJDjAgFJcK

[Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷 @dot_thorney]

@SueLaceybryant We had ours yesterday. Our Rutter was "Angel Tidings" but we enjoyed it all. New for us : "Born today is the Son of God", based on an African chant. I love that I can enjoy something free in the village and us has benefits for others as well (I'm told)

[Mark Stephens @MarksLarks]

A short story about decisions.

[Dot Halfhide 💙 🌷 @dot_thorney]

@octaviahillBH

[Lily Craven @TheAttagirls]

Woman of the Day social reformer and social worker Octavia Hill born OTD 1838 in Wisbech, who pioneered the development of social housing and co-founded the precursor to the National Trust. Her determination to provide community space, community halls and well-maintained, attractive housing to the poor anticipated the fundamental basis of town planning by some fifteen years.

Octavia started working at 14. Her father had been made bankrupt and her mother managed a socialist cooperative in London, the Ladies Guild, where Octavia was placed in charge of a workroom for girls. It had a profound effect on her. She had never seen such poverty before.

Slum housing in London in those days was notorious for its shoddy and hazardous condition. Slum landlords could only lease land for 21 years so their buildings were hastily erected, had no real foundations, had walls that were just half a-brick thick, and were so unstable that they would often collapse, usually with fatal consequences.

Octavia rolled up her sleeves and tackled the problem of slum housing in quite a different way to anyone else at the time. In 1864, she persuaded John Ruskin to buy three dilapidated properties, renovated them to a good standard and found tenants from the most deprived areas, taking them under her wing. She then used the rents to buy other neglected and decaying properties in London, overhauling them and transforming their tenants’ lives.

Her principle was: "Where a man persistently refuses to exert himself, external help is worse than useless”. Octavia encouraged her tenants to take personal responsibility. Arrears were dealt with promptly but in return, she appointed reliable caretakers and kept on top of repairs and improvements. Families were carefully placed so that they were never in overcrowded conditions and she made no rules that could not be properly enforced.

Within ten years, Octavia was managing the tenancies of about 3,000 people. She preferred to employ women as rent collectors. Women were more successful at keeping arrears in check but they also acted as early social workers, spotting problems and encouraging families to be self-reliant.

She was not a supporter of women’s suffrage but she helped Barbara Bodichon to campaign for the Married Women’s Property Act, which allowed any money earned by a married woman to be treated as her own property, and not her husband's.

It was widely believed that Octavia would have been the first woman member of a Royal Commission if she hadn’t had such a forthright and forceful personality. After meeting her for the first time, the Bishop of London said: “She spoke for half an hour…I never had such a beating in all my life." William Gladstone approved of her principles but thought her “too difficult”. (Does that sound familiar?)

Octavia founded the charity that later became Family Action, which in turn, set up Citizens Advice Bureaux. She was dedicated to making green open spaces easily available to poor people, helping to save Hampstead Heath and many woodlands.

“We all need space; unless we have it we cannot reach that sense of quiet in which whispers of better things come to us.”