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The Past and other Places

@pastandotherplaces.bsky.social

1.4K followers 780 following 1.8K posts

Kay W. Researching in retirement. Occasional blogger at The Past and other Places. Original discipline historical geography. Takes too many photos (kaysgeog on Flickr). Pedestrian non-driver. Edinburgh 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 https://thepastandotherplaces.wordpress.com/

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · May 23

Resources for anyone interested in mining communities in Scotland in the nineteenth century and early-twentieth century. Includes museums to visit. Recently edited. Suggestions welcome. #genealogy #FamilyHistory #skystorians #mining 📚🗃️
thepastandotherplaces.wordpress.com/housing-the-...

The Miners

A selective list of resources relating to housing in Scottish mining communities 1880-1930.

thepastandotherplaces.wordpress.com

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 49m

That would be excellent!

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Adam Chapman @adamchapman.bsky.social · 4h

A nice observational piece, showing what I learn is a ‘Ferguson Potato Spinner’ in action. Part of a suite of potato machines (mum took turns on this sort of work in the ‘60s - generally women’s labour then), i guess this shows how partial mechanisation was. #Skystorians #TractorCommentary

Advertising panel for Ferguson tractors potato attachments for their machines. The potato spinner is the bottom one and has a spinning blade with what looks like a tea tray on an arm.

The advert has a large body of text on the right on a white panel backed with yellow with black and white illustrations of cables tractors and machines on the left.

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 4h

The tattie holidays are about to start in Scotland. Remember picking half a bit as a child. Put me off for life. This is a great read on the subject. #LocalHistory #farming
www.abebooks.co.uk/978186232061...

Front cover of a book by Heather Holmes on the history of potato picking in the Lothians. Black and white photo of c.1970s potato harvesters with baskets of potatoes to empty.

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 4h

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 4h

Heather Holmes is an historian of agricultural implements and tattie howking. #agriculture #machinery #history
blog.scottishagriculturalimplementmakers.co.uk/hansons-pota...

Hanson’s potato digger of the mid 1850s: an important forerunner of the spinner digger – Scottish agricultural implement makers

blog.scottishagriculturalimplementmakers.co.uk

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The Man in Seat 61 @seatsixtyone.bsky.social · 4h

And at Glasgow Central just now, 92 023 is named:

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Carve Her Name @carvehername.bsky.social · 4h

#OnThisDay, 12 Oct 1956, Marga Klompé is appointed Minister of Social Work. She is the first woman to be a cabinet Minister in the Netherlands government

#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #NLHistory 🗃️
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Marga Klompé sitting with the rest of the Dutch cabinet - all white and male - as they pose for photos.

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 4h

Jean Payton Reid, architect and town planner (1917-97). Liberton Kirkyard, Edinburgh. Thought to have been Scotland's first female town planner. Family monument - pink granite obelisk.
#31DaysOfGraves day 12 notable women. #herstory
thepastandotherplaces.wordpress.com/2023/01/14/a...

Greek-style tall pointed obelisk in polished pink granite standing in a kirkyard. Most of the other gravestones are smaller and grey. The tower of the Kirk is prominent in the background. There are green shrubs and several bare-branched trees in the background.

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Jeannine Baker @nenieb.bsky.social · 8h

Fantastic piece by Kate Murphy responding to the devastating change of policy at the @BBC Written Archives Centre, which will make it impossible to undertake new independent research using the collection. cstonline.net/defending-th... #mediahistory

DEFENDING THE WAC: RECOVERING THE INVISIBLE WOMEN OF THE BBC by Kate Murphy

My first visit to the BBC’s Written Archives Centre was in 2002. I was working as a producer on Woman’s Hourand had applied for a three-month attachment to what was then the Diversity Centre…

cstonline.net

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This Is My Glasgow @thisismyglasgow.bsky.social · 6h

Late Victorian City Improvement Trust tenement on the corner between Trongate and Saltmarket in central Glasgow. Built by A.B. MacDonald in the 1890s, it may have originally been designed by John Carrick in 1877.

#glasgow #architecture #tenement #glasgowcross #architecturephotography

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Steve Chambers @planningtransport.co.uk · 6h

People following legal migration routes now fearing deportation.

Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan @london.gov.uk · 6h

I’m concerned about the changes to the Skilled Worker visa route and the impact it may have on Londoners working for Transport for London, our other public services and beyond.

Sir Sadiq Khan calls for pause on new immigration rules

The mayor of London said the changes had

www.bbc.co.uk

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Nancy Johnston @jeelyeater1.bsky.social · 6h

#31DaysOfGraves Day 12: Notable woman.Dr Elsie Inglis. Dean Cemetery, Edinburgh.

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Municipal Dreams @municipaldreams.bsky.social · 7h

Dutch domestic

View from window of canal, housing and church

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Steven Robb @stevenrobb.bsky.social · 1d

The Arms of King Charles III (no not that one) in the Palazzo di San Clemente in Florence. Charles Edward Stuart bought the palace in 1777 living there until 1785. The Latin motto states 'Charles III, born 1720, King of Great Britain and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, 1766.

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Greg Jenner @gregjenner.bsky.social · 1d

It’s Bookshop Day! Go and support your local bookshop and help them resist the dominance of Amazon

And if you want personally signed and dedicated copies of any of my books, buy from the lovely Kirstie at @foxlanebooks.bsky.social

Fox Lane Books 🦊 (@foxlanebooks.bsky.social)

🦊Indie bookseller with an online shop📚Lots of signed books & special editions 🦊 Sale sections all year round with book bargains📚Gift packages, book subscriptions & E-gift cards available🦊Bookish gifts...

foxlanebooks.bsky.social

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Sara Rich Dorman @srd.bsky.social · 1d

Really upsetting to hear that Polwarth medical practice is closing via social media. I suppose it was inevitable after they mived to Tollcross. But crazy that they’d close a practice, given levels of demand. www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/edinbur...

Edinburgh medical practice closure will see 5,000 patients relocated

An Edinburgh medical practice is set to close next month following a review by the Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership and NHS Lothian.

www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com

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Roger Robinson LRPS @rogerrobinson.bsky.social · 1d

#royalmile #blackandwhite #leicaphotography #edinburgh #scotland

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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 1d

'One does not wish to dignify this kind of vandalism with a response and you have to wonder whether the Tories will give Badenoch even one election before booting her out.'

In praise of “rip-off” degrees | The Observer

Kemi Badenoch’s attack on the arts and humanities isn’t just culturally short-sighted, it’s economically illiterate

observer.co.uk

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Lorraine @wolfq4.bsky.social · 1d

Day 11 theme is #military
Captain Kenneth Ashby Brown of the 5th Cameronians was KIA aged 29 on 14th April 1917, during the British Arras Offensive, having survived the Somme. FP of Glasgow Academy & University, he is remembered on the grave of his parents in Glasgow Necropolis
#31DaysOfGraves
#WW1

The family grave in Glasgow Necropolis of of Nicol Paton Brown and his wife Maria Crowley Brown (nee Ashby). They commemorated their only son Captain Kenneth Ashby Brown here, but he is buried at Heninel-Croisilles Road Cemetery, south of Arras in the North of France.
Photo credit: Lorraine Murray

Portrait of Captain Kenneth Ashby Brown. He is remembered on the Rolls of Honour of the Royal Technical College of Glasgow, University of Glasgow and The Glasgow Academy where he studied.
Photo credit: The Glasgow Academy Archive

#31DaysOfGraves 2025 daily themes from @annaandthedead

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Brian Groom @groomb.bsky.social · 1d

Wigan pit brow lasses, or coal mine surface workers, 19th century (WiganWorld).

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This Is My Glasgow @thisismyglasgow.bsky.social · 1d

Red sandstone tenements on the corner of Clarence Drive and Hyndland Road in the West End of Glasgow.

#glasgow #architecture #architecturephotography #tenement #glasgowtenements #hyndland

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 1d

#Autumn at Dalkeith Country Park, Midlothian. Have a day oot. No 3 bus from #Edinburgh. Café and restaurant in the park, with alternatives in Dalkeith. No entry charge for pedestrians.

Palatial country house in extensive grounds. Lush green grass in the foreground. A row of trees to the right in autumnal shades. A bright day with clouds and blue sky above.

A brown beech leaf lying on a pile of curled and crinkled fallen leaves.

Bright red and yellow apples on an apple tree (close up).

View from a bridge down a river valley. A bright day with blue sky and some clouds above. The tall trees on either side are beginning to take on autumnal shades.

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Prem Sikka @premnsikka.bsky.social · 2d

Labour Party deputy leader contest.

I won't vote for Bridget Phillipson or Lucy Powell.

Both are right-wing.
Supported two-child benefit cap, disability benefit cuts.
Snooping on benefit claimants' bank accounts.

In the words of Billy Connolly, “Don't vote, it only encourages them.”

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The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 1d

And no doubt offensive to many in the rest of the UK. Have they forgotten about the 2026 elections? 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿☘️

The Past and other Places @pastandotherplaces.bsky.social · 1d

"In a rare public announcement at the White House, she revealed weeks of behind the scenes diplomacy with the Kremlin chief after he held a summit in Alaska with her husband, US President Donald Trump."

Le Monde in English @english.lemonde.fr · 1d

Melania Trump says talks with Putin have secured the return of Ukrainian children abducted by Russia

US First Lady Trump, normally a private and elusive figure, announced on Friday that following weeks of back-channel talks with President Vladimir Putin, she had secured the reunification of abducted Ukrainian children with their families − including eight children in the past 24 hours.