What's historical in your area?

[Starchild]

Norwich. It had a thousand years to do something and ends up the place where a virgin is defined as a girl that can outrun her brothers.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Starchild
Norwich. It had a thousand years to do something and ends up the place where a virgin is defined as a girl that can outrun her brothers.

But the cathedral was made out of bread and beer.

At least, that's what the workers were paid in.

[Cort Haus]

The railways in Camden, London.

I'll start with the Roundhouse in Chalk Farm, over the road from my home.

This magnificent Grade II* listed building, was originally built in 1846 as an engine shed and is recognised as an outstanding example of mid-19th century architecture, particularly its innovative use of cast and wrought iron to support the slate roof. Its elegant and robust detailing and internal size are all historically significant.

Its use as a steam engine repair shed didn't last long due to rapid technology advances and soon the Roundhouse was being used as a bonded warehouse by Gilbey's Gin. Then in 1964 playwright Arnold Wesker established Centre 42 at the Roundhouse, named after the trade union movement Article 42 stating that arts should be for everyone. This provided the stage for a legendary, cutting edge performing arts venue. Some of the most memorable theatrical performances in the '60s and '70s were staged here. Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, Peter Brook and The Living Theatre of New York all performed at the Roundhouse during this period.

http://www.roundhouse.org.uk/about/history

David Bowie did a career-defining gig here, and The Doors, Led Zeppelin, Ramones, The Clash, Patti Smith and The Stranglers all played here. The Stranglers live album X-Cert was in part recorded there.

The Gin phase:


Under reconstruction in 2005:


Can't find a contemporary picture - maybe I should go out and take one.

Much of what follows is from memory with a few dates and details looked up. I apologise for any innacuracies, but it's more loving than a cut & paste.

The original London-to-Birmingham railway terminated here until it was extended down to Euston, where the station was opened in 1837. It was the first of five stations to be opened on or nearby what was originally called the New Road when it was built in the mid 1700's. This road, running West-to-East to the North of central London became a spine of new development as the city grew and the policy was to let the railway lines to the North, the Midlands and the West of England come as far as the New Road and no further..

Because the railway had to go over the newly-built Regent's Canal then under Hampstead Road, there were problems with the gradient which was too steep for the early locomotives to manage, so a steam winching-engine was built at Chalk Farm to pull the passenger coaches up. This actually became a landmark and a tourist attraction in itself, with a Pub advertising views of the winch-engine buildings.

In 1852 Kings Cross Station was opened a few hundred yards east of Euston. This served the Great Northern Railway, and in 1857 the Midland Railway terminal of St Pancras Station was opened immediately to the West of Kings Cross.

The line out of St Pancras was not without problems either, as it went through the site of St Pancras cemetery, and required hundreds of graves, coffins and bodies to be removed and relocated. Dozens of gravestones were stacked up against a tree, where they remain today, with the roots growing all round them like a scene from a gothic horror film. The man responsible for this was a Mr Thomas Hardy, who would later become the famous novelist. Another item of note in whats left of the cemetery is a mausoleum with a feature designed by the famous architect George Gilbert-Scott which is said to have been the basis of the design for the top of the famous British red public phone box.

A more recent claim-to-fame for the churchyard are the railings through which the Beatles were photographed for the inside gatefold sleeve of the Red and Blue albums.

At the front of St Pancras Station was built the Midland Grand Hotel, a neo-gothic palace designed by Gilbert Scott using a plan originally intended for the Foreign Office. It was ludicrously expensive, and closed in 1935, but is currently being refurbished. In Douglas Adams' 'Long Dark Teatime of the Soul' it was the temporally-relocated Valhalla of the Gods - who in modern times were the tramps who hung around the area.



The interior of the station, when built, featured the largest span of its day, 245 ft, and 105ft high. To get over the canal a bridge was used but the station was raised 17 ft above street level.

Hydraulic lifts were built to take whole wagons down to the vast storage areas beneath, wher the pillars that hold up the platform level are so placed as to economically encompass barrels of beer from Burton. The station was, and is, a remarkable feat of engineering

John Richardson. A history of Camden

Although the area suffered from the grim industrialism of the railways and their goods yards, the meeting of the railway and canal at Camden was to define its role both as a storage area for wine and gin, and a production centre for pianos. Although the dirt, soot and noise caused blight in the age of steam the goods yards would eventually become the thriving Camden Market of today, which linked to the vibrant nightlife which developed, eventually made the area a major tourist attraction in the late 20th and early 21st century and, no doubt, beyond.

[Caligastia]

Thomas Edison lived here for a while...

[Cort Haus]

Wernazuma, don't you have a football team, Sturm Graz? Do they have an interesting history?

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Dauphin

Edith Nesbit

Wasn't she the architect of the famous Nesbit move in the famous game of Mornington Crescent?

That links us nicely to the railways of Camden, as Mornington Crescent is one of the Underground (tube/metro/subway) stations, on the Northern Line, in Camden.

[Dis]

actually, historical in my town is some casino from the 50's or 60's

[Will9]

Evansville, Indiana.

There is a an old Indian mound site called Angel Mounds.

There is sign slightly to the east of Evansville on the river marking the only Civil War battle that had no shots fired.

[notyoueither]

We are a city because it was a good place to beat on beavers, or at least gather to trade their fur.

A little later we got picked by a Liberal PM and Victoria to be the capital of a new province. Suck that, Calgary!

Still more later many of the pilots in the BoB and later trained here, and local factories turned out hella lot of airplanes. Calgary was still sucking.

A bit more later and one of those damn beavers dug a bit too deep and black, icky stuff started bubbling up out of the ground. The sucking in Calgary increased.

Lately we've been the centre of development for some of the largest petroleum reserves to ever excite a Texan. Our greatness was imortalised by the building of the world's then largest shopping mall. Since Calgary couldn't manage even so meagre a feat, that city still sucks!

I should mention that a large part of the history of Edmonton involves a rivalry with a small town south of here named Calgary. It should go without saying that any town named Calgary sucks.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
Wernazuma, don't you have a football team, Sturm Graz? Do they have an interesting history?

Cort Haus: We have two football teams, and Sturm Graz is a piece of ****.
The other team, of course the older one, is the GAK - or maybe I should say was, because our stupid board ****ed up, we invested too much to win a championship (which we did in 2004), so we went bankrupt (with arrangement) this year and lost our licence, having to start from league 3 again.
Sturm also went bankrupt this year, there was even big scale fraudulence scandal of their president involved, but they managed it much better so they stay in league 1...
Really, the historically most interresting about Sturm is that president, Hannes Kartnig, a super arrogant fraud who got through with everything he did for many years because he was simply so offensive and rhetorically belligerent that he was little contested.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Caligastia
Thomas Edison lived here for a while...

Which reminds me that Johannes Kepler worked in Graz before the Habsburgs went anti-reformation crazy.

[Maquiladora]

To quote a site promoting my home town:

Having lived the larger part of my life in Rotherham I am of the opinion that it is a pretty boring place. I suspect that most of the people over most of the centuries that Rotherham has been inhabited would probably agree with me. From the poor Stone Age sods who chipped their flints on Canklow Hill to the present day youth who get their rocks off in quite different ways I somehow think that Rotherham has never been a centre for La Dolce Vita. Correct me if I'm wrong, even if you have to use a planchette rather than a PC. I dare you.

With that in mind, there is one 30m high folly very close to where I used to live called Hoober Stand.



Written on it:

This Pyramidal Building was Erected
by his Majestys most Dutyfull Subject
THOMAS Marquess of Rockingham Etc.
In Grateful Respect to the Preserver of our Religion
Laws and Libertys
KING GEORGE The Second
Who by the blessing of God having subdued a most Unnatural Rebellion
In Britain Anno 1746
Maintains the Ballance of Power and Settles
A Just and Honourable Peace in Europe
1748

In other words:

Hoober was built to celebrate the battle of Culloden where its builder, Thomas Watson, later to become 1st Marquess of Rockingham, found himself on Wednesday April 16th 1746. It was there that British troops, in what can only be described as a savage and inhumane manner, crushed a Jacobite uprising in a battle that lasted for only one hour, yet saw British troops roaming the countryside for days after, killing anyone who stood in their way.

It's about an hours walk from where I used to live, and could actually see it from the upstairs windows. I used to walk up there in the summer when I was a kid, what I can only think was out of boredom.

[Saras]

I'm now in Palanga. In it is the Birute hill and a nice surrounding park, where the second wife of our pagan Grand Duke Kestutis, Birute (also mother of Grand Duke Vytautas the Great, victor of Tannenberg battle) , is buried.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birut%C4%97

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palanga

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


Wasn't she the architect of the famous Nesbit move in the famous game of Mornington Crescent?

That links us nicely to the railways of Camden, as Mornington Crescent is one of the Underground (tube/metro/subway) stations, on the Northern Line, in Camden.

I do recall something about 'Railway Children'....

[PLATO]

Franklin Tennessee has an interesting history for sure. One of the most notable buildings is the Masonic Lodge. This structure has the designation of being the 1st 3 story building constructed west of the Allegheny Mountains. Here is a breif history of some of the events that have happened there and of the building itself:

Franklin's Masonic Lodge is a building of many firsts. Hiram Lodge No. 7, founded in Franklin in 1809, was first affiliated with the parent Lodge No. 55 in North Carolina. The local Lodge surrendered its North Carolina charter when the Grand Lodge of Tennessee was constituted in 1813 and received its present charter in 1815. In 1817 the Masons of Franklin organized the first legal lottery in Tennessee to fund the construction of a Masonic Hall. The three-story temple, completed in 1823, was the tallest building west of the Allegheny Mountains. Hiram Lodge No. 7 has met in the Masonic Hall since its completion, making it one of the oldest continuous lodges in the same location in the United States.

In addition to the temple's long Masonic history, it has been the site of many important religious, political, and social events. In 1830 James H. Otey, later the first Episcopal bishop of Tennessee, organized St. Paul's, the state's first Episcopal Church, at the Masonic Hall. On December 7, 1830, noted religious reformer Alexander Campbell preached in the hall and planted the seeds for the Church of Christ, which continued to meet on the site until the congregation completed the construction of a house of worship on Fourth Avenue in 1852. United States Commissioners John H. Eaton and John Coffee accompanied President Andrew Jackson to meet in council with the Chickasaw delegation in 1830 to negotiate the sale of Indian lands, marking the first time a U.S. president had personally participated in treaty negotiations. During the Civil War Confederate spies climbed to the roof to observe troop movements at Fort Granger, a Federal post across the river on Figuers's Bluff. After the battle of Franklin on November 30, 1864, the hall served as a hospital for wounded Union soldiers.