MARCUS CLAYSON
New Member
I would like to write a biography of Sir Herbert Manzoni, and I am sending this text to….
Birmingham History Forum
http://www.photobydjnorton.com/address.jpg
[email protected].
contact (birminghamheritage.org.uk)
There may be more organisations/people that I should contact. If you can suggest any, please either send me addresses or forward this text to them.
I first had the idea in the early 1980s when carrying out research for an extended essay for the Diploma in Trade Union Studies course I was taking at the then Solihull College. The subject of the essay was the Birmingham Rent Strike of 1939. It was whilst undertaking this research that I first became aware of Sir Herbert, and thought then that it might be a good idea to write about him. Why the long hiatus? Life! Too complicated and boring to go into details, I was recently made redundant, and, with time on my hands, and with a sudden and shocked awareness of advancing age, decided that I finally had to get around to planning to write the book, and read as many of the generally published materials about Sir Herbert that I could find in the Central Library; “it’s now or never”, and, ironically, it is now that the last of Sir Herbert’s creations are likely to soon be destroyed, as the old Bull Ring was. I spent many a dissolute hour in Manzoni Gardens when they existed!
I now need to undertake some research using primary materials, and I am sending this text to ask for advice and information. I do not know what is available in the Central Library, and how much of what is there is accessible to the public. I would also like to know if there are any surviving relatives and/or colleagues of Sir Herbert in Birmingham. I would also like to hear people’s ideas/opinions about the task.
This is not going to be an exercise in bad nostalgia of the type seen in the many “popular histories” that have been written during the last few decades; I intend it to be rather anodyne, insofar as I do not wish, at this stage, to discuss/debate with, say, Parker about the importance of “automobility” in Sir Herbert’s plans and creations. I do not intend to discuss the politics of Birmingham’s re – development during Sir Herbert’s time as city architect except insofar as it impinges upon the narrative – there is not going to be a “grand theme” in the manner of Parker’s dissertation or an essay about urban geography (all of that is in the pipeline and shall not concern us here); there is not going to be any misty eyed nonsense about the triumph of modernity either: I have been very impressed by “John Cotton: The Life of a Midlands Architect” by Jennie McGregor Smith. (Coombe Cottage Books,Nov. 2002), and would like to produce something similar: does anyone know if she is still around? Does anyone have any contact with her?
On a broader note, Sir Herbert was born in Wallasey, as was my late father. Sir Herbert was of Italian descent; why were his parents there? There was, at the time of Sir Herbert’s and my father’s birth, a considerable “Little Italy” in Birmingham city centre, about which I also wished to write, and then heard that someone from Birmingham University was planning either an undergraduate or post – graduate paper about it, so dropped the idea. As an alumnus of Birmingham University and member of their library, I should chase this up, as this is something that might be interesting in the context of Sir Herbert’s life (although it may not be!). I would be very interested to hear from anyone with any information about Birmingham’s “Little Italy”; it is probably too much to ask if anyone knows if there was a “Little Italy” on Merseyside in the early Twentieth Century, but that would be fascinating. There were strong links between Garibaldi and Birmingham during the Nineteenth Century I know – perhaps with other cities in the UK too. That, however, is something of a digression.
So, those of you who are “fellow Brummies”, and those of you who are not, I’m “putting out feelers” as they say, and I would welcome all comments, suggestions and information about sources. I have put my e-mail address below.
Marcus Clayson
[email protected]
Birmingham History Forum
http://www.photobydjnorton.com/address.jpg
[email protected].
contact (birminghamheritage.org.uk)
There may be more organisations/people that I should contact. If you can suggest any, please either send me addresses or forward this text to them.
I first had the idea in the early 1980s when carrying out research for an extended essay for the Diploma in Trade Union Studies course I was taking at the then Solihull College. The subject of the essay was the Birmingham Rent Strike of 1939. It was whilst undertaking this research that I first became aware of Sir Herbert, and thought then that it might be a good idea to write about him. Why the long hiatus? Life! Too complicated and boring to go into details, I was recently made redundant, and, with time on my hands, and with a sudden and shocked awareness of advancing age, decided that I finally had to get around to planning to write the book, and read as many of the generally published materials about Sir Herbert that I could find in the Central Library; “it’s now or never”, and, ironically, it is now that the last of Sir Herbert’s creations are likely to soon be destroyed, as the old Bull Ring was. I spent many a dissolute hour in Manzoni Gardens when they existed!
I now need to undertake some research using primary materials, and I am sending this text to ask for advice and information. I do not know what is available in the Central Library, and how much of what is there is accessible to the public. I would also like to know if there are any surviving relatives and/or colleagues of Sir Herbert in Birmingham. I would also like to hear people’s ideas/opinions about the task.
This is not going to be an exercise in bad nostalgia of the type seen in the many “popular histories” that have been written during the last few decades; I intend it to be rather anodyne, insofar as I do not wish, at this stage, to discuss/debate with, say, Parker about the importance of “automobility” in Sir Herbert’s plans and creations. I do not intend to discuss the politics of Birmingham’s re – development during Sir Herbert’s time as city architect except insofar as it impinges upon the narrative – there is not going to be a “grand theme” in the manner of Parker’s dissertation or an essay about urban geography (all of that is in the pipeline and shall not concern us here); there is not going to be any misty eyed nonsense about the triumph of modernity either: I have been very impressed by “John Cotton: The Life of a Midlands Architect” by Jennie McGregor Smith. (Coombe Cottage Books,Nov. 2002), and would like to produce something similar: does anyone know if she is still around? Does anyone have any contact with her?
On a broader note, Sir Herbert was born in Wallasey, as was my late father. Sir Herbert was of Italian descent; why were his parents there? There was, at the time of Sir Herbert’s and my father’s birth, a considerable “Little Italy” in Birmingham city centre, about which I also wished to write, and then heard that someone from Birmingham University was planning either an undergraduate or post – graduate paper about it, so dropped the idea. As an alumnus of Birmingham University and member of their library, I should chase this up, as this is something that might be interesting in the context of Sir Herbert’s life (although it may not be!). I would be very interested to hear from anyone with any information about Birmingham’s “Little Italy”; it is probably too much to ask if anyone knows if there was a “Little Italy” on Merseyside in the early Twentieth Century, but that would be fascinating. There were strong links between Garibaldi and Birmingham during the Nineteenth Century I know – perhaps with other cities in the UK too. That, however, is something of a digression.
So, those of you who are “fellow Brummies”, and those of you who are not, I’m “putting out feelers” as they say, and I would welcome all comments, suggestions and information about sources. I have put my e-mail address below.
Marcus Clayson
[email protected]
