Discussion of Park Closure at Night
Parks in Birmingham were usually kept closed at night, but in 1954 the Parks Committee did consider leaving Calthorpe Park open. These pages from the Parks Committee minutes consider this proposal, which ...
Domestic Economy Lesson, Somerville Road Board School, Birmingham by William Woollaston
This photograph has been carefully constructed. It was taken to be displayed or circulated as evidence of good educational practice. The blackboard is used to describe what is happening. The subject is ...
Domestic Interior, by Reginald Edgecombe
The Edgecombe drawings demonstrate that urban planners in Birmingham were considering the internal layout as much as the external appearance of new houses. This sketch illustrates the creative processes ...
Dormitory rules in Norton Reformatory
Dormitory, Sir Josiah Mason's Orphanage by Sir Benjamin Stone
As Mason’s Orphanage was so large the dormitory could accommodate three rows of beds. The room is essentially bare except for a few reproduction paintings. There is no evidence of any personal belongings ...
Drawing of a Church by Jessy Watt
Drawing of a Middlemore Girl
As an Edgbastonian, John Middlemore was proudly celebrated in the pages of the Edgbastonia magazine:
‘A benevolent Edgbaston gentleman who has solved one of the difficult social problems of modern ...
Drawing of George De Courcey, All Saints Mental Health Casebook
This drawing by Robson, the asylum doctor, is the only visual record of a child in All Saints Asylum. George was admitted from the workhouse in 1876 aged 9. Like Ellen Allport he is described as insane ...
Drawing of Trees by Gregory Watt
Birmingham born Gregory Watt (1777-1804) was the son of the inventor James Watt’s second marriage, to Ann McGregor. Gregory and his younger sister Jessy (1779-1794) were both accomplished child artists ...
Drawing of Trees by Gregory Watt
Dress by M. & E. Abbott
This striking dress in yellow trimmed with black velvet was made by M. & E. Abbott of 65 Hagley Road, Edgbaston, in 1896. However, we can't be sure exactly how it looked when it left the dressmakers. ...
Dudley & Dowell Foundry
Lunch break at Dudley & Dowell Foundry, Cradley Heath. Photograph by Paul Hill.
Dudley & Dowell Foundry
Dudley & Dowell Foundry, Cradley Heath. Photograph by Paul Hill.
Early Jewish Presence In Birmingham
‘A House Inhabited by Jews’ (1750).
In one Birmingham’s early ‘levy books’, a number of Jews can be seen living together as early as 1750. This is an important piece of evidence. It proves that ...
Ecole Belge
Leaflet appealing for money to continue the Belgian School, June 1918
Although some of the Belgian children attended local schools, the ‘Ecole Belge’ or Belgian Primary School opened in Birmingham on ...
Edgbaston Children's Home
This opened as a children’s home in 1965. It was not purpose-built but a modified, existing house in Edgbaston. It was thought that the purchase of this building (along with two other buildings) together ...
Edgbaston with Tower of Edgbaston Church
This drawing shows how rural Edgbaston was in the mid-nineteenth century. The tower of Edgbaston Old Church is visible in the background.
Edgbastonia Title Page, 1881
‘The contents will be of local interest, or local production, and […] they shall be of a healthy moral tone, and be altogether non-political and unsectarian’. So says the editor of Edgbastonia in May ...