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  1. sospiri

    Good classical music on YouTube

    We've got a jazz one, a pop one, but not this one, so I thought I would start one. My intention is to keep it listenable, so here goes with one of my favourite & tuneful symphonies, Dvorak's "New World". But I also wanted to showcase one of my favourite orcjhestras, that of the Gimnazija Kranj...
  2. sospiri

    W.W.TURNER - Theatre Furnishers - Station Road, Northfield

    Here's a name that I haven't come across before, and I am indebted to James McCarraher's Salisbury City Hall: Through the Looking Glass for the advertisement. Sorry about the picture quality. A copy of Cinema News & Property Gazette Technical Supplement at archive.org provided the following...
  3. sospiri

    Johnny Mandel (1925-2020)

    Sad to announce the death of a well known composer and songwriter at the age of 94. Full details here:- https://variety.com/2020/music/news/johnny-mandel-dead-dies-composer-mash-1234694020/ Maurice :cool:
  4. sospiri

    D-Day to Germany - a US War Correspondents View

    This is an illustrated lecture given by a US war correspondent sometime after the war and held in the National Archives. Footage of London, Plymouth, D-Day Utah Beach landings, Mont St Michel, a liberated Paris when there were still snipers taking pot-shots at you, Edward G. Robinson over to...
  5. sospiri

    Then & Now - Roy Wood

    Just came across this - it may have been on here before but the search engine reveals nothing. Enjoy......... Maurice :cool:
  6. sospiri

    Memorial to P/O Stanley R. Streeter & St Martins Church

    A former Moseley Grammar School pupil, Stanley Streeter, was in a Mosquito piloted by Sqn Ldr Ken Sutton, which was returning to base over Brighton when he was mortally wounded by friendly fire. Sutton managed to eject and survived, but Streeter was still in their blazing aircraft when it...
  7. sospiri

    ARP Decontamination Sqn

    In the 1939 Register for Tiverton Road, Longbridge, one of my very distance relations has the subsidiary note alongside his entry which says ARP Decontamination Sqn. I am guessing that this presumably refers to a possible threat of a gas attack and someone who was specifically trained /...
  8. sospiri

    Brickmaking in Birmingham

    We don't appear to have a general industrial section, so I'll stick this enquiry here. Browsing my Alan Godfrey maps, I found that the Sparkhill & Greet 1903 map had two current brickworks and two disused brickworks on that one map. Burbary and Greet were current, and Tyseley and what appears...
  9. sospiri

    Pop Musicians Backstage in the 1970s

    By courtesy of Esquire Magazine, here are 50 photos of British & American pop musicians backstage in the 1970s:- https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/music/g13810806/musicians-backstage-in-the-1970s-the-photos/?utm_source=flipboard_arb&utm_medium=cpm&utm_campaign=arb_fb_flip_m_u_g13810806 Maurice
  10. sospiri

    Alston Street, Ladywood

    Mike, Would you kindly publish a map showing number 12 Alston Street. My father's mother and siblings lived here between 1909 and 1959 and the houses at this end of the road were demolished for road widening enabling Ladywood Circus and Ladywood Middleway to be created. Photographs of this end...
  11. sospiri

    Hollier Street

    This street seems to have long since disappeared and is only mentioned five times according to the search engine, so this is primarily aimed at our map expert, Mikejee, and I'm specifically looking for House 2 Court 2 and the family NAVEN. Any pictures other than the pub on the corner of Darwin...
  12. sospiri

    14 Station Road, Edgbaston In 1911

    This may well be one for Mikejee, though others may know. I have DURAND and WOOD ancestors living at this address on the 1911 Census. When the railway branch line closed down in 1934, did Station Road become Station Avenue? The houses in the latter look about the right age. If so, were the...
  13. sospiri

    Wills & Probate - Another Source

    I think that many of us are aware of the Find-A-Will probate source here:- https://probatesearch.service.gov.uk/#wills But not everyone may be aware that there are also over half a million Wills & Probate Notices on the London Gazette site here:- https://www.thegazette.co.uk/wills-and-probate...
  14. sospiri

    Secret Printer Tracking Dots

    Well they were more or less secret until this appeared on BBC News:- https://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170607-why-printers-add-secret-tracking-dots Maurice
  15. sospiri

    Forgotten Army Dog Tags

    Three years ago near an ex-anti arcraft gun post in Essex a group of metal detectorists, known as Extreme Relic Hunters, unearthed over 14,000 metal dog tags belonging to WW2 amd post-WW2 soldiers. Ever since then, efforts have been made to return these to their rightful owners or their next of...
  16. sospiri

    Ww1 Army Medical Categories

    The following link may help you if you are wondering why your ancestor served in this war yet did not appear in the Medal Rolls, or if you are dealing with service records from the Burnt Records Collection and are not sure whether the ancestor went abroad or not. If his medical category has...
  17. sospiri

    Yates Street

    I believe this street now ceases to exist and the only photograph I have found is labelled "Bad locality". That I can well believe. My relations, the SEDGWICKs, were self-employed curriers at number 5 and I remember Garibaldi SEDGWICK, ("Uncle Gal") telling me stories when I was a boy of how the...
  18. sospiri

    The Beehive Pub, 153 Unett Street

    Hi all, but especially mikejee, I'm posting this for an old friend, Cerisa Pierpoint, who has just joined the Forum. Has anyone got any information about this pub in the period immediately prior to 1897 when the landlord, William Mealing, passed away. Maps, pictures or any information would be...
  19. sospiri

    Inserting URLs

    Has anyone else had problems with this recently? Insert a URL and despite adding spaces and carriage returns, the rest of the text gets put into blue or purple and underlined and you can't stop it. Even posting and going into Edit Post does not remove it! It's only starting to occur over the...
  20. sospiri

    Maurice POLLACK 1885-1918 Childhood actor

    I'll be adding much more to this in due course, but for now I'll briefly summarise that he was born in Birmingham of European parents and was killed in World War One. His father was a pianist and his mother an actress, the latter forming a childhood actors' group in Harborne. Maurice also knew...
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