When I was 15 I got my first proper job in the local fish and chip shop. With my Record of Achievement and newly minted National Insurance card I was interviewed and given a job that paid better than my daily newspaper round. Donning blue and white shirt and paper hat, I scooped chips and… Continue reading Smelling the Victorian chippy
I recently stumbled on this photograph of Henrietta Barnett in her Hampstead Heath office. I love it. Having previously thought about her husband, Samuel’s study, it is wonderful to challenge the idea that such spaces were the prerogative of men. This photograph somewhat jars with the more feminine image conveyed by Samuel Barnett’s account of… Continue reading At home in the Office
I spent this weekend working on my conference paper for ‘Devouring: Food, Drink and the Written Word, 1880-1945‘. I decided that it was time to go through the Annual Reports of Toynbee Hall. Anybody who knows me will know that ‘Lucie doesn’t do numbers’. As a cultural historian I have tended to shy away from… Continue reading The Cost of Dining at Toynbee Hall
About a month ago I posted this request on the Victorian Listserv and I’ve decided to throw it out to the twittersphere. “I’ve recently started to think about what it meant to eat and dine in Toynbee Hall, the East London University settlement, and I’ve been wondering for a while whether the classes dined… Continue reading Eating and Dining in Toynbee Hall
Over the years I have collected all sorts of documents about the Rev. Samuel Barnett and his wife Henrietta. Last week my colleague Helen Rogers sent a copy of ‘Reminiscences of my Aunt Bess’ by George Pelling, from the Burnett Archive, with the heading ‘you are going to be so excited…!’ I certainly was! Helen… Continue reading Parlour Maid meets Henrietta Barnett
Last week something unusual happened to me; I cried while reading a collection of primary sources. I had come across a bundle of photocopied obituaries taken from the Toynbee Record (the institutional periodical of the university settlement house Toynbee Hall) during the First World War. I stumbled on these documents by chance. I had actually… Continue reading The Historian’s Tears: Toynbee Hall & First World War Obituaries
Religion and Material Culture in the Rev. Samuel Barnett’s St. Jude’s Whitechapel vicarage This post is my position paper for the ‘Knowledge on the Mantlepiece’ seminar at the NAVSA/ BAVS meeting in Venice. I welcome any comments or observations you might have on this paper, especially if you are not planning to attend this seminar… Continue reading The Parable and the Mantlepiece
I was recently standing in front of a computer screen with my finger poised, but hovering. I was voting for my favourite poster at the London Transport Museum’s special exhibition ‘Poster Art 150: London Underground’s Greatest Design’. As I stood there, I felt a bit uneasy. I couldn’t choose. Slightly bewildered, I ended up choosing… Continue reading Let’s Vote: Voting at the Whitechapel Fine Art Exhibitions
Lucinda Matthews-Jones 