Dave Voisey

That's really cool! Maxim and the folks who worked with him had to do some proper miles in the early days

And the connection to industry in that image - the Italian machine gun would likely have been made by FIAT.

Currently at the Bristol Beacon supporting @davidolusoga.bsky.social's A Gun Through Time.
Do come and have a chat with us!

Five Hundred African Voices: A Catalog of Published Accounts by Africans Enslaved in the Transatlantic Slave Trade, 1586-1936 The importance of published accounts by African slave ship survivors is well-known but not their existence in large numbers. Fogleman and Hanserd catalog nearly five hundred discrete accounts and more...

Sounds really promising - I’ll direct her that way.

Also found this during lunch time, looks like there might be some important narratives to explore here huskiecommons.lib.niu.edu/allfacultyot...

In fairness, reenactors are another breed

Strongly agree. So many 17th century enquiries miss out King James I. He’s not just fascinating but his reign is crucial foundational knowledge to understand what comes next. Here’s a story we use to kick off our enquiry.

Would you like to use more stories in your GCSE teaching? Sharing some of our best stories to make GCSE History memorable and engaging.

New blog so that the GCSE historical stories that myself and @benbassett.bsky.social have worked on can be shared with the wider history teaching community. Enjoy.

open.substack.com/pub/petejack...

#historyteacher

Did some archive work at @vickersmg.bsky.social today. Quite emotional, lots of log books from aircrews who were KIA and this Christmas card wish Xmas to be bomb-free. Then again, there is this unintentionally funny wedding photo.

It worked well 2 years ago and wr mostly just set reading with some qs and we just check. Our logic being we just wanted them to read it. We have now hit the crowd who just take the sanction for not doing it.

1. Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner - Warren Zevon
2. The Unquiet Grave - The Dreadnoughts (actually a 1800s folk song but their version)
3. Jolene - Dolly Parton
4. Barrett's Privateers - Stan Rogers
5. Black Letters - The Dreadnoughts

I've got a couple which give a narrative of the July Crisis and another for mobilisation - if you're happy to DM an email address I can scan them as a word doc for you this weekend

Does it mention the bloody sandwhich shop?

I'll check my copy of Alex Watsons the Fortress tomorrow, but I remember that being pretty solid as he's only just providing context for a major Russian/Austro-Hungarian battle

Pykrete - Wikipedia

This was pykrete. Experiments were done with ice, and sawdust bit was seen as impractical
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pykrete

This has nothing on the chicken sustained nuclear landmine
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Pe...

It's the sheer volume of upside-down Union flags and Swiss flags painted on mini-roundabouts that I find really baffling. So proud to put the flag up but too lazy to go check how to do it properly.

Helms Deep easily stands out as one of the greatest battle sequences ever put on screen.

I'm looking at Priya Satia's Empire of Guns. It looks at the role of the Quaker Galton family. Neat little study into how one industry changed society, impacted the Transatlantic Trade and how it impacted India and N. America. + links to Wedgewood, Lloyd's + Barclays and Boulton.

Hadn't thought of the ACW angle. We discussed this on our discord and my mind went to the Boer War for very similar reasons. Russo-Japanese War also isn't a bad shout as MG use was so primitive, it'd why most nations dropped wheeled carriages as they were such obvious targets

YouTube video by Vickers MG Collection & Research Association Maxim - Vickers - Trenches | Dispatches from the Dugout

A project long in the making. It you want to know the concepts and practicalities of early Machineguns, then this episode of Dispactes from the Dugout by us @vickersmg.bsky.social will be essential viewing for you. Lots of discussion on what the impact of the MG was in 1914
youtu.be/jAFZm_yKB64?...

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#7 Not an Arhem specialist but know the general gist. Interesting way of looking at the Battle from a single day, and Murray is really good at contextualising the events, at least with someone with more than passing knowledge. Solid storytelling
www.audible.co.uk/pd/B0D5J8Q3L...

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#6 - on the audio book catchup. I loved Fry's earlier Greek books, but this one just didn't do it for me. I studied the Odessy years ago and am very familiar with the story, so this might be due to my own preconceptions, but it just didn't flow very well.
3/5
www.audible.co.uk/pd/B0CZPB3TR...

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Book #5 - much belated, McEwan's Attonement. Loved the themes and really liked the style it was written in. Compelling story and though it had a number of SWW tropes they weren't so burdensome to make it a hard read.
4/5
www.audible.co.uk/pd/B00P9R9QD...

They're also the paper complaining on how roughly private schools have been treated by the Gov, ignoring that they have even longer holidays

We found 4pm midweek was the best time - we got a ferry 2 hours early and we're brushed through passport control. Our EU passport holders weren't even checked

Recently I've been experimenting with a new type of booklet for students in KS3. Unlike my GCSE booklets, students don't write in these and instead use an exercise book for their class work. These booklets are also less task-based, consisting mainly of a story to be read and discussed in class.

When we did our range day for Y13, that was a genuine moment. 😅

Caught up with 2 of our Y12s who had done work experience @vickersmg.bsky.social. It was great seeing their joy at accessing the archive and being involved in the process of catalouging primary material. That was their focus, learning how to strip a MG was just a side feature for them.