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Lens: ZEISS Otus 1.4/85
Camera: Nikon D800
Exposure: ISO 100, f/4.5 at 1/6s
Processed: Adobe LR v5.7
Location: Hudson River Water Front Walkway
January 1, 2011
Okay Soooo I started a 365 last year and i failed haha. I have made another goal to do it again. I hope I can do it! My Birthday was yesterday, it was a great new years eve and 19th birthday! This is my old camera thats hanging around my neck, im excited to start this new project with my new camera! and by the way my underwear has cameras on it :]
I really want to be a photographer for Teen Vogue! My dream is to be one of the youngest photographers for Teen Vogue.. its about teenagers right?? Well im one!! haha
check out all the pics here : facebook
A Lost European Culture, Pulled From Obscurity
By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD
Before the glory that was Greece and Rome, even before the first cities of Mesopotamia or temples along the Nile, there lived in the Lower Danube Valley and the Balkan foothills people who were ahead of their time in art, technology and long-distance trade.
For 1,500 years, starting earlier than 5000 B.C., they farmed and built sizable towns, a few with as many as 2,000 dwellings. They mastered large-scale copper smelting, the new technology of the age. Their graves held an impressive array of exquisite headdresses and necklaces and, in one cemetery, the earliest major assemblage of gold artifacts to be found anywhere in the world.
The striking designs of their pottery speak of the refinement of the culture’s visual language. Until recent discoveries, the most intriguing artifacts were the ubiquitous terracotta “goddess” figurines, originally interpreted as evidence of the spiritual and political power of women in society.
New research, archaeologists and historians say, has broadened understanding of this long overlooked culture, which seemed to have approached the threshold of “civilization” status. Writing had yet to be invented, and so no one knows what the people called themselves. To some scholars, the people and the region are simply Old Europe.
The little-known culture is being rescued from obscurity in an exhibition, “The Lost World of Old Europe: the Danube Valley, 5000-3500 B.C.,” which opened last month at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World at New York University. More than 250 artifacts from museums in Bulgaria, Moldova and Romania are on display for the first time in the United States. The show will run through April 25.
At its peak, around 4500 B.C., said David W. Anthony, the exhibition’s guest curator, “Old Europe was among the most sophisticated and technologically advanced places in the world” and was developing “many of the political, technological and ideological signs of civilization.”
Dr. Anthony is a professor of anthropology at Hartwick College in Oneonta, N.Y., and author of “The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World.” Historians suggest that the arrival in southeastern Europe of people from the steppes may have contributed to the collapse of the Old Europe culture by 3500 B.C.
At the exhibition preview, Roger S. Bagnall, director of the institute, confessed that until now “a great many archaeologists had not heard of these Old Europe cultures.” Admiring the colorful ceramics, Dr. Bagnall, a specialist in Egyptian archaeology, remarked that at the time “Egyptians were certainly not making pottery like this.”
A show catalog, published by Princeton University Press, is the first compendium in English of research on Old Europe discoveries. The book, edited by Dr. Anthony, with Jennifer Y. Chi, the institute’s associate director for exhibitions, includes essays by experts from Britain, France, Germany, the United States and the countries where the culture existed.
Dr. Chi said the exhibition reflected the institute’s interest in studying the relationships of well-known cultures and the “underappreciated ones.”
Although excavations over the last century uncovered traces of ancient settlements and the goddess figurines, it was not until local archaeologists in 1972 discovered a large fifth-millennium B.C. cemetery at Varna, Bulgaria, that they began to suspect these were not poor people living in unstructured egalitarian societies. Even then, confined in cold war isolation behind the Iron Curtain, Bulgarians and Romanians were unable to spread their knowledge to the West.
The story now emerging is of pioneer farmers after about 6200 B.C. moving north into Old Europe from Greece and Macedonia, bringing wheat and barley seeds and domesticated cattle and sheep. They established colonies along the Black Sea and in the river plains and hills, and these evolved into related but somewhat distinct cultures, archaeologists have learned. The settlements maintained close contact through networks of trade in copper and gold and also shared patterns of ceramics.
The Spondylus shell from the Aegean Sea was a special item of trade. Perhaps the shells, used in pendants and bracelets, were symbols of their Aegean ancestors. Other scholars view such long-distance acquisitions as being motivated in part by ideology in which goods are not commodities in the modern sense but rather “valuables,” symbols of status and recognition.
Noting the diffusion of these shells at this time, Michel Louis Seferiades, an anthropologist at the National Center for Scientific Research in France, suspects “the objects were part of a halo of mysteries, an ensemble of beliefs and myths.”
In any event, Dr. Seferiades wrote in the exhibition catalog that the prevalence of the shells suggested the culture had links to “a network of access routes and a social framework of elaborate exchange systems — including bartering, gift exchange and reciprocity.”
Over a wide area of what is now Bulgaria and Romania, the people settled into villages of single- and multiroom houses crowded inside palisades. The houses, some with two stories, were framed in wood with clay-plaster walls and beaten-earth floors. For some reason, the people liked making fired clay models of multilevel dwellings, examples of which are exhibited.
A few towns of the Cucuteni people, a later and apparently robust culture in the north of Old Europe, grew to more than 800 acres, which archaeologists consider larger than any other known human settlements at the time. But excavations have yet to turn up definitive evidence of palaces, temples or large civic buildings. Archaeologists concluded that rituals of belief seemed to be practiced in the homes, where cultic artifacts have been found.
The household pottery decorated in diverse, complex styles suggested the practice of elaborate at-home dining rituals. Huge serving bowls on stands were typical of the culture’s “socializing of food presentation,” Dr. Chi said.
At first, the absence of elite architecture led scholars to assume that Old Europe had little or no hierarchical power structure. This was dispelled by the graves in the Varna cemetery. For two decades after 1972, archaeologists found 310 graves dated to about 4500 B.C. Dr. Anthony said this was “the best evidence for the existence of a clearly distinct upper social and political rank.”
Vladimir Slavchev, a curator at the Varna Regional Museum of History, said the “richness and variety of the Varna grave gifts was a surprise,” even to the Bulgarian archaeologist Ivan Ivanov, who directed the discoveries. “Varna is the oldest cemetery yet found where humans were buried with golden ornaments,” Dr. Slavchev said.
More than 3,000 pieces of gold were found in 62 of the graves, along with copper weapons and tools, and ornaments, necklaces and bracelets of the prized Aegean shells. “The concentration of imported prestige objects in a distinct minority of graves suggest that institutionalized higher ranks did exist,” exhibition curators noted in a text panel accompanying the Varna gold.
Yet it is puzzling that the elite seemed not to indulge in private lives of excess. “The people who donned gold costumes for public events while they were alive,” Dr. Anthony wrote, “went home to fairly ordinary houses.”
Copper, not gold, may have been the main source of Old Europe’s economic success, Dr. Anthony said. As copper smelting developed about 5400 B.C., the Old Europe cultures tapped abundant ores in Bulgaria and what is now Serbia and learned the high-heat technique of extracting pure metallic copper.
Smelted copper, cast as axes, hammered into knife blades and coiled in bracelets, became valuable exports. Old Europe copper pieces have been found in graves along the Volga River, 1,200 miles east of Bulgaria. Archaeologists have recovered more than five tons of pieces from Old Europe sites.
An entire gallery is devoted to the figurines, the more familiar and provocative of the culture’s treasures. They have been found in virtually every Old Europe culture and in several contexts: in graves, house shrines and other possibly “religious spaces.”
One of the best known is the fired clay figure of a seated man, his shoulders bent and hands to his face in apparent contemplation. Called the “Thinker,” the piece and a comparable female figurine were found in a cemetery of the Hamangia culture, in Romania. Were they thinking, or mourning?
Many of the figurines represent women in stylized abstraction, with truncated or elongated bodies and heaping breasts and expansive hips. The explicit sexuality of these figurines invites interpretations relating to earthly and human fertility.
An arresting set of 21 small female figurines, seated in a circle, was found at a pre-Cucuteni village site in northeastern Romania. “It is not difficult to imagine,” said Douglass W. Bailey of San Francisco State University, the Old Europe people “arranging sets of seated figurines into one or several groups of miniature activities, perhaps with the smaller figurines at the feet or even on the laps of the larger, seated ones.”
Others imagined the figurines as the “Council of Goddesses.” In her influential books three decades ago, Marija Gimbutas, an anthropologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, offered these and other so-called Venus figurines as representatives of divinities in cults to a Mother Goddess that reigned in prehistoric Europe.
Although the late Dr. Gimbutas still has an ardent following, many scholars hew to more conservative, nondivine explanations. The power of the objects, Dr. Bailey said, was not in any specific reference to the divine, but in “a shared understanding of group identity.”
As Dr. Bailey wrote in the exhibition catalog, the figurines should perhaps be defined only in terms of their actual appearance: miniature, representational depictions of the human form. He thus “assumed (as is justified by our knowledge of human evolution) that the ability to make, use and understand symbolic objects such as figurines is an ability that is shared by all modern humans and thus is a capability that connects you, me, Neolithic men, women and children, and the Paleolithic painters in caves.”
Or else the “Thinker,” for instance, is the image of you, me, the archaeologists and historians confronted and perplexed by a “lost” culture in southeastern Europe that had quite a go with life back before a single word was written or a wheel turned.
1st Explore
Explored # 476
January 1, 2009
1000 views =]
I decided to do the whole one picture a week for 52 weeks thing, I figured I wouldn't be able to keep up with the 365 thing... Happy new year! =]
I felt really silly setting up a tripod in my bathroom....
Almost 5 months have passed since my last upload. The reason behind this pause lies on the conditions that I experience in Greece.
In Greece, nowadays, there are three cases. Either you are unemployed or, if you are employed, you live within a constant state of insecurity of losing your job, either because the company you work is having problems or because they can find someone else who will be willing to work more hours for less money. All is justified in the name of “calming” the “markets”. As if the markets are demons or demi-gods who demand the lives of the people in order to be satisfied. This is madness!!
Unemployment is 26% and by the end of the year it will reach 34% of the active population! This kind of unemployment has been noted only in countries that have been facing long term wars. The health system is collapsing rapidly and the fascist party is getting more and more strong. We do not speak of a Far Right party but of a Fascist party on the steps of the Nazi party. Everyday that passes they become more and more popular with their mix of populist politics and hate speech.
Europe, for Greeks, is dead. As it seems Greece is dead for Europe too. A new Europe is rising that in order to secure itself it is becoming smaller and smaller. As if to become secure it has to cut parts of its body. What a mental anomaly!
And then there are those people who live by their pensions. As the man in this photo coming out of a “1 euro shop”, dressed poorly, passing through a body of demonstrators, looking down, speaking to himself, lost somewhere on his thoughts.
This old man, lives with a pension of 300 or 400 euros. Now, he has to pay all his medicine, he has to eat and live with this money. And the prices in Greece are the same just like Germany. Greece is among the three most expensive countries to live in Europe!
On my side, while life has been hard there have been some good news too. “Gateway” magazine from China has published a set of my photos on greek crisis on its July issue. It was an 8 page article I wrote with photos I had taken. In the next days I will see to post some pages from the magazine with the text in English.
On the other hand, I am left with no camera to take photos (except from an automatic Panasonic Lumix) since my Olympus E-400 has broken into pieces after an accident I had. This has been very frustrating for me and while I have been trying to put some money on the side this is very very difficult.
Hope you enjoy the photo.
The little RX100 delivers the goods again. A grab shot of someone looking for a lunch of tired salmon.
Some little studio work from yesterday. I got some new shelves for my studio from IKEA and I cleaned everything up because I want to do a bit more studio and flash work in the future. My plan is to do a 100 portrait project with 50mm focal length and flash work as main part of this project. There is no time frame but I don't want to do a portrait of a person twice that's mean I need 100 people for this project :-/ if you are interested to be a part of this, please let me know ;-)
Strobe info: VC300 in a gridded 120cm octa-box right from camera metered to F5.6 as main light. 400Ws monolight with light through umbrella left and far behind camera for fill light – metered to F2.8 or more less. Right and left behind me 430EX II in a 60x90 squared umbrella soft-box for rim – metered to F/4. 580 EXII with blue gel and full power spoted to the backdrop. Triggert with Pocket Wizard miniTT1, flexTT5 and Phottix Atlas.
Camera info: Canon EOS 5D mkII with Sigma 50mm 1.4 at 1/125 sec, F/5.6, ISO100
Hit L or use this one view large
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Posted in the We want more! Group :-)
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Locomotion No. 1 is an early British steam locomotive built for the Stockton and Darlington Railway. Built by George and Robert Stephenson's company Robert Stephenson and Company in 1825. It was the first one to run on a passenger carrying line.
The No. 1 engine, called Locomotion, for the Stockton & Darlington RailwayLocomotion used all the improvements that Stephenson had pioneered in the Killingworth locomotives. It used high-pressure steam from a centre-flue boiler, with a steam-blast in the chimney, to drive two vertical cylinders, enclosed within the boiler. A pair of yokes above them transmitted the power downwards, through pairs of connecting rods. It made use of a loose eccentric valve gear,[3] and was one of the first locomotives to use coupling rods rather than chains or gears to link its 0-4-0 driving wheels together.
The locomotive is historically important as the first one to run on a passenger carrying line,[4] rather than for the innovations in its design. It hauled the first train on the Stockton and Darlington Railway on 27 September 1825.
In 1828 the boiler exploded, killing the driver. With advances in design such as those incorporated into Stephenson's Rocket, Locomotion became obsolete very quickly. It was rebuilt and remained in service until 1841 when it was turned into a stationary engine.
Câmera:Canon EOS-1D Mark II N
Exposição:0,006 sec (1/160)
Abertura:f/1.8
Distância focal:50 mm
ISO:100
Lente:Canon 50mm 1.8f
"RP 1", ink and graphite on paper, 4.125" x 5.75".
_____________________________________
Relentless…the word I chose for this year, 2018. Or the word that chose me. Am I chosen by, or do I choose? I ask this question more often as my years pass by. So what is this word about? This word that chose me–relentless? Must I be relentless in my choosing? Did she choose me to be Mom? Or did I choose her?
The faint smile of knowing. I know that smile. The sideways looking. I know that look. The resolve of her mouth. I know those studied hatch marks. Those lines, drawn lovingly, knowingly. To be... relentless.
- Sherrie Lowly
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About the Redeemer Project: In November of 2017 I received an invitation from Bethany Kenyon of Redeemer University College in Ontario, Canada to participate in a two-person exhibition. My initial thought was to show a few paintings, but various considerations led me to the idea of making a series of small, postcard sized drawings. The drawings would be installed over the course of the exhibition one at a time, starting with just one. I invited my wife Sherrie to write a text for each drawing (see above) which I will post in relation to each drawing concurrently with when it (the drawing) is installed in the exhibition.
Here is the statement I wrote for the exhibition:
"The Redeemer Project"
The viewer: you complete the work. While my intention with this project is hopefully relevant, I invite you to look and think carefully prior to reading my statement. Perhaps start with "What does (the practice of making a) drawing mean?"
The subject: I see her face every day. Over the last 32 years Temma, our daughter, has been a constant presence in our lives. She is profoundly other. To use more medically clinical terms is to largely define her by who and what she isn't. I'm more interested in and constantly unraveled by who she is. The central stream of my work as a visual artist has been Temma-centric. She is emphatically present even while remaining an enigmatic mystery.
The project: Post card sized(1) ink (and a bit of graphite) drawings of Temma. Start the drawing from life, if need be(2) supplement with photographic reference. And again. And again.(3)
The artist: I like to think of (the making of) art as a relational practice, a representational practice, a political practice, a conceptual practice, a contemplative practice, a practice in being (present to), a practice in longing, a practice in loving.
1 - The size of an artwork is always meaningful. The material used to make an artwork is always meaningful. The process used to make an artwork is always meaningful.
2 - Temma doesn't pose, let alone hold a pose. Most likely she has little understanding of what it means to be seen.
3 - The season of Lent and the common practice of reflection leading up to Holy Week (when the exhibition concludes) was not irrelevant to my thinking towards this project and exhibition.
AasP
WRmh 132.1 61 80 88-90 117-7
IC 505 'Schauinsland' Hamburg-Altona - Basel SBB
Duisburg Hbf
24-10-1999
T199910-0018
Images from the 2016 edition of Defqon.1 "Dragonblood"
June 25&26
Biddinghuizen, the Netherlands
Client: Q-dance
© 2015 www.rudgr.com
Snapchat: @Rudgr.com
Check out my massive book on 20 years of dance music photography!
yashica mat 124g
fuji neopan 400
moersch tanol 1+1+100, 9,25min at 24'C
Even as I have over a dozen other rolls of film waiting to be developed in the fridge, some shot several weeks ago, I was eager to see the latest shots, so I developed the last roll I shot on vacation. And it's a disaster. Seems that my inner computer was not working correctly, as I underestimated the exposure times on 3/4 frames and they are almost totally clear. There were just 3 frames exposed correctly and I am posting two of these.
i wanted to post an image of the Chicago Skyline for my 1,000th upload so here it is, a long exposure 16x9 crop with fast moving clouds over the city and some blurred out geese in the lake...have a good one friends...pls. View On Black
Featured in chicagoist.com's Extra Extra on 11/08/2012...
Sunset at Long Reef - Sydney NSW
Canon 5D Mark11
Canon 16-35L F2.8II USM
Lee Filter = 1.2 ND
Lee Filter = 0.9 Hard Grad
Lee Filter = Circ Pol
F9
Exp = 30sec
ISO 100
Lens @ 27mm
PBE
Plataforma Biotica Como Dispositivo Ecosistemico
Taller de diseño IX
Es un brazo del bosque que se introduce en el espacio urbano para concientizar sobre la necesidad imperante de la presencia de zonas verdes en la mancha urbana
Mejorando asi la calidad del aire del sector y ser un estructurante ecosistemico en el centro de la ciudad y conectándose con planes parciales a futuro
Realizado por: Carolina Restrepo Escobar y Julian Muñoz Londoño
Images from the 2016 edition of Defqon.1 "Dragonblood"
June 25&26
Biddinghuizen, the Netherlands
Client: Q-dance
© 2015 www.rudgr.com
Snapchat: @Rudgr.com
Check out my massive book on 20 years of dance music photography!
newcastlephotos.blogspot.com/2006/06/all-saints-cemetery....
All Saints Cemetery
This Cemetery stands on Jesmond Road, opposite Jesmond Old Cemetery and was the first cemetery in Newcastle to be instigated by the Burial Board. Consecrated in 1855 and opened in 1856 this was very much a rural part of Newcastle. The residential housing surrounding the cemetery on 3 sides were built later.
Noted Newcastle architect Benjamin Green designed the cemetery, its buildings and the fine Gothic archway over the entrance from Jesmond Road. The cemetery is surrounded by cast iron railings with fleur-de-lys heads.
The cemetery was extended to Osborne Avenue, from just under 10 acres by another 1.3 hectares in 1881.
In 1924 Carliol Square Gaol was demolished and the bodies of its executed criminals were transferred into unmarked graves in the cemetery.
In total around 90,000 burials have taken place here.
Thomas Harrison Hair (1810-1875) the artist best known for his Views of the Collieries of Northumberland and Durham, is buried here in an unmarked grave.
Two Small Chapels:
2 chapels. 1856 by Green. Coursed squared sandstone with ashlar turrets and dressings; Welsh slate roofs. T-plan with additional porch on side away from centre of cemetery, and corner turret on innermost side at south end. Aligned north-south. Decorated style. Double doors, with elaborate hinges,on inner fronts have nook shafts and head-stopped dripmoulds; similar surround to plainer door in outward-facing porch; windows of 3 lights facing gateway, 2 lights on other fronts, have similar dripmoulds. Lancets to corner turrets with gabled belfry under octagonal spirelets. Buttresses. Steeply-pitched roofs with cross finials. LISTED GRADE 2.
1 of the Chapels is now the Russian Orthodox Church Of St. George.
Gate, walls, piers, gates and railings.
Cemetery gateway, walls, piers, gates and railings. Dated 1856; by Green. Coursed squared sandstone with ashlar dressings; wrought iron gates; cast iron railings. Gothic style. High gable over 2-centred arch with 12 shafts each side and many mouldings; gabled ends have fantastic beasts climbing down kneelers; head-stopped dripmoulds, buttresses and finials.
High, pointed coping to flanking walls containing pedestrian doors in arches; end piers have gables with fleur-de-lis moulding. Chamfered coping to dwarf quadrant walls and similar walls along cemetery front, with 4 square piers at each side having pyramidal coping. High gates are Gothic-patterned; railings have fleur-de-lis heads.
Burials:
Samuel Smith.
Celtic Cross monument. Samuel Smith OBE JP (1872-1949) was the founder of Rington's Tea. He was born in Leeds and became an errand boy for a tea merchants on leaving school at 11. In 1908 he moved to Newcastle and set up a small shop in Heaton with William Titterington. They called the company Ringtons. The tea was imported from India and Sri Lanka then tasted, blended and packaged. It was delivered by the company's black, gold and green horse-drawn coaches. In 1926 the business moved to purpose-built premises in Algernon Road. Eventually there were 26 branches of Ringtons in the North. The firm moved into coachbuilding during the World Wars, which led to the creation of Smith's Electric Vehicles at Team Valley Trading Estate.
Alexander Gardner.
Cross monument. Alexander Gardner (1877-1921) was a footballer for Newcastle United. Before the First World War, Newcastle United were in the First Division, won three league titles and won one FA Cup final of three. Alexander was the captain and played at right half (midfielder). He made 268 appearances and scored 20 goals. He was born in Leith in 1899. The 1904/5 team won 23 out of 34 league games. In 1909 Alexander broke his leg, which ended his football career. He became landlord of the Dun Cow Inn in Claremont Road.
Michael Joseph Quigley.
Gravestone of Michael Joseph Quigley (1837-1924), American Civil War veteran. Michael was born in Bradford and emigrated to America with his wife shortly before the outbreak of civil war. He served under General Robert E. Lee in Virginia but was wounded in his left arm. He was later employed in Government Service. He returned to Britain in 1876. He lived in St. Lawrence Square off Walker Road. His income was subsidised by a pension from the American Government.
James Skinner.
Obelisk monument to James Skinner (1836-1920), shipbuilder. James was born in London. He moved to Newcastle aged 14 to begin an apprenticeship at Coutts shipyard at Low Walker. He went on to manage Andrew Leslie's shipyard at Hebburn then opened a yard at Bill Quay with William Wood, shipyard cashier. The firm Wood Skinner & Co. built 330 vessels over 42 years up to 1925. They also built the 30-bed Tyne Floating Hospital for Infectious Diseases at Jarrow Slake, designed by Newcastle Civil Engineer, George Laws. The hospital ship was launched on 2 August 1885. It sank in 1888. She was refloated and remained moored there for over 40 years.
Francis Batey.
Urn monument to Francis Batey (1841-1915), steam tug boat owner. Francis joined his father's tug boat business at the age of 11 and eventually gained his master's certificate. When the Albert Edward Dock opened in 1884, he was assistant pilot on the Rio Amazonas, the first ship to enter the dock. He went on to be chairman of several tug related companies on the River Tyne. One of his sons, John Thomas Batey, became Managing Director of Hawthorn Leslie's Hebburn shipyard.
Antonio Marcantonio.
Impressive monument of a statue of a monk or friar holding an infant. Antonio Marcantonio (1886-1960), ice cream manufacturer, arrived in Newcastle in 1895 to join a small colony of Italians living in Byker. In the early 1900s he returned to Italy to marry Angela. He returned to Newcastle and began making ice cream in a room in his house using small pans of salt and ice to freeze it. Eventually he took over a small factory on Stepney Bank. 500 gallons of ice cream were made daily. He also owned five ice cream parlours, the first one was in the Grainger Arcade. The Mark Toney business still flourishes (factory at Benton Square).
George Henry Carr.
A 13 feet high monument to George Henry Carr (1867-1889), racing cyclist. There is a shield on each side depicting a bicycle, flowers, the badge of the Jubilee Rovers Bicycle Club and the badge of Clarence Bicycle Club. Carr was a prominent figure on the racing circuit. He died aged 22 of inflammation of the brain.
John James Lightfoot,
Monument of an angel to John James Lightfoot (1877-1897), apprentice joiner. John James was crushed to death aged 19 during restoration of the 200 year old Green Tree beerhouse in Robson's Entry, Sandgate.The building collapsed killing 4 people and injuring 12. The disaster was sketched by the Chronicle's artist and published on 6 March 1897 the day after the accident. The article describes the scene - 'in the house to the east there was a yawning space where the wall had tumbled in; behind the hole a staircase stood, but seemed, like the sword of Damocles, to have no more than a hair-strength to support it'.
Josephine Esther Salisse.
Family vault of M. and H.M. Salisse. A stone sarcophagus with a bronze female figure mourning over it. Josephine Esther Salisse (1905-1924) was from Thornton Heath in Surrey. She died suddenly at her aunt's home in Stratford Road, Heaton, aged 19.
John and Benjamin Green were a father and son who worked in partnership as architects in North East England during the early nineteenth century. John, the father was a civil engineer as well as an architect. Although they did carry out some commissions separately, they were given joint credit for many of their projects, and it is difficult to attribute much of their work to a single individual. In general, John Green worked on civil engineering projects, such as road and rail bridges, whereas Benjamin worked on projects that were more purely architectural. Their work was predominantly church and railway architecture, with a sprinkling of public buildings that includes their masterpiece, Newcastle's Theatre Royal.
Drawings by John and Benjamin Green are held by the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Biographies
John Green was born on 29 June 1787 at Newton Fell House, Nafferton, two miles north of Ovington, Northumberland. He was the son of Benjamin Green, a carpenter and maker of agricultural implements. After finishing school, he worked in his father's business. The firm moved to the market town of Corbridge and began general building work with young John concentrating on architectural work. About 1820, John set up business as an architect and civil engineer in nearby Newcastle upon Tyne.
John Green married Jane Stobart in 1805, and they had two sons, John (c.1807–68) and Benjamin (c1811-58), both of whom became architects. Little is known about the career of John, but Benjamin worked in partnership with his father on many projects.
In 1822 John Green designed a new building for the Newcastle Literary and Philosophical Society. The building, which houses the society's substantial library, is still in use today. He also designed a number of farmhouses, being employed on the Beaufront estate near Hexham and also on the Duke of Northumberland’s estates.
John Green was principally a civil engineer, and built several road and rail bridges. In 1829–31 he built two wrought-iron suspension bridges crossing the Tyne (at Scotswood) and the Tees (at Whorlton). The bridge at Scotswood was demolished in 1967 but the one at Whorlton still survives. When the High Level Bridge at Newcastle was proposed ten years later, John Green submitted plans, but those of Robert Stephenson were accepted by the York, Newcastle and Berwick Railway. Green also built a number of bridges using an innovative system of laminated timber arches on masonry piers, the Weibeking system, based on the work of Bavarian engineer C.F. Weibeking. The two he built for the Newcastle and North Shields Railway, at the Ouseburn and at Willington Quay remain in use, though the timbers were replaced with wrought iron in a similar lattice pattern in 1869. In 1840 he was elected to the Institution of Civil Engineers, and in 1841 he was awarded the institution's Telford Medal for his work on laminated arch design.
John Green died in Newcastle on 30 September 1852.
Benjamin Green
Benjamin Green was a pupil of Augustus Charles Pugin, father of the more famous Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin. In the mid-1830s he became a partner of his father and remained so until the latter's death in 1852. The two partners differed somewhat. John has been described as a 'plain, practical, shrewd man of business' with a 'plain, severe and economical' style, whereas Benjamin was 'an artistic, dashing sort of fellow', with a style that was 'ornamental, florid and costly'.
The Greens worked as railway architects and it is believed that all the main line stations between Newcastle and Berwick upon Tweed were designed by Benjamin. In 2020 Morpeth Station was restored to Green's original designs following a £2.3M investment. They also designed a number of Northumbrian churches, the best examples being at Earsdon and Cambo.
The Green's most important commissions in Newcastle were the Theatre Royal (1836–37) and the column for Grey's Monument (1837–38). Both of these structures were part of the re-development of Newcastle city centre in neo-classical style by Richard Grainger, and both exist today. Although both of the partners were credited with their design, it is believed that Benjamin was the person responsible.
Another well-known structure designed by the Greens is Penshaw Monument (1844). This is a folly standing on Penshaw Hill in County Durham. It was built as a half-sized replica of the renowned Temple of Hephaestus in Athens, and was dedicated to John George Lambton, first Earl of Durham and the first Governor of the Province of Canada. The monument, being built on a hill is visible for miles around and is a famous local landmark. It is now owned by the National Trust.
Benjamin Green survived his father by only six years, and died in a mental home at Dinsdale Park, County Durham on 14 November 1858.
Major works
Presbyterian Chapel, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1822 (demolished 2011)
Literary and Philosophical Society, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1822–1825
St Peter's Church, Falstone, 1824–1825
Westgate Hill Cemetery, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1825–1829 (lodge demolished 1970, railings and gates removed, piers and basic layout remains)
Ingram Farm, Ingram, 1826
Whorlton Suspension Bridge, Wycliffe, County Durham, 1829–1831
Hawks Cottages, Gateshead, 1830 (demolished 1960)
Scotswood Chain Bridge, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1831, (demolished 1967)
Church of St Mary and St Thomas Aquinas, Stella, 1831–1832[1]
Bellingham Bridge, Bellingham, 1834
Holy Trinity Church, Stockton-On-Tees, 1834–1835[2]
Holy Trinity Church, Dalton (near Stamfordham), 1836
Vicarage of St Alban, Earsdon, 1836
Church of St Alban, Earsdon, 1836–1837
St Mary's Roman Catholic Church, Alnwick, 1836
Church of the Holy Saviour, Newburn, 1836–1837
Poor Law Guardians Hall, North Shields, 1837
Master Mariners Homes, Tynemouth, 1837–1840[3]
Theatre Royal, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1837
Parish Hall of the Church of the Holy Saviour, Newburn, 1838
Column of Grey's Monument, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1838
Willington Viaduct, Wallsend, 1837–1839
Ouseburn Viaduct, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1837–1839
Church of the Holy Saviour, Tynemouth, 1839–1841
Ilderton Vicarage, Ilderton, 1841
The Red Cottage, Whitburn, 1842
Holy Trinity Church, Cambo, 1842
Holy Trinity Church, Horsley-on-Rede, 1844
The Earl of Durham's Monument, Sunderland, 1844
St Edwin's, Coniscliffe, Co. Durham, 1844 (restoration of mediaeval church)
40–44 Moseley Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, 1845
Witham Testimonial Hall, Barnard Castle, 1846
Old Railway Station, Tynemouth Rd, Tynemouth 1846–1847
Acklington Station, Acklington, 1847
Chathill Station, Chathill, 1847
Belford Station, Belford, Northumberland, 1847
Morpeth Station, Morpeth, Northumberland, 1847
Warkworth Station, Warkworth, Northumberland, 1847
Holy Trinity Church, Seghill, 1849
Newcastle Joint Stock Bank, St Nicholas Square, Newcastle, c.1850
Norham station, Norham, 1851
St Paul's Church, Elswick, 1854
All Saints Cemetery, Jesmond, 1854
Sailor's Home, 11 New Quay, North Shields, 1856
United Free Methodist Church, North Shields, 1857
Corn Exchange, Groat Market, Newcastle (demolished 1974)
Newcastle upon Tyne, or simply Newcastle is a cathedral city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. It is located on the River Tyne's northern bank, opposite Gateshead to the south. It is the most populous settlement in the Tyneside conurbation and North East England.
Newcastle developed around a Roman settlement called Pons Aelius, the settlement became known as Monkchester before taking on the name of a castle built in 1080 by William the Conqueror's eldest son, Robert Curthose. It was one of the world's largest ship building and repair centres during the industrial revolution. Newcastle was part of the county of Northumberland until 1400, when it separated and formed a county of itself. In 1974, Newcastle became part of Tyne and Wear. Since 2018, the city council has been part of the North of Tyne Combined Authority.
The history of Newcastle upon Tyne dates back almost 2,000 years, during which it has been controlled by the Romans, the Angles and the Norsemen amongst others. Newcastle upon Tyne was originally known by its Roman name Pons Aelius. The name "Newcastle" has been used since the Norman conquest of England. Due to its prime location on the River Tyne, the town developed greatly during the Middle Ages and it was to play a major role in the Industrial Revolution, being granted city status in 1882. Today, the city is a major retail, commercial and cultural centre.
Roman settlement
The history of Newcastle dates from AD 122, when the Romans built the first bridge to cross the River Tyne at that point. The bridge was called Pons Aelius or 'Bridge of Aelius', Aelius being the family name of Roman Emperor Hadrian, who was responsible for the Roman wall built across northern England along the Tyne–Solway gap. Hadrian's Wall ran through present-day Newcastle, with stretches of wall and turrets visible along the West Road, and at a temple in Benwell. Traces of a milecastle were found on Westgate Road, midway between Clayton Street and Grainger Street, and it is likely that the course of the wall corresponded to present-day Westgate Road. The course of the wall can be traced eastwards to the Segedunum Roman fort at Wallsend, with the fort of Arbeia down-river at the mouth of the Tyne, on the south bank in what is now South Shields. The Tyne was then a wider, shallower river at this point and it is thought that the bridge was probably about 700 feet (210 m) long, made of wood and supported on stone piers. It is probable that it was sited near the current Swing Bridge, due to the fact that Roman artefacts were found there during the building of the latter bridge. Hadrian himself probably visited the site in 122. A shrine was set up on the completed bridge in 123 by the 6th Legion, with two altars to Neptune and Oceanus respectively. The two altars were subsequently found in the river and are on display in the Great North Museum in Newcastle.
The Romans built a stone-walled fort in 150 to protect the river crossing which was at the foot of the Tyne Gorge, and this took the name of the bridge so that the whole settlement was known as Pons Aelius. The fort was situated on a rocky outcrop overlooking the new bridge, on the site of the present Castle Keep. Pons Aelius is last mentioned in 400, in a Roman document listing all of the Roman military outposts. It is likely that nestling in the shadow of the fort would have been a small vicus, or village. Unfortunately, no buildings have been detected; only a few pieces of flagging. It is clear that there was a Roman cemetery near Clavering Place, behind the Central station, as a number of Roman coffins and sarcophagi have been unearthed there.
Despite the presence of the bridge, the settlement of Pons Aelius was not particularly important among the northern Roman settlements. The most important stations were those on the highway of Dere Street running from Eboracum (York) through Corstopitum (Corbridge) and to the lands north of the Wall. Corstopitum, being a major arsenal and supply centre, was much larger and more populous than Pons Aelius.
Anglo-Saxon development
The Angles arrived in the North-East of England in about 500 and may have landed on the Tyne. There is no evidence of an Anglo-Saxon settlement on or near the site of Pons Aelius during the Anglo-Saxon age. The bridge probably survived and there may well have been a small village at the northern end, but no evidence survives. At that time the region was dominated by two kingdoms, Bernicia, north of the Tees and ruled from Bamburgh, and Deira, south of the Tees and ruled from York. Bernicia and Deira combined to form the kingdom of Northanhymbra (Northumbria) early in the 7th century. There were three local kings who held the title of Bretwalda – 'Lord of Britain', Edwin of Deira (627–632), Oswald of Bernicia (633–641) and Oswy of Northumbria (641–658). The 7th century became known as the 'Golden Age of Northumbria', when the area was a beacon of culture and learning in Europe. The greatness of this period was based on its generally Christian culture and resulted in the Lindisfarne Gospels amongst other treasures. The Tyne valley was dotted with monasteries, with those at Monkwearmouth, Hexham and Jarrow being the most famous. Bede, who was based at Jarrow, wrote of a royal estate, known as Ad Murum, 'at the Wall', 12 miles (19 km) from the sea. It is thought that this estate may have been in what is now Newcastle. At some unknown time, the site of Newcastle came to be known as Monkchester. The reason for this title is unknown, as we are unaware of any specific monasteries at the site, and Bede made no reference to it. In 875 Halfdan Ragnarsson, the Danish Viking conqueror of York, led an army that attacked and pillaged various monasteries in the area, and it is thought that Monkchester was also pillaged at this time. Little more was heard of it until the coming of the Normans.
Norman period
After the arrival of William the Conqueror in England in 1066, the whole of England was quickly subjected to Norman rule. However, in Northumbria there was great resistance to the Normans, and in 1069 the newly appointed Norman Earl of Northumbria, Robert de Comines and 700 of his men were killed by the local population at Durham. The Northumbrians then marched on York, but William was able to suppress the uprising. That same year, a second uprising occurred when a Danish fleet landed in the Humber. The Northumbrians again attacked York and destroyed the garrison there. William was again able to suppress the uprising, but this time he took revenge. He laid waste to the whole of the Midlands and the land from York to the Tees. In 1080, William Walcher, the Norman bishop of Durham and his followers were brutally murdered at Gateshead. This time Odo, bishop of Bayeux, William's half brother, devastated the land between the Tees and the Tweed. This was known as the 'Harrying of the North'. This devastation is reflected in the Domesday Book. The destruction had such an effect that the North remained poor and backward at least until Tudor times and perhaps until the Industrial Revolution. Newcastle suffered in this respect with the rest of the North.
In 1080 William sent his eldest son, Robert Curthose, north to defend the kingdom against the Scots. After his campaign, he moved to Monkchester and began the building of a 'New Castle'. This was of the "motte-and-bailey" type of construction, a wooden tower on top of an earthen mound (motte), surrounded by a moat and wooden stockade (bailey). It was this castle that gave Newcastle its name. In 1095 the Earl of Northumbria, Robert de Mowbray, rose up against the king, William Rufus, and Rufus sent an army north to recapture the castle. From then on the castle became crown property and was an important base from which the king could control the northern barons. The Northumbrian earldom was abolished and a Sheriff of Northumberland was appointed to administer the region. In 1091 the parish church of St Nicholas was consecrated on the site of the present Anglican cathedral, close by the bailey of the new castle. The church is believed to have been a wooden building on stone footings.
Not a trace of the tower or mound of the motte and bailey castle remains now. Henry II replaced it with a rectangular stone keep, which was built between 1172 and 1177 at a cost of £1,444. A stone bailey, in the form of a triangle, replaced the previous wooden one. The great outer gateway to the castle, called 'the Black Gate', was built later, between 1247 and 1250, in the reign of Henry III. There were at that time no town walls and when attacked by the Scots, the townspeople had to crowd into the bailey for safety. It is probable that the new castle acted as a magnet for local merchants because of the safety it provided. This in turn would help to expand trade in the town. At this time wool, skins and lead were being exported, whilst alum, pepper and ginger were being imported from France and Flanders.
Middle Ages
Throughout the Middle Ages, Newcastle was England's northern fortress, the centre for assembled armies. The Border war against Scotland lasted intermittently for several centuries – possibly the longest border war ever waged. During the civil war between Stephen and Matilda, David 1st of Scotland and his son were granted Cumbria and Northumberland respectively, so that for a period from 1139 to 1157, Newcastle was effectively in Scottish hands. It is believed that during this period, King David may have built the church of St Andrew and the Benedictine nunnery in Newcastle. However, King Stephen's successor, Henry II was strong enough to take back the Earldom of Northumbria from Malcolm IV.
The Scots king William the Lion was imprisoned in Newcastle, in 1174, after being captured at the Battle of Alnwick. Edward I brought the Stone of Scone and William Wallace south through the town and Newcastle was successfully defended against the Scots three times during the 14th century.
Around 1200, stone-faced, clay-filled jetties were starting to project into the river, an indication that trade was increasing in Newcastle. As the Roman roads continued to deteriorate, sea travel was gaining in importance. By 1275 Newcastle was the sixth largest wool exporting port in England. The principal exports at this time were wool, timber, coal, millstones, dairy produce, fish, salt and hides. Much of the developing trade was with the Baltic countries and Germany. Most of the Newcastle merchants were situated near the river, below the Castle. The earliest known charter was dated 1175 in the reign of Henry II, giving the townspeople some control over their town. In 1216 King John granted Newcastle a mayor[8] and also allowed the formation of guilds (known as Mysteries). These were cartels formed within different trades, which restricted trade to guild members. There were initially twelve guilds. Coal was being exported from Newcastle by 1250, and by 1350 the burgesses received a royal licence to export coal. This licence to export coal was jealously guarded by the Newcastle burgesses, and they tried to prevent any one else on the Tyne from exporting coal except through Newcastle. The burgesses similarly tried to prevent fish from being sold anywhere else on the Tyne except Newcastle. This led to conflicts with Gateshead and South Shields.
In 1265, the town was granted permission to impose a 'Wall Tax' or Murage, to pay for the construction of a fortified wall to enclose the town and protect it from Scottish invaders. The town walls were not completed until early in the 14th century. They were two miles (3 km) long, 9 feet (2.7 m) thick and 25 feet (7.6 m) high. They had six main gates, as well as some smaller gates, and had 17 towers. The land within the walls was divided almost equally by the Lort Burn, which flowed southwards and joined the Tyne to the east of the Castle. The town began to expand north of the Castle and west of the Lort Burn with various markets being set up within the walls.
In 1400 Henry IV granted a new charter, creating a County corporate which separated the town, but not the Castle, from the county of Northumberland and recognised it as a "county of itself" with a right to have a sheriff of its own. The burgesses were now allowed to choose six aldermen who, with the mayor would be justices of the peace. The mayor and sheriff were allowed to hold borough courts in the Guildhall.
Religious houses
During the Middle Ages a number of religious houses were established within the walls: the first of these was the Benedictine nunnery of St Bartholomew founded in 1086 near the present-day Nun Street. Both David I of Scotland and Henry I of England were benefactors of the religious house. Nothing of the nunnery remains now.
The friary of Blackfriars, Newcastle (Dominican) was established in 1239. These were also known as the Preaching Friars or Shod Friars, because they wore sandals, as opposed to other orders. The friary was situated in the present-day Friars Street. In 1280 the order was granted royal permission to make a postern in the town walls to communicate with their gardens outside the walls. On 19 June 1334, Edward Balliol, claimant to be King of Scotland, did homage to King Edward III, on behalf of the kingdom of Scotland, in the church of the friary. Much of the original buildings of the friary still exist, mainly because, after the Dissolution of the Monasteries the friary of Blackfriars was rented out by the corporation to nine of the local trade guilds.
The friary of Whitefriars (Carmelite) was established in 1262. The order was originally housed on the Wall Knoll in Pandon, but in 1307 it took over the buildings of another order, which went out of existence, the Friars of the Sac. The land, which had originally been given by Robert the Bruce, was situated in the present-day Hanover Square, behind the Central station. Nothing of the friary remains now.
The friary of Austinfriars (Augustinian) was established in 1290. The friary was on the site where the Holy Jesus Hospital was built in 1682. The friary was traditionally the lodging place of English kings whenever they visited or passed through Newcastle. In 1503 Princess Margaret, eldest daughter of Henry VII of England, stayed two days at the friary on her way to join her new husband James IV of Scotland.
The friary of Greyfriars (Franciscans) was established in 1274. The friary was in the present-day area between Pilgrim Street, Grey Street, Market Street and High Chare. Nothing of the original buildings remains.
The friary of the Order of the Holy Trinity, also known as the Trinitarians, was established in 1360. The order devoted a third of its income to buying back captives of the Saracens, during the Crusades. Their house was on the Wall Knoll, in Pandon, to the east of the city, but within the walls. Wall Knoll had previously been occupied by the White Friars until they moved to new premises in 1307.
All of the above religious houses were closed in about 1540, when Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries.
An important street running through Newcastle at the time was Pilgrim Street, running northwards inside the walls and leading to the Pilgrim Gate on the north wall. The street still exists today as arguably Newcastle's main shopping street.
Tudor period
The Scottish border wars continued for much of the 16th century, so that during that time, Newcastle was often threatened with invasion by the Scots, but also remained important as a border stronghold against them.
During the Reformation begun by Henry VIII in 1536, the five Newcastle friaries and the single nunnery were dissolved and the land was sold to the Corporation and to rich merchants. At this time there were fewer than 60 inmates of the religious houses in Newcastle. The convent of Blackfriars was leased to nine craft guilds to be used as their headquarters. This probably explains why it is the only one of the religious houses whose building survives to the present day. The priories at Tynemouth and Durham were also dissolved, thus ending the long-running rivalry between Newcastle and the church for control of trade on the Tyne. A little later, the property of the nunnery of St Bartholomew and of Grey Friars were bought by Robert Anderson, who had the buildings demolished to build his grand Newe House (also known as Anderson Place).
With the gradual decline of the Scottish border wars the town walls were allowed to decline as well as the castle. By 1547, about 10,000 people were living in Newcastle. At the beginning of the 16th century exports of wool from Newcastle were more than twice the value of exports of coal, but during the century coal exports continued to increase.
Under Edward VI, John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, sponsored an act allowing Newcastle to annexe Gateshead as its suburb. The main reason for this was to allow the Newcastle Hostmen, who controlled the export of Tyne coal, to get their hands on the Gateshead coal mines, previously controlled by the Bishop of Durham. However, when Mary I came to power, Dudley met his downfall and the decision was reversed. The Reformation allowed private access to coal mines previously owned by Tynemouth and Durham priories and as a result coal exports increase dramatically, from 15,000 tons in 1500 to 35,000 tons in 1565, and to 400,000 tons in 1625.
The plague visited Newcastle four times during the 16th century, in 1579 when 2,000 people died, in 1589 when 1700 died, in 1595 and finally in 1597.
In 1600 Elizabeth I granted Newcastle a charter for an exclusive body of electors, the right to elect the mayor and burgesses. The charter also gave the Hostmen exclusive rights to load coal at any point on the Tyne. The Hostmen developed as an exclusive group within the Merchant Adventurers who had been incorporated by a charter in 1547.
Stuart period
In 1636 there was a serious outbreak of bubonic plague in Newcastle. There had been several previous outbreaks of the disease over the years, but this was the most serious. It is thought to have arrived from the Netherlands via ships that were trading between the Tyne and that country. It first appeared in the lower part of the town near the docks but gradually spread to all parts of the town. As the disease gained hold the authorities took measures to control it by boarding up any properties that contained infected persons, meaning that whole families were locked up together with the infected family members. Other infected persons were put in huts outside the town walls and left to die. Plague pits were dug next to the town's four churches and outside the town walls to receive the bodies in mass burials. Over the course of the outbreak 5,631 deaths were recorded out of an estimated population of 12,000, a death rate of 47%.
In 1637 Charles I tried to raise money by doubling the 'voluntary' tax on coal in return for allowing the Newcastle Hostmen to regulate production and fix prices. This caused outrage amongst the London importers and the East Anglian shippers. Both groups decided to boycott Tyne coal and as a result forced Charles to reverse his decision in 1638.
In 1640 during the Second Bishops' War, the Scots successfully invaded Newcastle. The occupying army demanded £850 per day from the Corporation to billet the Scottish troops. Trade from the Tyne ground to a halt during the occupation. The Scots left in 1641 after receiving a Parliamentary pardon and a £4,000,000 loan from the town.
In 1642 the English Civil War began. King Charles realised the value of the Tyne coal trade and therefore garrisoned Newcastle. A Royalist was appointed as governor. At that time, Newcastle and King's Lynn were the only important seaports to support the crown. In 1644 Parliament blockaded the Tyne to prevent the king from receiving revenue from the Tyne coal trade. Coal exports fell from 450,000 to 3,000 tons and London suffered a hard winter without fuel. Parliament encouraged the coal trade from the Wear to try to replace that lost from Newcastle but that was not enough to make up for the lost Tyneside tonnage.
In 1644 the Scots crossed the border. Newcastle strengthened its defences in preparation. The Scottish army, with 40,000 troops, besieged Newcastle for three months until the garrison of 1,500 surrendered. During the siege, the Scots bombarded the walls with their artillery, situated in Gateshead and Castle Leazes. The Scottish commander threatened to destroy the steeple of St Nicholas's Church by gunfire if the mayor, Sir John Marley, did not surrender the town. The mayor responded by placing Scottish prisoners that they had captured in the steeple, so saving it from destruction. The town walls were finally breached by a combination of artillery and sapping. In gratitude for this defence, Charles gave Newcastle the motto 'Fortiter Defendit Triumphans' to be added to its coat of arms. The Scottish army occupied Northumberland and Durham for two years. The coal taxes had to pay for the Scottish occupation. In 1645 Charles surrendered to the Scots and was imprisoned in Newcastle for nine months. After the Civil War the coal trade on the Tyne soon picked up and exceeded its pre-war levels.
A new Guildhall was completed on the Sandhill next to the river in 1655, replacing an earlier facility damaged by fire in 1639, and became the meeting place of Newcastle Town Council. In 1681 the Hospital of the Holy Jesus was built partly on the site of the Austin Friars. The Guildhall and Holy Jesus Hospital still exist.
Charles II tried to impose a charter on Newcastle to give the king the right to appoint the mayor, sheriff, recorder and town clerk. Charles died before the charter came into effect. In 1685, James II tried to replace Corporation members with named Catholics. However, James' mandate was suspended in 1689 after the Glorious Revolution welcoming William of Orange. In 1689, after the fall of James II, the people of Newcastle tore down his bronze equestrian statue in Sandhill and tossed it into the Tyne. The bronze was later used to make bells for All Saints Church.
In 1689 the Lort Burn was covered over. At this time it was an open sewer. The channel followed by the Lort Burn became the present day Dean Street. At that time, the centre of Newcastle was still the Sandhill area, with many merchants living along the Close or on the Side. The path of the main road through Newcastle ran from the single Tyne bridge, through Sandhill to the Side, a narrow street which climbed steeply on the north-east side of the castle hill until it reached the higher ground alongside St Nicholas' Church. As Newcastle developed, the Side became lined with buildings with projecting upper stories, so that the main street through Newcastle was a narrow, congested, steep thoroughfare.
In 1701 the Keelmen's Hospital was built in the Sandgate area of the city, using funds provided by the keelmen. The building still stands today.
Eighteenth century
In the 18th century, Newcastle was the country's largest print centre after London, Oxford and Cambridge, and the Literary and Philosophical Society of 1793, with its erudite debates and large stock of books in several languages predated the London Library by half a century.
In 1715, during the Jacobite rising in favour of the Old Pretender, an army of Jacobite supporters marched on Newcastle. Many of the Northumbrian gentry joined the rebels. The citizens prepared for its arrival by arresting Jacobite supporters and accepting 700 extra recruits into the local militia. The gates of the city were closed against the rebels. This proved enough to delay an attack until reinforcements arrived forcing the rebel army to move across to the west coast. The rebels finally surrendered at Preston.
In 1745, during a second Jacobite rising in favour of the Young Pretender, a Scottish army crossed the border led by Bonnie Prince Charlie. Once again Newcastle prepared by arresting Jacobite supporters and inducting 800 volunteers into the local militia. The town walls were strengthened, most of the gates were blocked up and some 200 cannon were deployed. 20,000 regulars were billeted on the Town Moor. These preparations were enough to force the rebel army to travel south via the west coast. They were eventually defeated at Culloden in 1746.
Newcastle's actions during the 1715 rising in resisting the rebels and declaring for George I, in contrast to the rest of the region, is the most likely source of the nickname 'Geordie', applied to people from Tyneside, or more accurately Newcastle. Another theory, however, is that the name 'Geordie' came from the inventor of the Geordie lamp, George Stephenson. It was a type of safety lamp used in mining, but was not invented until 1815. Apparently the term 'German Geordie' was in common use during the 18th century.
The city's first hospital, Newcastle Infirmary opened in 1753; it was funded by public subscription. A lying-in hospital was established in Newcastle in 1760. The city's first public hospital for mentally ill patients, Wardens Close Lunatic Hospital was opened in October 1767.
In 1771 a flood swept away much of the bridge at Newcastle. The bridge had been built in 1250 and repaired after a flood in 1339. The bridge supported various houses and three towers and an old chapel. A blue stone was placed in the middle of the bridge to mark the boundary between Newcastle and the Palatinate of Durham. A temporary wooden bridge had to be built, and this remained in use until 1781, when a new stone bridge was completed. The new bridge consisted of nine arches. In 1801, because of the pressure of traffic, the bridge had to be widened.
A permanent military presence was established in the city with the completion of Fenham Barracks in 1806. The facilities at the Castle for holding assizes, which had been condemned for their inconvenience and unhealthiness, were replaced when the Moot Hall opened in August 1812.
Victorian period
Present-day Newcastle owes much of its architecture to the work of the builder Richard Grainger, aided by architects John Dobson, Thomas Oliver, John and Benjamin Green and others. In 1834 Grainger won a competition to produce a new plan for central Newcastle. He put this plan into effect using the above architects as well as architects employed in his own office. Grainger and Oliver had already built Leazes Terrace, Leazes Crescent and Leazes Place between 1829 and 1834. Grainger and Dobson had also built the Royal Arcade at the foot of Pilgrim Street between 1830 and 1832. The most ambitious project covered 12 acres 12 acres (49,000 m2) in central Newcastle, on the site of Newe House (also called Anderson Place). Grainger built three new thoroughfares, Grey Street, Grainger Street and Clayton Street with many connecting streets, as well as the Central Exchange and the Grainger Market. John Wardle and George Walker, working in Grainger's office, designed Clayton Street, Grainger Street and most of Grey Street. Dobson designed the Grainger Market and much of the east side of Grey Street. John and Benjamin Green designed the Theatre Royal at the top of Grey Street, where Grainger placed the column of Grey's Monument as a focus for the whole scheme. Grey Street is considered to be one of the finest streets in the country, with its elegant curve. Unfortunately most of old Eldon Square was demolished in the 1960s in the name of progress. The Royal Arcade met a similar fate.
In 1849 a new bridge was built across the river at Newcastle. This was the High Level Bridge, designed by Robert Stephenson, and slightly up river from the existing bridge. The bridge was designed to carry road and rail traffic across the Tyne Gorge on two decks with rail traffic on the upper deck and road traffic on the lower. The new bridge meant that traffic could pass through Newcastle without having to negotiate the steep, narrow Side, as had been necessary for centuries. The bridge was opened by Queen Victoria, who one year later opened the new Central Station, designed by John Dobson. Trains were now able to cross the river, directly into the centre of Newcastle and carry on up to Scotland. The Army Riding School was also completed in 1849.
In 1854 a large fire started on the Gateshead quayside and an explosion caused it to spread across the river to the Newcastle quayside. A huge conflagration amongst the narrow alleys, or 'chares', destroyed the homes of 800 families as well as many business premises. The narrow alleys that had been destroyed were replaced by streets containing blocks of modern offices.
In 1863 the Town Hall in St Nicholas Square replaced the Guildhall as the meeting place of Newcastle Town Council.
In 1876 the low level bridge was replaced by a new bridge known as the Swing Bridge, so called because the bridge was able to swing horizontally on a central axis and allow ships to pass on either side. This meant that for the first time sizeable ships could pass up-river beyond Newcastle. The bridge was built and paid for by William Armstrong, a local arms manufacturer, who needed to have warships access his Elswick arms factory to fit armaments to them. The Swing Bridge's rotating mechanism is adapted from the cannon mounts developed in Armstrong's arms works. In 1882 the Elswick works began to build ships as well as to arm them. The Barrack Road drill hall was completed in 1890.
Industrialisation
In the 19th century, shipbuilding and heavy engineering were central to the city's prosperity; and the city was a powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution. Newcastle's development as a major city owed most to its central role in the production and export of coal. The phrase "taking coals to Newcastle" was first recorded in 1538; it proverbially denotes bringing a particular commodity to a place that has more than enough of it already.
Innovation in Newcastle and surrounding areas included the following:
George Stephenson developed a miner's safety lamp at the same time that Humphry Davy developed a rival design. The lamp made possible the opening up of ever deeper mines to provide the coal that powered the industrial revolution.
George and his son Robert Stephenson were hugely influential figures in the development of the early railways. George developed Blücher, a locomotive working at Killingworth colliery in 1814, whilst Robert was instrumental in the design of Rocket, a revolutionary design that was the forerunner of modern locomotives. Both men were involved in planning and building railway lines, all over this country and abroad.
Joseph Swan demonstrated a working electric light bulb about a year before Thomas Edison did the same in the USA. This led to a dispute as to who had actually invented the light bulb. Eventually the two rivals agreed to form a mutual company between them, the Edison and Swan Electric Light Company, known as Ediswan.
Charles Algernon Parsons invented the steam turbine, for marine use and for power generation. He used Turbinia, a small, turbine-powered ship, to demonstrate the speed that a steam turbine could generate. Turbinia literally ran rings around the British Fleet at a review at Spithead in 1897.
William Armstrong invented a hydraulic crane that was installed in dockyards up and down the country. He then began to design light, accurate field guns for the British army. These were a vast improvement on the existing guns that were then in use.
The following major industries developed in Newcastle or its surrounding area:
Glassmaking
A small glass industry existed in Newcastle from the mid-15th century. In 1615 restrictions were put on the use of wood for manufacturing glass. It was found that glass could be manufactured using the local coal, and so a glassmaking industry grew up on Tyneside. Huguenot glassmakers came over from France as refugees from persecution and set up glasshouses in the Skinnerburn area of Newcastle. Eventually, glass production moved to the Ouseburn area of Newcastle. In 1684 the Dagnia family, Sephardic Jewish emigrants from Altare, arrived in Newcastle from Stourbridge and established glasshouses along the Close, to manufacture high quality flint glass. The glass manufacturers used sand ballast from the boats arriving in the river as the main raw material. The glassware was then exported in collier brigs. The period from 1730 to 1785 was the highpoint of Newcastle glass manufacture, when the local glassmakers produced the 'Newcastle Light Baluster'. The glassmaking industry still exists in the west end of the city with local Artist and Glassmaker Jane Charles carrying on over four hundred years of hot glass blowing in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Locomotive manufacture
In 1823 George Stephenson and his son Robert established the world's first locomotive factory near Forth Street in Newcastle. Here they built locomotives for the Stockton and Darlington Railway and the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, as well as many others. It was here that the famous locomotive Rocket was designed and manufactured in preparation for the Rainhill Trials. Apart from building locomotives for the British market, the Newcastle works also produced locomotives for Europe and America. The Forth Street works continued to build locomotives until 1960.
Shipbuilding
In 1296 a wooden, 135 ft (41 m) long galley was constructed at the mouth of the Lort Burn in Newcastle, as part of a twenty-ship order from the king. The ship cost £205, and is the earliest record of shipbuilding in Newcastle. However the rise of the Tyne as a shipbuilding area was due to the need for collier brigs for the coal export trade. These wooden sailing ships were usually built locally, establishing local expertise in building ships. As ships changed from wood to steel, and from sail to steam, the local shipbuilding industry changed to build the new ships. Although shipbuilding was carried out up and down both sides of the river, the two main areas for building ships in Newcastle were Elswick, to the west, and Walker, to the east. By 1800 Tyneside was the third largest producer of ships in Britain. Unfortunately, after the Second World War, lack of modernisation and competition from abroad gradually caused the local industry to decline and die.
Armaments
In 1847 William Armstrong established a huge factory in Elswick, west of Newcastle. This was initially used to produce hydraulic cranes but subsequently began also to produce guns for both the army and the navy. After the Swing Bridge was built in 1876 allowing ships to pass up river, warships could have their armaments fitted alongside the Elswick works. Armstrong's company took over its industrial rival, Joseph Whitworth of Manchester in 1897.
Steam turbines
Charles Algernon Parsons invented the steam turbine and, in 1889, founded his own company C. A. Parsons and Company in Heaton, Newcastle to make steam turbines. Shortly after this, he realised that steam turbines could be used to propel ships and, in 1897, he founded a second company, Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Company in Wallsend. It is there that he designed and manufactured Turbinia. Parsons turbines were initially used in warships but soon came to be used in merchant and passenger vessels, including the liner Mauretania which held the blue riband for the Atlantic crossing until 1929. Parsons' company in Heaton began to make turbo-generators for power stations and supplied power stations all over the world. The Heaton works, reduced in size, remains as part of the Siemens AG industrial giant.
Pottery
In 1762 the Maling pottery was founded in Sunderland by French Huguenots, but transferred to Newcastle in 1817. A factory was built in the Ouseburn area of the city. The factory was rebuilt twice, finally occupying a 14-acre (57,000 m2) site that was claimed to be the biggest pottery in the world and which had its own railway station. The pottery pioneered use of machines in making potteries as opposed to hand production. In the 1890s the company went up-market and employed in-house designers. The period up to the Second World War was the most profitable with a constant stream of new designs being introduced. However, after the war, production gradually declined and the company closed in 1963.
Expansion of the city
Newcastle was one of the boroughs reformed by the Municipal Corporations Act 1835: the reformed municipal borough included the parishes of Byker, Elswick, Heaton, Jesmond, Newcastle All Saints, Newcastle St Andrew, Newcastle St John, Newcastle St Nicholas, and Westgate. The urban districts of Benwell and Fenham and Walker were added in 1904. In 1935, Newcastle gained Kenton and parts of the parishes of West Brunton, East Denton, Fawdon, Longbenton. The most recent expansion in Newcastle's boundaries took place under the Local Government Act 1972 on 1 April 1974, when Newcastle became a metropolitan borough, also including the urban districts of Gosforth and Newburn, and the parishes of Brunswick, Dinnington, Hazlerigg, North Gosforth and Woolsington from the Castle Ward Rural District, and the village of Westerhope.
Meanwhile Northumberland County Council was formed under the Local Government Act 1888 and benefited from a dedicated meeting place when County Hall was completed in the Castle Garth area of Newcastle in 1910. Following the Local Government Act 1972 County Hall relocated to Morpeth in April 1981.
Twentieth century
In 1925 work began on a new high-level road bridge to span the Tyne Gorge between Newcastle and Gateshead. The capacity of the existing High-Level Bridge and Swing Bridge were being strained to the limit, and an additional bridge had been discussed for a long time. The contract was awarded to the Dorman Long Company and the bridge was finally opened by King George V in 1928. The road deck was 84 feet (26 m) above the river and was supported by a 531 feet (162 m) steel arch. The new Tyne Bridge quickly became a symbol for Newcastle and Tyneside, and remains so today.
During the Second World War, Newcastle was largely spared the horrors inflicted upon other British cities bombed during the Blitz. Although the armaments factories and shipyards along the River Tyne were targeted by the Luftwaffe, they largely escaped unscathed. Manors goods yard and railway terminal, to the east of the city centre, and the suburbs of Jesmond and Heaton suffered bombing during 1941. There were 141 deaths and 587 injuries, a relatively small figure compared to the casualties in other industrial centres of Britain.
In 1963 the city gained its own university, the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, by act of parliament. A School of Medicine and Surgery had been established in Newcastle in 1834. This eventually developed into a college of medicine attached to Durham University. A college of physical science was also founded and became Armstrong College in 1904. In 1934 the two colleges merged to become King's College, Durham. This remained as part of Durham University until the new university was created in 1963. In 1992 the city gained its second university when Newcastle Polytechnic was granted university status as Northumbria University.
Newcastle City Council moved to the new Newcastle Civic Centre in 1968.
As heavy industries declined in the second half of the 20th century, large sections of the city centre were demolished along with many areas of slum housing. The leading political figure in the city during the 1960s was T. Dan Smith who oversaw a massive building programme of highrise housing estates and authorised the demolition of a quarter of the Georgian Grainger Town to make way for Eldon Square Shopping Centre. Smith's control in Newcastle collapsed when it was exposed that he had used public contracts to advantage himself and his business associates and for a time Newcastle became a byword for civic corruption as depicted in the films Get Carter and Stormy Monday and in the television series Our Friends in the North. However, much of the historic Grainger Town area survived and was, for the most part, fully restored in the late 1990s. Northumberland Street, initially the A1, was gradually closed to traffic from the 1970s and completely pedestrianised by 1998.
In 1978 a new rapid transport system, the Metro, was built, linking the Tyneside area. The system opened in August 1980. A new bridge was built to carry the Metro across the river between Gateshead and Newcastle. This was the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge, commonly known as the Metro Bridge. Eventually the Metro system was extended to reach Newcastle Airport in 1991, and in 2002 the Metro system was extended to the nearby city of Sunderland.
As the 20th century progressed, trade on the Newcastle and Gateshead quaysides gradually declined, until by the 1980s both sides of the river were looking rather derelict. Shipping company offices had closed along with offices of firms related to shipping. There were also derelict warehouses lining the riverbank. Local government produced a master plan to re-develop the Newcastle quayside and this was begun in the 1990s. New offices, restaurants, bars and residential accommodation were built and the area has changed in the space of a few years into a vibrant area, partially returning the focus of Newcastle to the riverside, where it was in medieval times.
The Gateshead Millennium Bridge, a foot and cycle bridge, 26 feet (7.9 m) wide and 413 feet (126 m) long, was completed in 2001. The road deck is in the form of a curve and is supported by a steel arch. To allow ships to pass, the whole structure, both arch and road-deck, rotates on huge bearings at either end so that the road deck is lifted. The bridge can be said to open and shut like a human eye. It is an important addition to the re-developed quayside area, providing a vital link between the Newcastle and Gateshead quaysides.
Recent developments
Today the city is a vibrant centre for office and retail employment, but just a short distance away there are impoverished inner-city housing estates, in areas originally built to provide affordable housing for employees of the shipyards and other heavy industries that lined the River Tyne. In the 2010s Newcastle City Council began implementing plans to regenerate these depressed areas, such as those along the Ouseburn Valley.