Pat Rooney and Michael Palin in a book shop on 42nd Street in New York on the 6th June 2005. Normally I would not allow the big stars in entertainment to have their photo taken with me. As Michael is a nice guy and we had a few things in common, like travel, I relented and was delighted and it made his day.

Seriously, he is a gentleman and a lovely guy and it was just a bit of luck that I met him as he had finished signing his latest book. I came into the book shop almost by accident. We had a chat he told me he was off in a few weeks to stay in Lismore Castle in Waterford.

Michael Edward Palin, CBE, FRGS ( born 5 May 1943) is an English comedian, actor, writer and television presenter best known for being one of the members of the comedy group Monty Python and for his travel documentaries. Palin wrote most of his comedic material with Terry Jones. Before Monty Python, they had worked on other shows such as the Ken Dodd Show, The Frost Report and Do Not Adjust Your Set. Palin appeared in some of the most famous Python sketches, including "Argument Clinic", "Dead Parrot", "The Lumberjack Song", "The Spanish Inquisition", and "The Fish-Slapping Dance".

Palin continued to work with Jones after Python, co-writing Ripping Yarns. He has also appeared in several films directed by fellow Python Terry Gilliam and made notable appearances in other films such as A Fish Called Wanda, for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.[1] In a 2005 poll to find The Comedians' Comedian, he was voted the 30th favourite by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.[2]

After Python, he began a new career as a travel writer and travel documentarian. His journeys have taken him across the world, including the North and South Poles, the Sahara Desert, the Himalayas, Eastern Europe and, most recently, Brazil. In 2000 Palin was honoured as a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for his services to television.[3] From 2009 to 2012 Palin was the president of the Royal Geographical Society.[4] On 12 May 2013, Palin was made a BAFTA fellow, the highest honour that is conferred by the organisation.[5]

Early life and career[edit]

Palin was born in Broomhill, Sheffield, West Riding of Yorkshire, the second child and only son of Mary Rachel Lockhart (née Ovey) and Edward Moreton Palin.[6][7] His father was a Shrewsbury School and Cambridge-educated engineer working for a steel firm.[8] His maternal grandfather, Lieutenant-Colonel Richard Lockhart Ovey, DSO, was High Sheriff of Oxfordshire in 1927.[9] He started his education at Birkdale Preparatory School, Sheffield, and later Shrewsbury School. His sister Angela was nine years older than he was. Despite the age gap the two had a close relationship until her suicide in 1987.[8][10] He has ancestral roots in Letterkenny, County Donegal.[11]

When he was five years old, Palin had his first acting experience at Birkdale playing Martha Cratchit in a school performance of A Christmas Carol. At the age of 10, Palin, still interested in acting, made a comedy monologue and read a Shakespeare play to his mother while playing all the parts.[12] After his school days in 1962 he went on to read modern history at Brasenose College, Oxford. With fellow student Robert Hewison he performed and wrote, for the first time, comedy material at a university Christmas party.[13] Terry Jones, also a student in Oxford, saw that performance and began writing together with Hewison and Palin.[12] In the same year Palin joined the Brightside and Carbrook Co-Operative Society Players and first gained fame when he won an acting award at a Co-Op drama festival.[14] He also performed and wrote in the Oxford Revue (called the Et ceteras) with Jones.[15]

In 1966 he married Helen Gibbins, whom he first met in 1959 on holiday in Southwold in Suffolk.[8] This meeting was later fictionalised in Palin's play East of Ipswich.[16] The couple have three children and a grandchild. His youngest child, Rachel (b. 1975) is a BBC TV director, whose work includes MasterChef: The Professionals, shown on BBC2 throughout October and November 2010.[17][18] While still a baby, his son William briefly appeared in Monty Python and the Holy Grail as "Sir Not-appearing-in-this-film". His nephew is the theatre designer Jeremy Herbert.[citation needed]

After finishing university in 1965 Palin became a presenter on a comedy pop show called Now! for the television contractor Television Wales and the West.[19] At the same time Palin was contacted by Jones, who had left university a year earlier, for assistance in writing a theatrical documentary about sex through the ages.[20] Although this project was eventually abandoned, it brought Palin and Jones together as a writing duo and led them to write comedy for various BBC programmes, such as The Ken Dodd Show, The Billy Cotton Bandshow, and The Illustrated Weekly Hudd.[21] They collaborated in writing lyrics for an album by Barry Booth called Diversions. They were also in the team of writers working for The Frost Report, whose other members included Frank Muir, Barry Cryer, Marty Feldman, Ronnie Barker, Ronnie Corbett, Dick Vosburgh and future Monty Python members Graham Chapman, John Cleese and Eric Idle. Although the members of Monty Python had already encountered each other over the years, The Frost Report was the first time all the British members of Monty Python (its sixth member, Terry Gilliam, was at that time an American citizen) worked together.[8] During the run of The Frost Report the Palin/Jones team contributed material to two shows starring John Bird: The Late Show and A series of Bird's. For A series of Bird's the Palin/Jones team had their first experience of writing narrative instead of the short sketches they were accustomed to conceiving.[22]

Following The Frost Report the Palin/Jones team worked both as actors and writers on the show Twice a Fortnight with Graeme Garden, Bill Oddie and Jonathan Lynn, and the successful children's comedy show Do Not Adjust Your Set with Idle and David Jason. The show also featured musical numbers by the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, including future Monty Python musical collaborator Neil Innes. The animations for Do Not Adjust Your Set were made by Terry Gilliam. Eager to work with Palin[23] sans Jones, Cleese later asked him to perform in How to Irritate People together with Chapman and Tim Brooke-Taylor. The Palin/Jones team were reunited for The Complete and Utter History of Britain.

During this period Cleese contacted Palin about doing the show that would ultimately become Monty Python's Flying Circus.[8] On the strength of their work on The Frost Report and other programmes, Cleese and Chapman had been offered a show by the BBC, but Cleese was reluctant to do a two-man show for various reasons, among them Chapman's reputedly difficult personality. At the same time the success of Do Not Adjust Your Set had led Palin, Jones, Idle and Gilliam to be offered their own series and, while it was still in production, Palin agreed to Cleese's proposal and brought along Idle, Jones and Gilliam. Thus the formation of the Monty Python troupe has been referred to as a result of Cleese's desire to work with Palin and the chance circumstances that brought the other four members into the fold.[24]

Monty Python[edit]

Main article: Monty Python

In Monty Python, Palin played various roles, which ranged from manic enthusiasm (such as the lumberjack of the Lumberjack Song, or Herbert Anchovy, host of the game show "Blackmail") to unflappable calmness (such as the Dead Parrot vendor, Cheese Shop proprietor, or Postal Clerk). As a straight man he was often a foil to the rising ire of characters portrayed by John Cleese. He also played timid, socially inept characters such as Arthur Putey, the man who sits idly by as a marriage counsellor (Eric Idle) makes love to his wife (Carol Cleveland), and Mr. Anchovy, a chartered accountant who wants to become a lion tamer. He also appeared as the "It's" man at the beginning of most episodes.

Palin frequently co-wrote sketches with Terry Jones and also initiated the "Spanish Inquisition sketch", which included the catchphrase "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!" He also composed songs with Jones including "The Lumberjack Song", "Every Sperm is Sacred" and "Spam". His solo musical compositions included "Decomposing Composers" and "Finland".[25]

Other work[edit]

After the Monty Python television series ended in 1974, the Palin/Jones team worked on Ripping Yarns, an intermittent television comedy series broadcast over three years from 1976. They had earlier collaborated on the play Secrets from the BBC series Black and Blue in 1973. He starred as Dennis the Peasant in Terry Gilliam's 1977 film Jabberwocky. Palin also appeared in All You Need Is Cash (1978) as Eric Manchester (based on Derek Taylor), the press agent for the Rutles.

In 1980, Palin co-wrote Time Bandits with Terry Gilliam. He also acted in the film.

In 1982, Palin wrote and starred in The Missionary, co-starring Maggie Smith. In it, he plays the Reverend Charles Fortescue, who is recalled from Africa to aid prostitutes.

In 1984, he reunited with Terry Gilliam to appear in Brazil. He appeared in the comedy film A Fish Called Wanda, for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.[1] Cleese reunited the main cast almost a decade later to make Fierce Creatures.

After filming for Fierce Creatures finished, Palin went on a travel journey for a BBC documentary and, returning a year later, found that the end of Fierce Creatures had failed at test screenings and had to be reshot.

Apart from Fierce Creatures, Palin's last film role was a small part in The Wind in the Willows, a film directed by and starring Terry Jones. Palin also appeared with John Cleese in his documentary, The Human Face. Palin was in the cast of You've Got Mail, the Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan romantic comedy as a subplot novelist, but his role was eventually cut entirely.[26]

He also assisted Campaign for Better Transport and others with campaigns on sustainable transport, particularly those relating to urban areas, and has been president of the campaign since 1986.[27]

Palin has also appeared in serious drama. In 1991 Palin worked as producer and actor in the film American Friends based upon a real event in the life of his great grandfather, a fellow at St John's College, Oxford.[28] In that same year he also played the part of a headmaster in Alan Bleasdale's Channel 4 drama series G.B.H..

Palin also had a small cameo role in Australian soap opera Home and Away. He played an English surfer with a fear of sharks, who interrupts a conversation between two main characters to ask whether there were any sharks in the sea. This was filmed while he was in Australia for the Full Circle series, with a segment about the filming of the role featuring in the series.

In November 2005, he appeared in the John Peel's Record Box documentary.[29]

Michael Palin, Nightingale House, November 2010

In 2013 Michael Palin appeared in a new First World War drama titled The Wiper Times written by Ian Hislop and Nick Newman.[30

Television documentaries[edit]

Travel[edit]

Palin's first travel documentary was part of the 1980 BBC Television series Great Railway Journeys of the World, in which, humorously reminiscing about his childhood hobby of train spotting, he travelled throughout the UK by train, from London to the Kyle of Lochalsh, via Manchester, York, Newcastle upon Tyne, Edinburgh and Inverness. At the Kyle of Lochalsh, Palin bought the station's long metal platform sign and is seen lugging it back to London with him.

In 1994, Palin travelled through Ireland for the same series, entitled "Derry to Kerry". In a quest for family roots, he attempted to trace his great grandmother – Brita Gallagher – who set sail from Ireland 150 years ago during the Great Famine (1845–1849), bound for a new life in Burlington, New Jersey. The series is a trip along the Palin family line.

Starting in 1989, Palin appeared as presenter in a series of travel programmes made for the BBC. It was after the veteran TV globetrotter Alan Whicker and journalist Miles Kington turned down presenting the first of these, Around the World in 80 Days, that gave Palin the opportunity to present his first and subsequent travel shows.[31] These programmes have been broadcast around the world in syndication, and were also sold on VHS tape and later on DVD:

Michael Palin: Around the World in 80 Days (Travel 1988; Programme release 1989): travelling as closely as possible the path described in the famous Jules Verne story without using aircraft.

Pole to Pole (Travel 1991; Programme release 1992): travelling from the North Pole to the South Pole, following as closely as possible the 30 degree line of longitude, over as much land as possible, i.e., through Europe and Africa.

Full Circle with Michael Palin (Travel 1996/97; Programme release 1997): in which he circumnavigated the lands around the Pacific Ocean anti-clockwise; a journey of almost 50,000 miles (80,000 km) starting on Little Diomede Island in the Bering Strait and taking him through Asia, Oceania and the Americas.

Michael Palin's Hemingway Adventure (1999): retracing the footsteps of Ernest Hemingway through the United States, Europe, Africa and the Caribbean.

Sahara with Michael Palin (Travel 2001/02; Programme release 2002): in which he trekked around and through the world's largest desert.

Himalaya with Michael Palin (Travel 2003/04; Programme release 2004): in which he travels through the Himalaya region.

Michael Palin's New Europe (Travel 2006/07; Programme release 2007): in which he travels through Central and Eastern Europe.

Brazil with Michael Palin (2012) in which he travels through Brazil.

Following each trip, Palin wrote a book about his travels, providing information and insights not included in the TV programme. Each book is illustrated with photographs by Basil Pao, the stills photographer who was on the team. (Exception: the first book, Around the World in 80 Days, contains some pictures by Pao but most are by other photographers.)

All seven of these books were also made available as audio books, and all of them are read by Palin himself. Around the World in 80 Days and Hemingway Adventure are unabridged, while the other four books were made in both abridged and unabridged versions, although the unabridged versions can be very difficult to find.[citation needed]

For four of the trips a photography book was made by Pao, each with an introduction written by Palin. These are large coffee-table style books with pictures printed on glossy paper. The majority of the pictures are of various people encountered on the trip, as informal portraits or showing them engaged in some interesting activity. Some of the landscape photos are displayed as two-page spreads.

Palin's travel programmes are responsible for a phenomenon termed the "Palin effect": areas of the world that he has visited suddenly become popular tourist attractions – for example, the significant increase in the number of tourists interested in Peru after Palin visited Machu Picchu.[32] In a 2006 survey of "15 of the world's top travel writers" by The Observer, Palin named Peru's Pongo de Mainique (canyon below the Machu Picchu) his "favourite place in the world".[33]

Palin notes in his book of Around the World in 80 Days that the final leg of his journey would originally have taken him and his crew on one of the trains involved in the Clapham Junction rail crash, but they arrived ahead of schedule and caught an earlier train.

Art and history[edit]

In recent years, Palin has written and presented occasional documentary programmes on artists that interest him. The first, on Scottish painter Anne Redpath, was Palin on Redpath in 1997. In The Bright Side of Life (2000), Palin continued on a Scottish theme, looking at the work of the Scottish Colourists. Two further programmes followed on European painters; Michael Palin and the Ladies Who Loved Matisse (2004) and Michael Palin and the Mystery of Hammershøi (2005), about the French artist Henri Matisse and Danish artist Vilhelm Hammershøi respectively. The DVD Michael Palin on Art contains all these documentaries except for the Matisse programme.

In November 2008, Palin presented a First World War documentary about Armistice Day, 11 November 1918, when thousands of soldiers lost their lives in battle after the war had officially ended. Palin filmed on the battlefields of Northern France and Belgium for the programme, called the Last Day of World War One, produced for the BBC's Timewatch series.[34]

Activism[edit]

In July 2010, Palin sent a message of support for the Dongria Kondh tribe of India, who are resisting a mine on their land by the company Vedanta Resources. Palin said, "I’ve been to the Nyamgiri Hills in Orissa and seen the forces of money and power that Vedanta Resources have arrayed against a people who have occupied their land for thousands of years, who husband the forest sustainably and make no great demands on the state or the government. The tribe I visited simply want to carry on living in the villages that they and their ancestors have always lived in".[35]

On 2 January 2011, Palin became the first person to sign the UK-based Campaign for Better Transport's Fair Fares Now campaign.

Recognition[edit]

Class 153, no. 153335 'Michael Palin' at Cambridge.

Each member of Monty Python has an asteroid named after him. Palin's is Asteroid 9621 Michaelpalin.[36]

In honour of his achievements as a traveller, especially rail travel, Palin has two British trains named after him. In 2002, Virgin Trains' new £5 million high speed Super Voyager train number 221130 was named "Michael Palin" – it carries his name externally and a plaque is located adjacent to the onboard shop with information on Palin and his many journeys.[37] Also, National Express East Anglia named a British Rail Class 153 (unit number 153335) after him. In 2008, he received the James Joyce Award of the Literary and Historical Society in Dublin.

Palin was instrumental in setting up the Michael Palin Centre for Stammering Children in 1993.[38]

In recognition of his services to the promotion of geography, Palin was awarded the Livingstone Medal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society in March 2009, along with a Fellowship to the Society.[39] In June 2013, he was similarly honoured in Canada with a gold medal for achievements in geography by the Royal Canadian Geographical Society.[40]

In June 2009, Palin was elected for a three-year term as President of the Royal Geographical Society.[41]

Because of his self-described "amenable, conciliatory character" Michael Palin has been referred to as unofficially "Britain's Nicest Man."[42

Bibliography[edit]

Travel books[edit]

Around the World in 80 Days (1989) ISBN 0-563-20826-0

Pole to Pole (1992) ISBN 0-563-37065-3

Full Circle (1997) ISBN 0-563-37121-8

Michael Palin's Hemingway Adventure (1999) ISBN 0-297-82528-3

Sahara (2002) ISBN 0-297-84303-6

Himalaya (2004) ISBN 0-297-84371-0

New Europe (2007) ISBN 0-297-84449-0

Brazil (2012) ISBN 0-297-86626-5

All his travel books can be read at no charge, complete and unabridged, on his website.

Autobiography (contributor)[edit]

The Pythons Autobiography by The Pythons (2003) ISBN 0-7528-5293-0

Diaries[edit]

Diaries 1969–1979: The Python Years. 2006. ISBN 0-297-84436-9

Diaries 1980–1988: Halfway to Hollywood – The Film Years. London, Weidenfeld & Nicolson. 2009. ISBN 978-0-297-84440-2

Fiction[edit]

Hemingway's chair (1995) ISBN 0-7493-1930-5

Bert Fegg's Nasty Book for Boys and Girls w/Terry Jones, illus Martin Honeysett, Frank Bellamy et al. (1974) ISBN 0-413-32740-X

Dr Fegg's Encyclopaedia of all world knowledge (1984) (expanded reprint of the above, with Terry Jones and Martin Honeysett) ISBN 0-87226-005-4

The Truth (2012) ISBN 978-0297860211

Children's books[edit]

Small Harry and the Toothache Pills (1982) ISBN 0-416-23690-1

Limerics or The Limerick Book (1985) ISBN 0-09-161540-2

Cyril and the House of Commons (1986) ISBN 1-85145-078-5

Cyril and the Dinner Party (1986) ISBN 1-85145-069-6

The Mirrorstone with Alan Lee and Richard Seymour (1986) ISBN 0-224-02408-6

Plays[edit]

The Weekend (1994) ISBN 0-413-68940-9

Television[edit]

Now! (October 1965 – middle 1966)

The Ken Dodd Show

Billy Cotton Bandshow

The Illustrated Weekly Hudd

The Frost Report. (10 March 1966 – 29 June 1967)

The Late Show (15 October 1966 – 1 April 1967)

A Series of Bird's (1967) (3 October 1967 – 21 November 1967 screenwriter (guest stars)

Twice a Fortnight (21 October 1967 – 23 December 1967)

Do Not Adjust Your Set (26 December 1967 – 14 May 1969)

Broaden Your Mind (1968)

How to Irritate People (1968)

Marty (TV series) (1968)

The Complete and Utter History of Britain (1969)

Monty Python's Flying Circus (5 October 1969 – 5 December 1974)

Saturday Night Live (Hosted 8 April 1978 with Musical Guest Eugene Record, and 27 January 1979 with The Doobie Brothers)

Ripping Yarns (1976–1979)

Great Railway Journeys of the World, episode title "Confessions of a Trainspotter" (1980)

East of Ipswich (1987) writer

Michael Palin: Around the World in 80 Days (1989)

GBH (1991)

Pole to Pole (1992)

Great Railway Journeys, episode title "Derry to Kerry" (1994)

The Wind in the Willows (1995)

The Willows in Winter (1996)

Full Circle with Michael Palin (1997)

Palin On Redpath (1997)

Michael Palin's Hemingway Adventure (1999)

Michael Palin On... The Colourists (2000)

Sahara with Michael Palin (2002)

Life on Air (2002)

Himalaya with Michael Palin (2004)

Michael Palin's New Europe (2007)

Around the World in 20 Years (30 December 2008)

Brazil with Michael Palin (2012)

Awards[edit]

BAFTA Awards[edit]

1984 Nominated – BAFTA Award for "Best Original Song" (the award was discontinued after the 1985 ceremonies) for Every Sperm is Sacred from The Meaning of Life (shared with André Jacquemin, Dave Howman and Terry Jones)

1989 Won – BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for A Fish Called Wanda (as Ken Pile)[43]

1992 Nominated – British Academy Television Award for Best Actor for G.B.H.

2005 Won – BAFTA Special Award

2009 Won – BAFTA Special Award as part of the Monty Python team for outstanding contribution to film and television[44]

2013 Won – BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award[45][46

References[edit]

^ Jump up to: a b "Film Nominations 1988". BAFTA. Retrieved 11 January 2008.

Jump up ^ Michael Palin Biography Yahoo.com. Retrieved 7 May 2012

Jump up ^ "Trio of Dames lead showbiz honours". BBC News. 31 December 1999. Retrieved 15 August 2006.

Jump up ^ People & Staff Royal Geographical Society. Retrieved 24 June 2012

Jump up ^ "Michael Palin To Receive Academy Fellowship At The Arqiva British Academy Television Awards".

Jump up ^ Nick Barratt (11 November 2006). "Family detective". The Daily Telegraph (UK). Retrieved 25 October 2008.

Jump up ^ "Michael Palin Biography (1943–)". Filmreference.com. Retrieved 2011-06-01.

^ Jump up to: a b c d e Chalmers, Robert (29 July 2012). "The dark knight rises: Perhaps Michael Palin isn’t the nicest chap in Britain after all...". The Independent. Retrieved 14 August 2012.

Jump up ^ The Pythons Autobiography by The Pythons, pg. 31

Jump up ^ "The wandering man". Thestandard.com.hk. Retrieved 2011-06-01.[dead link]

Jump up ^ "First Letterkenny heritage magazine launched". Donegal News. 14 March 2013. Retrieved 14 March 2013. "Over 100 people attended the official launch of Letterkenny Community Heritage Group’s new magazine in the Station House Hotel this week. [...] Did you know that Michael Palin of Monty Python fame has ancestral roots in the town?"

^ Jump up to: a b Ross, 200

Jump up ^ Michael Palin biography[dead link]

Jump up ^ "ABC TV Documentaries: Sahara episode 3/4". Australian Broadcasting Company. Retrieved 2 September 2006.

Jump up ^ Desert Island Discs, Radio 4, Sat 17 November 1979 - www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/desert-island-discs/castawa...

Jump up ^ Ross, 57

Jump up ^ Warman, Anna. "Travelling with Michael Palin". Retrieved 14 August 2006.

Jump up ^ "Home truths on Wanderlust". Camden New Yournal. 27 September 2007. Retrieved 7 September 2008.

Jump up ^ Michael Palin by John Oliver at BFI Screen Online, URL accessed 13 December 2006

Jump up ^ Hodgkinson, Tom (2006). "In Conversation with Michael Palin". The Idler. Retrieved 20 December 2006.

Jump up ^ Biography at Pythonet.org, URL accessed 17 December 2006

Jump up ^ "A Series Of Bird's". BBC Guide to Comedy. Retrieved 16 September 2006.

Jump up ^ Ross, 91

Jump up ^ The Pythons Autobiography By The Pythons; Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, John Chapman, David Sherlock, Bob McCabe; Thomas Dunne Books; 2003

Jump up ^ Monty Python Sings - Monty Python : Songs, Reviews, Credits, Awards : AllMusic

Jump up ^ "NEWS 1999_01_17 - Michael Palin Dropped From Final Print of Hanks/Ryan Romantic Comedy". Daily Llama. Retrieved 2011-06-01.

Jump up ^ Campaign for Better Transport website[dead link]

Jump up ^ American Friends at Rotten Tomatoes.com, URL accessed 13 December 2006

Jump up ^ "John Peel's Record Box", 2005

Jump up ^ "Python Palin stars in BBC WWI drama". BBC News. Retrieved 2 July 2013.

Jump up ^ Vestey, Michael (6 August 2005). "Watching over Whicker". Findarticles.com. Retrieved 25 October 2008.[dead link]

Jump up ^ Webster, Ben (14 January 2005). "Globetrotter Palin brought down to earth by eco-lobby". The Times (London). Retrieved 14 August 2006.

Jump up ^ Wilkinson, Carl (8 January 2006). "My favourite place in the world". The Observer (UK). Retrieved 18 August 2007.

Jump up ^ "Timewatch – The Last Day of World War One". BBC. Retrieved 1 November 2008.

Jump up ^ Michael Palin sends message to support Dongria Kondh, Survival International

Jump up ^ "JPL Small-Body Database Browser". Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Retrieved 17 October 2006.

Jump up ^ Virgin Trains, URL accessed 13 December 2006

Jump up ^ "Palin's centre for stammerers wins £340,000 grant". Retrieved 9 September 2008.

Jump up ^ "Royal Scottish Geographical Society: Medals & Awards". Retrieved 29 January 2010.

Jump up ^ Ouzounian, Richard (26 June 2013). "Michael Palin, from Monty Python to travel series host". The Toronto Star. Retrieved 26 June 2013.

Jump up ^ "Michael Palin announced as new president of Royal Geographical Society (with IBG)". Retrieved 25 November 2009.

Jump up ^ Lee, Marc (24 August 2009). "Michael Palin: he's not a Messiah, just a very nice man". The Daily Telegraph (London).

Jump up ^ "BAFTA Film Awards - Best Supporting Actor 1989". BAFTA.

Jump up ^ "Monty Python Special Award". Retrieved 20 October 2009.[dead link]

Jump up ^ "TV Baftas 2013: all the winners". The Guardian. 12 May 2013.

Jump up ^ "Michael Palin To Receive Academy Fellowship At The Arqiva British Academy Television Awards". BAFTA.

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In the 1980s and early 90s it was really quite difficult to see either a Little Egret or a Great White Egret in Britain. What a difference a few decades has made. Now both have become widespread and are established annual breeders. Who'd-a-thunk that you can now wander locally and see both species on the same pond!

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This week's Saturday Flashback recalls the heyday of rice production in America's south. Before Houston's population explosion and dramatic urban expansion in recent decades, it was apparently quite easy to see rice production not that far out of town. It still just about exists but very much reduced and further from the centre.

The building in the photo remains as a reminder of all the processing and distribution that took place after the twice-yearly harvest. It is situated in Jacinto City, close to the Houston Ship Channel and a myriad of rail freight lines. I cannot find exactly when it was abandoned. However, an internet photo indicates it may not have been not much more than a decade ago. Another photo suggests that silos on the near side of the elevator tower have been demolished since 2005.

A company called "American Rice Inc" still operates elsewhere in Houston and I do wonder if they bought out Texas Rice Inc and in doing so closed this particular plant?

From an unknown date and an unknown photographer, this is a photo of Jesty's at 1, Straits, Easton, Isle of Portland. Compare and contrast to the photo of the same address today and you can see that the only external feature that survives is the first floor window.

At some point, a building extension has been added filling in the gap where the gate behind the cart used to be. This must have happened in relatively recent times as the gates were still there when "Portland Spice", a business previous to todays' Chinese takeaway occupied the site.

EDIT : Note that things have moved on and my comparison building immediately below is incorrect. It is across the street from "Flavour of Asia" correctly identified by David!

I always say that I am by no means a fossil expert.

However, as far as I know, this week's Saturday Timewatch features a fossilised oyster (Deltoidium delta) from Ringstead Bay, Dorset. These are by far the easiest fossils to find at the site, either washed out onto the beach or sticking out of the mud just above the foreshore.

However, most are either broken or only have one half of the bivalve. Photographed in situ emerging from the muds of time, the example above was unusual and impressive in that it had both halves of the oyster still together. The length is approximately 5" / 12cms and the width 4" / 10cms. Once removed from the mud, it was rather flatter than it appears in the photo with the maximum depth being 1" / 2cms.

It was a good find!

Given this bustling scene in this fascinating photo, you wouldn't know this was the dustbowl decade. This week's Saturday Timewatch features the downtown area of the small town of Rusk, TX, on June 12th 1934 when the population was around 4000, about 1000 less than the current population.

Established by an act of the Texas Legislature on April 11, 1846, Rusk was named after Thomas Jefferson Rusk. 10 years earlier he had signed the Texas Declaration of Independence.........from Mexico.

Other claims to fame?? Not too many but according to Wiki it does have the longest footbridge in the nation. I thought you'd like to know that.

PS : Can any of the vehicle aficionados identify the cars?

There are several interpretations as to how the tiny Dorset hamlet of Poxwell got its name. A popular one is to do with the Black Death plague of the 14th century. However, the settlement seems to go back many hundreds of years before that.

Some say Poxwell is named after a tribesman 'Poca' who lived on the hill, the 'well' coming from the old English 'swelle' meaning hill. Others that the derivation is 'Puck's Well'. Wiki recklons the name originates from the ‘Pokes well’ – a well dating from the period when occupied by the Romans in the 1st century which is located on a hillside in the village. The hamlet is named Pocheswelle in the Domesday Book of 1086.

So take your pick! This water conduit, no longer in use, lies alongside the main road that now runs through the hamlet.

Taken on the westbound platform at Bath Spa Station, the metal signage on the bench legs seemed different and older than on other Great Western Railway benches.

Do any of the railway bods know if this is the original God's Wonderful Railway GWR design??

We are back in England but photos from our Texas visit will continue to appear, hopefully mixed in with some new photos from Dorset.

We stayed three nights in an Argosy trailer. I was not familiar with the brand but soon discovered it had many similarities to the more famous Airstream and was effectively manufactured by the same company. It was marketed as a somewhat cheaper version to the Airstream in the 1970s and 1980s.

I was delighted to find an original sales document on the inside of a cupboard. I have no idea why it wasn't filled in and returned during the purchase.

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This photo was taken in the loo at Middleport Pottery, Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent. As I understand it, although Middleport is currently being turned into a 'working museum' this artefact is still in use today because previous owners took the view that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. So around what little of the works you can currently visit there are some things left that got put in decades ago and never got taken out!

I can't find any information about this particular product though the company,Keeling and Walker, still exist. Does anyone have any idea what date this would be from?

The photo for this week's "Saturday Flashback" was only taken a few weeks ago. However, it illustrates a traditional Japanese Shinto wedding, where layer after layer of clothing and ceremonial custom have literally built up over centuries. The bride is dressed in what I understand to be "shiromuku" style. She is all in white because just like in the west, white represents pureness, cleanliness, virginity. Meanwhile the groom is also in a very traditional black and white. Note how one of the attendants is bowing as the wedding party passes.

Open just four nights a week, Holman Valley Steakhouse is situated at the lonely t-junction of Farm Roads 155 and 1965, some 12 miles south of La Grange. It is pretty much in the middle of nowhere. Locally owned and staffed, they offer classic country cooking straight out of the last century, all at a sensible price. It is genuine homemade food. Nothing fancy. Steaks, burgers, chicken fried steak or fried catfish with traditional sides such as corn or black-eyed peas. Buttermilk Pie for dessert.

No. 31806 waits at Corfe Castle. She is about to head down to Swanage in reverse. I always think it is good to see engines running along their original routes and this is the case here. To quote from Swanage Railway's website "No. 31806 used to run down to Corfe Castle and Swanage during the British Railways days of the 1950s and is the quintessential Southern Railway branch line locomotive"

Life so often gets in the way of ongoing projects. So it was nice today to spend an hour re-booting the Old and New Portland photo project.

This is just off Easton Square, Easton, Isle of Portland, dated around 120 years ago, photographer unknown. Look carefully at today's photo below and you can all the buildings are still intact, albeit updated in a variety of ways. For example, above what used to be E.Hoare's shop, a much larger upper window has been installed whilst the one next door (with the scaffolding) is currently being repaired and probably modernised.

The next shop along, with the Popular Lending Library upstairs is now an estate agency, Hull Gregson Hull, including a link with the Yorkshire Building Society. Note that unlike other properties, a stub of the old chimney has been retained.

Next along, what used to be a residential property is now Ukiyo. The front door has been moved from the centre to one side.

The last but one building in the row is very recognisable despite the modernisation. The end property has been converted from an unknown shop to residential, has lost the chimneys but has a loft window added.

Not visible in the photo but next to the end property is Foundry Close, surely an indication of previous industrial activity.

Duties : 1) Single-handed to maintain the one acre garden, paddock, greenhouse and conservatory 2) Clean knives and shoes 3) Cut wood for fires in house 4) Light boiler daily 5) Pump 500 strokes from well to fill water tank for household use and extra when guests visited 6) Store apples, pears, potatoes and onions in loft 7) Feed and slaughter when necessary the Rhode Island Red chickens and finally 8) sweep paths.

Pay and hours as described.

Another free visit during English Heritage Open week was to Thomas Hardy's house. Although it was primarily about Hardy, it was the lives of his employees, chambermaids, kitchen maids, gardener etc that really caught my attention.

The regulars might remember that we have always admired the short-lived spring blossom of a local cherry tree that we learned had a back story.....see here www.flickr.com/photos/99303089@N00/51984754383/

Now that back story has expanded! One of this week's local council candidates was delivering campaign leaflets. I immediately recognised the name 'Ross Skinner'. So instead of him 'doorstepping' me for political purposes, I doorstepped him to let him know how every year we enjoyed the cherry tree's blossom at the end of his driveway.

To cut a long story sideways, it was quite a surprise to discover in the conversation that the lady associated with the tree was also the author of several novels including "The Lighthouse Keeper" from 1965. An eBay search revealed one for sale at a reasonable price and here is the photo of the hardcover with a photo of the author shown below. I haven't got around to reading the book as yet but isn't it amazing how local village histories slowly reveal themselves bit by bit.

A dastardly challenge. What is this?

Notes :

The yellow and black in the background are irrelevant.

The competition will remain open until Monday evening UK time unless someone gets the answer before then.

Yes, I do know the answer!

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Today's *Saturday Flashback* is from 1974. It was taken in a small town near Tanger, Morocco.

(This is a weekly series of flashback photos. The above is scanned from a 35mm slide)

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Picture this! Sometime in the late-19th century, a Victorian explorer came down from London to Dorset, probably by train, undertaking an expedition to look for fossils. Wearing plus fours, maybe even a jacket, tie and waistcoat, one day he climbed part way up the cliff at Charmouth, which is perfectly possible where the land has slumped (see second photo below). After several hours searching around Black Ven, he took lunch on site, spreading a jar of anchovy paste onto biscuits. Lunch finished, he tossed the jar away. Over 100 years later the broken lid of the jar re-appeared, jutting out of the latest mudslide at the bottom of the cliff!

Apparently these jars are not that uncommon though finding one in good condition is unusual. Sadly, I could only find this half of a lid.

Starring in this weekend's Swanage Railway "Winter Warmer", this was our first opportunity to see and hear the sole survivor of the T3 class of locomotives. Originally entering service in March 1893 for the London and South Western Railway, 563 was the last of the class to be withdrawn from service in 1945. By that time she had covered 1.5 million miles including holiday trains from London Waterloo to Swanage.

Her 'preservation' years were convoluted. However, ending up at Swanage in 2017, serious restoration began and 6 years later, on t7th October 2023, 563 hauled her first passenger trains for the first time in three-quarters of a century.

In this photo, running tender first, 563 approaches Corfe Castle station.

This week's Saturday Flashback shows a postcard of Pontin's, Osmington Bay, nr Weymouth circa 1970s.

Taken at Brooks Camp area, Katmai.

Ammonites : from the sea and back to the ocean over 150 million years.

I am very far from an expert on geology or fossils. This is what I understand happened to the multitude of ammonites found along the Dorset coastline.

It began 200 million years ago when sea levels rose and transformed the Triassic desert into a shallow tropical sea. With the new marine habitats came a profusion of marine life and many of the animals living at the time are preserved as fossils. At Ringstead Bay, Dorset, it is mostly Kimmeridge Clay from the Upper Jurassic, dated by geologists as just over 150 million years old at this location.

Ammonites are an extinct group of molluscs most closely related to today’s squid, octopus and cuttlefish. Upon death, they fell to the seafloor and were gradually buried in accumulating sediment. Chemical conditions then allowed some to ‘survive’ as fossils, buried in rock for millions of years as geological conditions changed time and again.

The wheel turns full circle as Dorset’s present-day cliffs erode, eventually washing out the fossils at the shoreline. Whilst some ammonites at Ringstead are extremely robust and solid, as they are elsewhere along the coast, most at Ringstead are very fragile, such as can be seen in the photo. Once exposed they quickly return to the ocean as specks of matter.

It was quite unexpected on one of our regular local 'rurex' walks (to borrow Danny's word) to discover The Watercress Company's site at Warmwell Mill had closed down and was abandoned. Rurex we did!

We are guessing, but don't know for certain, that their neighbours, a very large holiday company, made them an offer for the land that they couldn't refuse. If correct, the holiday company could expand their operations onto this site with good access, large holiday homes, a bar and restaurant building and possibly a fishing lake where the cress beds have operated for years.

There are a selection of site exploration photos below.

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......it was 10 years ago today that I uploaded my first post to flickr. The photo was taken on June 18 2006 but uploaded on August 6th 2006.

The original is linked below. It didn't exactly take flickrworld by storm, with two comments and two faves and one of those was quite recent!

Apologies : The laptop screen photo is a bit dark, but heho.

Boiler Avenue, Spindletop, 1903.

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It is uncommon to find really good fossil specimens along our local Ringstead Beach, Dorset. These ammonite remains were the best of the bunch during a winter walk yesterday.

In the foreground, there is a nicely preserved compressed ammonite about the size of a 5 pence / 10 cent coin that is placed for comparison behind. The there is in a much larger rock full of unidentified micro fossils. Two larger fragments were also found. The partial ammonite to the right is the size of your middle finger. It was just visible jutting out from clay washed down off the cliffs during winter storms, but easy enough to carefully extract. The chunk further back is much larger again but poorly preserved. They are all approximately 150 million years old from the Jurassic era.

Saturday Timewatch features what many consider to be the golden age of rail travel in America, the 1950s. The above is a ticket cover from that era.

Lyle's Golden Syrup has been a British staple for well over a century. The logo and contents have been unchanged for 140 years whilst the classic tins have also been an ever-present for over a century, only changing into metric some decades ago..

Personally I was horrified when a plastic squeezy version of the product appeared in more recent times but fortunately the metal tin tradition has carried on. Interesting fact : Capt. Scott took a supply of Lyle's Golden Syrup on the ill-fated Antarctica expedition of 1910. Scott's stores were rediscovered in 1956 and guess what, the tins and contents were still in good condition!

I wonder how many of you were brought up on what in my family was always known as 'treacle' and still enjoy the occasional tin?

Originally called Liebig's Extract of Meat and Malt Wine , Wincarnis is a 17% fortified wine, still sold, apparently tastes like a sweet sherry. The modern version no longer contains meat!!

This Saturday's look back into history goes as far as World War 2. The photo shows a surviving Type 26 pillbox along the Dorset coast. I assume it is associated with both the transmitter system shown below and a heavy anti-aircraft battery at nearby Upton Fort. This stretch of the Dorset coastline was highly strategic for several reasons, not least the presence of numerous "landing" beaches that would have been suitable for the German cross-Channel invasion that never came. This location is also within easy sight of Portland where the harbour was attacked by German bombers.

PS : I would liked to have done a "then and now" photo to replicate the image below. However, without a plane it proved to be impossible to get a decent angle.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YQomR5xJ_Y

It amazes but pleases that 44 years after the release of "The Last Picture Show" small town theatres / cinemas in America still hang on.

Desert Theatre, Burns, Oregon, is one of them. Two more are shown below.

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El Nuevo Orden Mundial ha sido intentado por los dictadores con la fuerza militar. Asuntos que todo el mundo ha comprendido, y es que la fuerza militar no puede funcionar. No se puede crear una dictadura mundial con la fuerza militar.

Los Illuminatis desarrollaron un nuevo concepto para hacer posible una dictadura mundial. En lugar de forzar a los ciudadanos a adherirse a un nuevo orden mundial o una dictadura totalitaria mediante la fuerza militar es imposible porque los ciudadanos se rebelan siempre.

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La idea fue desarrollada por adam Weishaupt, -fundador de Illuminati-, de crear mucho caos, mucha violencia con el fin de atemorizar al mundo, para que los ciudadanos lleguen por si mismos a la conclusión de que hay demasiada violencia, demasiadas guerras y que la única solución posible es de crear un nuevo orden mundial.

Un nuevo Orden Mundial, formado por un gobiernmo único, un Ejército único, una sola moneda y todo sería para mejor, la paz mundial, pero es un engaño. Todo el caos creado hasta ahora ha sido dirigido con un sólo objetivo el de hacernos tener miedo y de aceptar un Nuevo Orden Mundial en el cual tendrán un control total así como una inmensa dictadura.

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Los Illuminatis, organizaron y financiaron minuciosamente las guerras, revoluciones,

y las recesiones para después poder crear un Nuevo Orden Mundial y nuevas leyes.

Es una de las más antiguas tácticas puestas en marcha.-

1.- ♥ _Operación Gladio 1 - Los Jefes De Los Anillos_♥ Con subtítulos en español. Producción original de la BBC sobre esta estructura criminal nazi de la OTAN

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2.- ♥ _Timewatch, Operación Gladio: Segunda Parte_♥ Con subtítulos en español.

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3.- ♥ _Timewatch, Operación Gladio: Tercera Parte_♥ Con subtítulos en español.

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Producciones de periodismo de investigación que contradice todas las actividades de propaganda vertidas en todos los medios de comunicación desde 1947 hasta nuestros días por los servicios de inteligencia de la alianza militar de la OTAN que ha infiltrado TODAS las instituciones judiciales, estatales de comunicación y de funcionamiento estatal con la organización político militar nazi World Anticommunist League, WACL. Organización terrorista militar nazi controlada por el último Secretario General conocido John K.- Singlaub, CIA operativo y Críminal de Guerra aún con vida jamás INVESTIGADO residente en Colorado, Estados Unidos de América.

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Video documental relacionado a CRIMENES DE GUERRA SIN AJUSTICIAR. Crímenes de guerra de la alianza militar de la OTAN con sus esbirros nazis en guerra.

VIDEO: LO QUE NO SABÍAS DE LA GUERRA SIONISTA...CLICK ON...CLICK ON

www.youtube.com/watch?v=mK12q9Nvci4

CLICK ON...CLICK ON....

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Este es el verdadero TERRORISMO!!. Este es el terrorismo de la OTAN nazificadora de las relaciones mundiales

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Tal como fuere practicado por las Tropas de las calaveras de Adolf Hitler son hoy las tropas militares nazificadas de Noruega, Reino Unido, Estados Unidos de América aplaudidas por la socialdemocracia internacional las que nazifican las relaciones sociales mundiales.

Colectividad política transnacional CRIMINAL y nazificadora de las relaciones sociales humanas. Organización política colaboradora de los Proyectos Nazis Internacionales del Pentágono MK ULTRA, MK NAOMI, MK SEARCH, MK DELTA y organización que ha dedicado TODOS SUS ESFUERZOS EN ESCAPAR DE LA JUSTICIA ORDINARIA.

La socialdemocracia está conformada por falsificadores profesionales que utilizan el sistema de Naciones Unidas en función de actividad de corrupción y prestigios privados y personales. Toda la política de la socialdemocracia internacional está conformada por actividad planificada militar de IMPUNIDAD.

La socialdemocracia internacional se mofa de Naciones Unidas y se rie del sistema de justicia mundial a gritos.

Organización y colectividad política comprometida en actividades de planificación de genocidios humanos, colaborado de las actividades nazis de la OTAN, organización colaboradora de los Proyectos de destrrucción humanas y que controla el cartel del petróleo.

Thanks to Kim's collage, this week's Saturday Timewatch continues our Somerset and Dorset Railway (S&D) four-year exploration as it gets very close to the Dorset / Somerset county border.

Stalbridge is a lovely small town that seems largely stuck in the 1970s and 80s. However, compared to other towns and villages along the S&D there is precious little to show that the famous old railway ever passed through. Apart from a tiny hump along Station Rd where the railway line crossed the road, (not shown here), this is all we could find.

Station Road speaks for itself. However, any remnant of the station and yard are long gone, only commemorated by the name of The Sidings industrial estate that is now located there. Shown of the left side of the collage, it is fortunate that you can still pick up the old line a couple of hundred yards north of Stalbridge and on the edge of town. It is now a farm track but sadly not a public right-of-way. The county border is pretty much where the horizon is. I may well show that location in a future post.

A very recent landslip on the cliffs at Ringstead Bay has revealed what must surely be a WW2 pillbox....or maybe not, as John has pointed out! Previously it was totally hidden by the growth of vegetation. This is a telephoto from the beach and it is far too difficult for us to venture up there to investigate further to see if there are any gun slits and where they are. There are other anti-invasion defences further down the beach but no-one we have spoken seems to know about this one.

The chances are that it will crash down onto the beach in the not-too-distant future at which point investigations will continue!.

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