John O

middle aged mid life crisis?...what crisis? and over middle age too as theres not many people living that are twice as old as me.

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

The oldest roads ever found on earth are British. 🇬🇧

Rome gets the credit for roads.

But Britain had roads before Egypt had pyramids.🇬🇧

In 1970, a man named Ray Sweet was cutting peat in the Somerset Levels.

His spade hit wood.

Oak planks. Laid end to end across the marsh.

He'd just found the oldest road on earth.

Archaeologists dated the timber precisely — matching the growth rings against thousands of years of climate records.

3807 BC.

Nearly six thousand years old.

Beside it, buried in the same peat, they found a jade axe.

Not from Somerset. Not even from Britain.

From the Alps.

These people were trading across Europe six thousand years ago.

For decades, the Sweet Track was known as the oldest road ever found.

Then in 2009, archaeologists were digging next to Belmarsh Prison in London.

Four and a half metres underground.

They found timber.

Another road. Built in 4100 BC.

Three hundred years older still.

The pyramids weren't built until 2560 BC.

Britain's roads are older by more than a thousand years.

Our people. 🇬🇧

Who looked at the problem.

And solved it.

Six thousand years ago.

Did they teach you that?

Together we keep our history alive. 🇬🇧 https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf
Be part of us.

Be Proud Of Us.🇬🇧

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

The Queen banned them. 50,000 people rioted anyway. 🍞👑

In 1592 Queen Elizabeth I banned the sale of spiced buns. You could only buy one on Good Friday. Christmas. Or at a funeral.

So every Good Friday the Chelsea Bun House opened at 3 in the morning. And the crowds came. George II came. George III came. Queen Charlotte turned up and gave the baker a silver mug containing five guineas as a thank you. 👑

In 1792 the crowd got so out of hand that the baker Mrs Hand publicly announced there would be NO hot cross buns the following year.

She changed her mind.

In 1839, the last year of the Bun House, they sold 240,000 hot cross buns. In one day. 🇬🇧

The nursery rhyme dates to 1733. You are still eating them today.

This channel exists because people like you chose to make it happen. Thousands of stories like this one are waiting to be told. Battles won. Names forgotten. History that belongs to all of us but gets told to none of us.

If you want to be part of keeping it alive: https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf

Be Part Of Us.

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🇬🇧 Before 1830, nobody had a lawn.

The rich had their grass cut by scythemen. Ordinary people had no garden worth speaking of.

Edwin Budding was an engineer in Stroud, Gloucestershire. Working in a textile mill, he noticed a machine using a cutting cylinder to trim the surface of cloth.

He looked at it.

And thought about grass.

He built a machine with a cutting cylinder mounted on a wheeled frame. Then pushed it across his garden at midnight. At midnight. So the neighbours wouldn't see.

It worked.

He patented it in August 1830.

Within twenty years the Victorian suburb was born. The striped lawn. The neat garden. The Sunday morning ritual.

Every suburban garden in America. Every cricket ground. Every football pitch. Every golf course on earth.

Traces back to one man. In Stroud. With a cloth machine. At midnight.

Right now, somewhere in the world, someone is cutting their grass. And they have no idea who Edwin Budding was.

Help us share more of our history:
https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf

Be Part Of Us.

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🇬🇧 In the second half of the eighteenth century, something happened in Scotland.

A country of one and a half million people.

Produced ideas that changed the entire world.

In one generation.

Adam Smith. He wrote The Wealth of Nations in 1776. He invented economics.

David Hume. He asked the question nobody had dared ask. How do we actually know anything? His answer changed philosophy forever.

James Watt. Walking across Glasgow Green, the idea came to him. A separate condenser. It made the steam engine practical. And started the Industrial Revolution.

Joseph Black. He discovered latent heat. The principle that made refrigeration, steam power and thermodynamics possible.

James Hutton. He looked at the rocks at Siccar Point. And understood the earth was unimaginably old. He invented geology.

These men knew each other. They argued in the same taverns. Walked the same streets.

In one generation, one small country invented economics, philosophy, geology, thermodynamics and the steam engine.

The modern world runs on what they built. 🇬🇧

This is your history.

Help us keep it alive. 👇

Be Part Of Us 👉 https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf 🙏

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🇬🇧 The last time a foreign army invaded Britain, a Welsh cobbler sent them home.

With a pitchfork. 🍴

Her name was Jemima Nicholas.

Born in Mathry, Pembrokeshire. 1755. A cobbler. Not a soldier. Not a general.

On the 22nd of February 1797, four French warships anchored off the Welsh coast. 🚢 1,400 soldiers came ashore at Carreg Wastad Point. Many of them were convicts and deserters. Their plan was to march on Bristol, start a revolution and inspire the British poor to rise up.

It did not go to plan.

A ship had recently wrecked nearby. Its cargo was Portuguese wine. 🍷 The French found it. Within hours, the invasion force was drunk.

Jemima heard what was happening.

She reached for her pitchfork. And walked out to meet them. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

She found twelve French soldiers. They were drunk. She rounded them up, marched them to the church, and locked the door.

She wasn't the only one.

Hundreds of Welsh women came out of their homes in their traditional red shawls and tall black hats. 🟥 From a distance, after a glass or two of Portuguese wine, they looked exactly like British Redcoats.

On the 24th of February, two days after they landed, 1,400 French soldiers surrendered. ⚖️

Unconditionally.

The surrender was signed in a pub.

It was the last time a foreign army set foot on British soil. 🇬🇧

Jemima Nicholas was awarded a pension of £50 a year for the rest of her life. She died in 1832. Her gravestone reads:

"The Welsh heroine who boldly marched to meet the French invaders who landed on our shores."

Did they teach you her name? 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

Jemima Nicholas was almost forgotten forever.

So were thousands of others.

Every time you support this channel,
more of them survive.

Be Part Of Us.

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

https://t.co/wN9S2gRmFj

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

🇬🇧 Magna Carta had a twin.

It was law for 754 years.

You've never heard of it.

After 1066, the Normans claimed the forests of England. Not just the trees...

Villages, farmland, rivers. One third of the country. Land ordinary people had farmed for centuries. Taken.

Hunt a deer to feed your family? They blinded you.

Cut down a tree to heat your home? They took your hands.

1215. The barons forced King John to sign Magna Carta. The most famous document in English history.

But Magna Carta was for the barons. Not for the people in the forests.

Two years later. 1217.

A second charter was sealed. The Charter of the Forest.

This one was for everyone.

The right to gather firewood. The right to graze your animals. The right to fish the streams. No more blinding. No more mutilation. For gathering wood.

For the first time in English law, ordinary people had rights to the land. Not given by the king. Taken from him.
754 years. It was law until 1971.

Every common in England. Every village green. Every right of way.

The idea that land belongs to everyone... It started here. 🇬🇧

They taught you Magna Carta.

They never taught you this.

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

They don’t teach you about Frank Whittle in school 🇬🇧

A working-class boy from Coventry. Too short for the RAF. Applied under a false name and got in.

Invented the jet engine at 21. Britain ignored him. His patent lapsed because he couldn’t afford £5. Germany picked it up and flew first.

Every aircraft on earth flies because of him ✈️

This is what British pride looks like. Not empires. Not kings. Ordinary people who changed the world and got forgotten.

We find them. We bring them back.🇬🇧🫡
👉 https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

🇬🇧 The British government let a million people starve to death.

Called it God's judgement.

A fungus destroyed the potato crop across Ireland. For most of the country, potatoes were all they had. Within a year, entire villages were dying.

The man in charge was Charles Trevelyan. He didn't see a disaster. He saw an opportunity. He said the famine would "reform the Irish character." He closed the food depots.

Four thousand ships carried food OUT of Ireland. Under armed guard.

The government spent £7 million on relief. Sounds generous. Half of it was loans. To the starving.

Trevelyan got a knighthood.

A million died. Another million left on ships and never came back. Ireland's population halved. It has never recovered.

That's the story everyone knows. Here's the bit they never teach you.

On the first of January 1847, a banker opened his London home, invited the richest men in Britain to his table, and told them to give. They founded the British Relief Association. And opened the doors to everyone.
Railway companies offered free trains to carry the food. Then ordinary people started giving.

Railway workers in Wales pooled their wages. Day labourers in Cumbria passed round a collection pot. Convicts on a prison ship scraped together their pennies. Women in a refuge stopped eating so they could donate.

Congregations of every faith: Presbyterian, Catholic, Jewish, Hindu. Emptied their pockets.

Half a million pounds. In today's money, nearly £70 million. Not from the government. From the British people. Bankers. Railway workers. Convicts. Women who skipped meals to donate.

It dwarfed every other charity on earth. Two hundred thousand children fed every day for eight months.

The Choctaw Nation. 16 years after the Trail of Tears, still rebuilding, still poor. They sent $170. Because they knew what hunger felt like.

The government looked at Ireland and saw God's judgement. Ordinary British people looked at Ireland and saw their neighbours.

The government failed Ireland. The people didn't.

No one made them. That's just what we do.

Your support keeps their story alive.

Be part of us: https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf 🙏

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

For a thousand years, the Bible existed in England. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿✝️

But only in Latin.

Ordinary people weren't allowed to read it.

The Church said only the Church could speak to God.

William Tyndale thought that was wrong.

Oxford-educated. Spoke eight languages.

He told a clergyman: I will cause the boy that drives the plough to know more scripture than you.

He asked the Bishop of London for permission to translate.

Refused.

So he left England. He never came back.

In Germany, he translated alone. In hiding. Moving city to city.

In 1526, the first copies reached England. Smuggled in bales of cloth.

The Church burned every copy it could find.

He printed more.

The Bishop of London bought copies just to burn them.

Tyndale used the money to print better editions.

He was betrayed. Arrested in Antwerp. Imprisoned in Vilvoorde Castle for eighteen months.

In October 1536, they strangled him at the stake. Then burned his body.

His last words: Lord, open the King of England's eyes.
Within three years, Henry ordered an English Bible in every church.

It was largely Tyndale's translation.

When the King James Bible was published in 1611, eighty-four percent of the New Testament was Tyndale's work.

Let there be light. The salt of the earth. The spirit is willing. A moment in time. The powers that be.

Phrases you use every day.

Written by a man they killed for writing them.

They didn't teach you his name.

He wanted a ploughboy to read.

We want a nation to remember.

Be part of us: https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf 🙏

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

[Proudofus.uk @ProudofusUK]

Every football club on earth exists because of this island. 🇬🇧

Kings banned it. The richest schools in England claimed it. They wrote the rules and locked the gates.

Then the working class stole it back.

In 1850, Parliament passed the Factory Act. Work stopped at two on a Saturday. Working men had free time. And they chose football.

Churches formed clubs to keep men out of pubs: Aston Villa, Bolton, Everton.

Factories formed teams from their own workers: West Ham from the Thames Ironworks, Arsenal from a munitions factory.

The FA Cup Final. Blackburn Olympic: weavers, spinners, a plumber. They beat the Old Etonians 2-1. No private school team ever reached the final again.

Then British workers carried it everywhere they went ⚽🌍

Scottish miners in Spain founded its oldest club. A Nottingham lace trader gave Juventus their black and white stripes.
A butcher's son from the same city founded AC Milan. British railway workers in Uruguay named their team after Stephenson's Rocket.
Cornish miners founded Mexico's first football club. A schoolteacher from Kent taught the game to his students in Argentina. His school produced Lionel Messi.
A boy from Southampton brought two footballs to Brazil. They call him the father of Brazilian football.
Real Madrid are said to wear white because of an English amateur team.

From Lancashire cotton mills to every continent on earth.

Three and a half billion people watch football. The most popular sport ever created. And it was created here. By the British people.

Every Saturday, three o'clock. That kickoff time exists because of the Factory Act of 1850. The moment working men were given an afternoon off.

They chose football. And the world followed.

No owners. No sponsors. Just supporters.

Be part of us. 👉 https://t.co/rih7iKwnvf 🙏

Be Proud Of Us. 🇬🇧

[TV Football 1968-92 @1968Tv]

With football invented in 1992. For all those who love the Premier League.
Here are the top 15 clubs, with the most points collected in the Premier League years.
#PremierLeague

[John O @joliv1202]

@Matt_Pinner Clean sweep, all 20.

[John O @joliv1202]

@daveatherton Did that same thing yesterday whilst out walking the dog.

[John O @joliv1202]

@Utdbrizzy Went down like he'd been shot..

[John O @joliv1202]

@ColinSpenc4257 Crackling…

[John O @joliv1202]

@TheRealJamieKay Just needs baked beans in the mince as well….

[HLTCO @HLTCO]

Fantastic from Brighton, this. A massively important message delivered very well.

[John O @joliv1202]

@DYSONlife4real 101 wanks

[John O @joliv1202]

@Matt_Pinner 64 none…still waiting @Matt_Pinner ?

[John O @joliv1202]

@DYSONlife4real Yup, who are you?