Having not written any articles recently, I felt I should add a short note about my exhibition of Parlington artefacts that have been on display at Lotherton Hall these last six months and more. Today the items have been taken down and packed into boxes, to return to Parlington, so ends my first mini-exhibition, which by all accounts was well received. Perhaps the best item on display was the collection of stereo photo cards from the 1860′s and the “Brewster” mahogany stereo viewer (shown above). I think it reasonable to believe that the photographs were taken by one of Gascoigne family, or a close friend and found their way via the then butler John Shelton to his descendants and finally back to Parlington! The details of the extrordinary discovery is recounted on the Parlington history site here.
Archive for the ‘The Hall’ Category
Lotherton Parlington Exhibition Closes
Thursday, May 20th, 2010Rest in Peace Meg
Wednesday, January 27th, 2010
After a bad couple of weeks, our dog Meg has today passed away, she was around 14 years old or 98 in dog years, she has always been a true and faithful friend to all the family, and our friends also, so her passing is a great loss. I have selected a suitable location to bury her here at Parlington, following in the long tradition that the Gascoigne family undertook with their pets, as far back as the nineteenth century at least, to my knowledge.
Barbecue Turkey and a Weber!
Saturday, December 26th, 2009
The intro photo was taken on Christmas day by my eldest daughter, Pip, she thought it worth capturing the moment! I have cooked the Christmas turkey on a Weber BBQ since the late 80′s. The BBQ in the image is the fifth I have owned, and with the ash collection system beneath the kettle, is, I can testify, the best yet! Behind and almost obscured is an earlier model, which had just completed cooking a duck to accompany the turkey.
Tutankhamun was not born in Swaffham!
Friday, November 27th, 2009Swaffham Cemetery
This may seem an odd post title, but during my visit to London last weekend, whilst on route to the V & A Museum in South Kensington, I noticed a sign in the tube network which gave dates of various luminaries from the past and their birth places. There was the name of Howard Carter [1874-1939] the Egyptologist, famous for discovering the tomb of Tutankhamun on the 26th of November 1922. His birthplace was stated as Swaffham, and having visited the place recently, I was unaware of this fact. [This link is to an earlier post about a visit to Swaffham] This reminded me of my own mini discovery a couple of years ago whilst cutting the grass, my foot slipped down a rabbit hole and I grated my ankle on a hard object which turned out to be the remains of a brick wall.
Parlington Talk at Lotherton Hall, Sequel
Monday, November 9th, 2009
The talk that I give to Historical Societies and other interested groups is built with Apple Keynote, a great program for presentations, people often ask if I can let them know what software the talk is created with, sadly for most, using PC’s I have to explain that there is no version that runs on their computers. The responses I get, about what they think of PowerPoint, is amusing!
Following the talk I gave at Lotherton, Adam White the Curator kindly sent a couple of photographs of the event. Whilst it wasn’t a huge gathering, the room was full, so it would have been a struggle to accommodate any more people!
Porcelain Figurine
Thursday, October 1st, 2009The weather was too good to miss the opportunity after work, so I continued some excavations around the location of the fountain, the centre piece of the lawn in the nineteenth century. Of course I had to find the location first, but recent geophys scans gave some insights so off I went!
Parlington Talk at Lotherton Hall
Friday, September 11th, 2009
I am giving a talk at Lotherton Hall on Saturday 31st October, 2:00-3:00 pm, it is open to all comers and is advertised at Lotherton and on their web site. The talk is a computer based ‘slide’ show, dealing with the uncovering and discovery of the demolished mansion house of the Gascoigne family and tracks what has been unearthed, literally in some cases, in recent years. Included are some unique photographs taken in the nineteenth century, that have provided new insights into the hall! There is also the ongoing mini exhibition of Parlington artefacts on the first floor landing in the display cases at Lotherton Hall.
Country Life Magazine
Friday, September 4th, 2009A reader of the Country Life magazine sent a letter to the editor about a painting they had of Parlington, a water colour, I was later contacted and asked if I could supply a picture for the magazine for their response to the the reader. The picture below is of the item in the September 2nd 2009 edition. The reply was provided by a Mr Scott of Merseyside. I requested that the magazine publish my web site address to accompany the item, this they did as you can see in the image of the magazine page below.
Geophysical Research
Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009The old hall footprint is well established as a result of the ground plan produced by George Fowler Jones architectural parctice in 1885, this is still in existence and held I believe at Temple Newsam. I obtained a digital copy of the reference photograph some years ago and have used it extensively to assist in discovering how the parts of the hall were aligned on the ground. However with the recent discovery of the photographs taken by Jones in the latter part of the nineteenth century; held at the National Media Museum, Bradford, it became clear that the lawns had extensive flower beds. Moreover the plan shows drainage lines and the position of the fountain and the river Crow which runs across the lawns in a stone culvert. We decided therefore to undertake a geophysical analysis of the ground to determine if any of the earlier features could be discovered.
Local Archaeologist Gets Involved
Monday, August 24th, 2009
I was recently introduced to a local archaeologist who lives in Aberford and we have since discussed some of my findings at Parlington, on Sunday this last weekend I showed her some pieces of the fragments of hand painted lime plaster discovered in the demolition rubble. They ares quite possibly seventeenth or early eighteenth century. I had already shown the fragments to the curator at Lotherton Hall and there is an article on the Parlington history site here. However she was so impressed that we got stuck in and dug out some more, luckily the weather was excellent throughout most of the day, so we were able to find not only quite a number of additional pieces, but also some large chunks of plaster coving the same pattern as found in that location earlier and detailed here on the history site.