Bob Henderson
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roberthenderson.bsky.social
Bob Henderson
@roberthenderson.bsky.social
760 followers 360 following 47 posts
Historian of the Russian revolutionary emigration. Formerly Russian curator at the British Library. Based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Latest book (pbk. ed.): https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/spark-that-lit-the-revolution-9781350344730/
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#OTD 1917 the 'October' Revolution took place in Russia

Our archives include significant primary sources on the relationship between Britain and Russia in the decade following the 1917 revolutions

650+ documents have been digitised and are freely available online at warwick.ac.uk/services/lib...
Reposted by Bob Henderson
“We do not want an independent Scotland because we dislike the English, but because we want separation from that Union of financial, military and monarchic establishments calling itself Great Britain.”
—Alasdair Gray, “Independence: An Argument for Home Rule”, 2014.
"I am sitting with a philosopher in the garden: he says again and again ‘I know that that’s a tree’, pointing to a tree that is near us. Someone else arrives and hears this, and I tell him: ‘This fellow isn’t insane. We are only doing philosophy’." (OC §467)
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#OtD 25 Oct 1882 German anarchist Johann Most was released from Clerkenwell Prison in London after spending a year and a half there doing forced labour for praising the assassination of Tsar Alexander II by Russian revolutionaries stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9781...
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New in Transactions: 'Russian History without Russia: Archive Encounters in an Era of Restricted Access', by Jamie Bryson bit.ly/3IUFMr5

What's the experience of an independent early career historian of Russia today? What are the challenges since 2022 of conducting research at distance? 1/2
Reposted by Bob Henderson
Reposted by Bob Henderson
This would be funny if it wasn’t so serious! Why are the police even involved in this madness?
Reposted by Bob Henderson
#OtD 25 Jul 1867 Karl Marx wrote the preface to the first German edition of his masterwork, Capital. A "weapon in the hands of workers" (as Harry Cleaver called it), it remains the most powerful critique of capitalism ever written shop.workingclasshistory.com/en-gb/collec...
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#SkyStorians Question for you: Anyone recently/currently researching the British General Strike of 1926? It's not my field, but thinking of organising a small event in May 2026 to mark the centenary. If you'd be interested or know people who would be, then get in touch on here or by email. Thanks!
Remarkable!
#libraries
Did you know Scotland's first free public lending library is nearly 350 years old? 🤔

Innerpeffray Library in rural Perthshire has welcomed readers from all walks of life since 1680, when it was founded by local landowner David Drummond, the third Lord Madertie.
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#OtD 10 Jul 1914 27-year-old suffragette Rhoda Fleming leapt on the footboard of the king and queen's limousine in Perth, Scotland, and tried to break its windows stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/8199...
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James Hogg & Mikhail Bulgakov

In the latest @lrb.co.uk podcast, @marinawarner.bsky.social & Adam Thirlwell look at how James Hogg’s JUSTIFIED SINNER & Bulgakov’s THE MASTER & MARGARITA represent fanaticism, & ask why both writers used the fantastical to test reality
www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and...
Podcast: Marina Warner and Adam Thirlwell · Close Readings: James Hogg and Mikhail Bulgakov
London Review of Books
www.lrb.co.uk
The British Museum Library was regarded by many, including Lenin, as the best in the world. This was due in no small part to the exhaustive collection of reference works available to readers on open access in its famous Round Reading Room.
(1912 plan showing arrangement of books.)
#libraryhistory
Many thanks. Brings back fond memories of evenings spent in the Room on duty behind the Readers' Enquiries desk.
For those who remember working at the Round Reading Room of the British Museum under the great rotunda, a recording from the BBC of what it sounded like -- the echoing voices, the footfalls, the trolley. Scroll down to 'British Library - British Library reading room...' tinyurl.com/4mpj3ctk
tinyurl.com
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I never stop using it
From the first newspapers established by Peter the Great to the fall of the Romanovs, the Imperial Russian Newspapers collection chronicles 189 years of Russian history. Available for free via Open Access here gpa.eastview.com/crl/irn
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300 Years of Libraries in Scotland
15 July, Edinburgh – free, ticketed

How do you like your books? Old or new? Paperback or hardback? Borrowed or bought? Take a trip 300 years into the past to hear how Scotland’s libraries evolved into what we know today.
www.ticketsource.co.uk/edinburgh-ce...
www.ticketsource.co.uk
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Beautiful Lower Largo, on the Firth of Forth shore of Fife, where Daniel Defoe found the inspiration for Robinson Crusoe. More pics and info: www.undiscoveredscot...

#Scotland #LowerLargo #Fife #EastNeuk
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Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies (@aseees.bsky.social) declared an undesirable organization by the Russian authorities

meduza.io/news/2025/06...
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#OtD 5 Jun 1868 Marxist industrial unionist, James Connolly was born in Edinburgh to Irish parents. An advocate of Irish independence and a member of the @IWW Connolly was executed by British authorities following the unsuccessful Easter rising of 1916 stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/1053...
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Behind the Scenes tour at the Mitchell
14 June, Mitchell Library, Glasgow. Free, ticketed

Principal Librarian Dawn Vallance will lead a tour of the vast back stacks of the Mitchell – one of Europe’s largest public libraries – not usually accessible to the public
www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/behind-the...
Behind the Scenes Tour at the Mitchell Library
Discover one of Glasgow’s most iconic landmarks in this exclusive guided tour of the Mitchell Library.
www.eventbrite.co.uk
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The Aliens Act of 1905 created a new type of immigrant to the UK and a new means of controlling them.

🔓 This archive article is free for 7 days

buff.ly/scsyrT1
Building Britain’s Borders
buff.ly
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#OtD 1 Apr 1921 William Fishman was born. Fishman was a pioneer historian of the working class in London's East End who researched and wrote about working-class solidarity in the area from the late 1800s onwards stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/8031...