The Poppa and The Punkin: A World War II Romance Told in Letters 1939-1946, is the story of a young couple who send 600-700 letters to each other during the war when they are separated. One of their moms also writes her son and the wife also writes to her baby brother. They share the collective feelings of the family throughout the war whether they are on the Pacific front, the European front or on the Homefront. The couple's son who has discovered this trove of letters has developed an ac...

A pictorial history of the rise, fall, and rebirth of the scenic railway in Cornwall, featuring never before published photos.In 1963 comic duo Flanders and Swann composed Slow Train—a lament for some of the many railway lines proposed for closure by Dr Beeching. Among the destinations listed in their song is the refrain "from St Erth to St Ives". Constructed in 1877 as the last broad gauge line to be built in the UK, the St Ives branch did not close in the 1960s an...

This is the story of Britain’s model villages: miniature worlds that have captivated garden guests and paying public since the early twentieth century. This history of these small-scale utopias covers their early growth as playthings of the wealthy, their blossoming into fairylands on seafronts during the post-war holiday boom, and of many model villages’ gradual decline from toy-towns to ghost towns. But it is also the story of how diligent modelmakers, artists and crafters have carried o...

Real Estate Investment Secrets Back in the days of the wild, Wild West, when easterners traveled across this vast country looking for opportunity in the newly opened territories, they were often referred to as a tenderfoot. This wasn’t a complimentary term but it was a rather apt one. The easterners wore city shoes that weren’t designed to withstand the rigors of the western terrain. Their hats didn’t have wide brims to protect them from the sun and their clothing wasn’t made of tough mate...

Did you know?In 1884 the Circle Line opened and was described in The Times as 'a form of mild torture which no person would undergo if he could conveniently help it.'According to one psychologist, Tube commuters can experience greater levels of stress than a police officer facing a rioting mob or even a fighter pilot going into a dogfight.Underground trains have only twice been used to transport deceased people in coffins: William Gladston...

A glorious insight into the history, landscape and people of Britain, from The Sunday Times bestseller.Nicknamed the ‘Holiday Line’, the 300-mile stretch of railway from Swindon to Penzance opened up the South West to a new breed of holiday-makers in the Victorian age, laying the foundations of the modern tourist industry. Michael Portillo visits Swindon, the powerhouse behind the Great Western Railway’s extraordinary feats of engineering, travels through Brunel’s famous Box Tunnel...

A glorious insight into the history, landscape and people of Britain, from The Sunday Times bestseller.The Holyhead line was first built to carry mail from Wales to Ireland, but brought many changes to industries along its route, including perry-makers, Hereford cattle farmers, Cheshire cheese-makers and slate miners. Michael Portillo travels to Hereford to see the Mappa Mundi and visits Coalbrookdale, cradle of the iron industry and the home of the world’s first iron bridge. And b...

A glorious insight into the history, landscape and people of Britain, from The Sunday Times bestseller.The railway line between Brighton and London bridged the gap between capital, countryside and coast, fostering the rise of the new middle classes created by the Industrial revolution and transforming Brighton from a royal playground into a busy resort. Travelling through London, Michael Portillo visits Sydenham, site of the Crystal Palace, and the Burlington Arcade in Piccadilly, ...

From the Edwardian golden age of steam to the present, the railway has captured the hearts and imaginations of the British people like no other mode of travel.In wartime and peace, along major routes and minor, steam, diesel and electric trains have carried commuters to work, families to holiday destinations and provided the means to myriad other adventures – the train a constant presence in an ever-changing way of life.A Century of Railway Travel ...

Stevenage Through Time is a unique insight into the illustrious history of this part of the country. Reproduced in full colour, this is an exciting examination of Stevenage, the famous streets and the famous faces, and what they meant to the people of this area throughout the 19th and into the 20th Century. Looking beyond the exquisite exterior of these well-kept photos, readers can see the historical context in which they are set and through the author's factual captions for every picture...

The railway came to Oxfordshire during the 1840s, the core of the present-day local railway network being completed by 1853. Other lines were subsequently constructed and, despite some branch line closures during the 1960s, these Victorian railways are still serving the public during the first decades of the twenty-first century. Their longevity is a tribute to the energy and vision of the nineteenth-century entrepreneurs who brought the railway system into existence over 160 years ago. Th...

Battersea has grown to be a fashionable and vibrant district of south-west London. Referred to as Patricesy in the Domesday Book, Battersea was historically best known for market gardening, providing fruit, vegetables and flowers for the City of London. However, the area moved from rural to urban with the coming of the railways, industry and large-scale housing from the 1840s, provoking a population growth from 4,000 to 120,000 by the beginning of the twentieth century. Glimpses of the pas...