A review of local books.

Selected and Edited by Keith Skipper. Published by Mousehold Press.
A hardback book, in the popular A5 size, with 186 pages. Colour cover and 32 black and white illustrations. ISBN: 978-1-874739-61-6. Price £14.99.

KEITH SKIPPER, at the heart of local life for half-a-century as journalist, broadcaster and entertainer, hit the book-publishing trail in the mid-1980s with three volumes of dialect broadcasts he made as ‘Old Barney’, BBC Radio Norfolk’s rural correspondent.

Now he brings together the largest number of dialect scribes and supporters ever assembled under one Norfolk roof. He takes a fascinating story from the latter part of the 17th century, when one of Norfolk’s most famous adopted sons, Sir Thomas Browne, first noticed the place had a dialect of its own, to the current revival sparked by the formation in 1999 of Friends Of Norfolk Dialect (FOND), of which Keith was a prime mover.

His treasury of a still-vibrant vernacular embraces firm favourites like comedian Sidney Grapes, writer of the evergreen Boy John Letters, schoolmaster and poet John Kett, talented all-rounder Dick Bagnall-Oakeley, Methodist minister Colin Riches, who gave Bible stories a delightful Norfolk flavour, and the Singing Postman.

But there are many others, both from a golden Victorian age and more recent times, ushered into a deserved spotlight after too long in the shadows – neglected figures like Charles Loynes Smith, Norwich city councillor and horse-loving poet, and Harold Fitch, puckish parson and gifted storyteller.

Maurice Woods, creative force behind Harbert’s News from Dumpton in local weekly newspapers for nearly 40 years, and Arthur Patterson, in the self-effacing guise of John Knowlittle as he penned Melinda Twaddle’s Notions for over three decades in the Yarmouth Mercury, rub shoulders with other newspaper notables such as Eric Fowler (Jonathan Mardle of the Eastern Daily Press), Ida Fenn, who gave the Fleggs district a distinctive voice, and James Spilling, second editor of the EDP and author of the trailblazing Giles’s Trip to London.

There’s room as well for more ‘serious’ exponents of the dialect art – Mary Mann, James Blyth and Lilias Rider Haggard, while internationally-lauded playwright Arnold Wesker takes a bow as someone significant from outside who did make an effort to get the Norfolk sound right!

Current EDP editor Peter Waters, acknowledging the important role our local newspapers continue to play in this field, writes the foreword to this timely addition to the local literary scene. Peter Trudgill, president of FOND, one of the world’s leading authorities on dialects and the ideal local lad to set the scene for this celebration, contributes a highly erudite and amusing introduction.
[Review by publisher]

For further details or to buy online click here

RUMOLEDEW – Telling Tales in a Norfolk Village

Keith Skipper. Halsgrove 2009. 120 pages. 13 black and white illustrations
ISBN 978 1841149 69 1. Price £12.99.

KEITH SKIPPER’S foray into recording life in a village of under 500 inhabitants may well be a work of fiction, but where else will you find a village of this size complete with its own shop, pub, church, school, new village Hall – and a Post Office?

Interviews with a score, or so, of parishioners find common ground with real parish councils dealing with ‘in-comers’ who, as soon as they arrive in their new home, want street lighting and double yellow lines all over the place and other reminders of the ‘civilisation’ they have left behind. As local history enthusiast, Peter Diggins, so rightly says: “I want local villages to flourish – but not at the behest of greedy outsiders.”

Thank you, Keith, for reminding us of the importance of nurturing and supporting our villages, otherwise we will really be faced with a rum ole dew. Even the twin village of Sloightly-sur-le-Huh may have its work cut out to enable us to walk tall with no inclinations to work other than for the good of our communities. [Reviewed by Peter Brooks]

For further details or to buy online click here

THE LITTLE BOOK OF NORFOLK

Neil R Storey. Published by The History Press, The Mill, Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 2QG. Hardback book in A5 size with 192 pages. Colour cover, 45 black and white illustrations.
ISBN 978 0 7524 6160 1. Price £9.99.

NEIL STOREY’S The Little Book of Norfolk follows in the tradition of Schotts Miscellany, with sections on everything you might never have thought of asking about our lovely county.

Everything is here, from the list of Norfolk VCs and other heroes, to the slightly naughty names of some of our local roads.

Neil delights in the strange and the gory; his list of criminals includes the sad tale of a maidservant who was boiled to death in 1531 for poisoning her mistress. Sadder still, in 1708, two children of seven and eleven were sentenced to death for stealing a loaf of bread. Both events occurred in Kings Lynn; thank goodness times have changed!

This is a book to pick up and read in snippets, not to plough through in a sitting.

An interesting ‘On This Day’ section lists events great and small through the ages. Just the thing for finding out what amazing event happened on your birthday. If yours is July 14th, you can glory in the fact that in 1835 ‘Handbills advertised a display of gymnastics by Mynheer Kousewinkler van Raachboomstadt “The Dutch Hercules” on Chapel Field Gardens. Thousands turned up only to discover it was a hoax’. Pity it wasn’t April 1st. Although on that date in 1875, the Yarmouth and Gorleston tramway was formally opened by the Mayor of Yarmouth.

A larger section on the Norfolk Dialect would have been welcome, but this was balanced by Neil’s dedication of the book ‘For all my friends at FOND – Friends of Norfolk Dialect’, so he is forgiven.

An intriguing and entertaining book, it would be a good Christmas or birthday present for anyone who loves Norfolk and all its oddities. [Reviewed by Brenda Bizzell]

For further details or to buy online click here

NORFOLK TALES OF MYSTERY & MURDER

Neil Storey. Countryside Books 2009. 96 pages. 16 black and white illustrations. 1 map. ISBN 978 1846741 61 6. Price £8.99.

NEIL STOREY’S books are always conscientiously researched, and this is certainly the case of the true stories told in this book with its graphic descriptions of executions, corpses and how they died.

Although, as might be expected, Norwich and Great Yarmouth experienced the most murders the stigma of being the scene of a capital crime is spread across the county; from Barton Bendish, Felbrigg and Feltwell through Holkham, Hempnall, Honingham and King’s Lynn to Pulham St Mary and Wymondham.

Interestingly, Neil includes seven pages on the sighting of mystery zeppelins over Norfolk during 1909. Apparently German archives and our own national intelligence sources do not have any record of these secret missions. [Reviewed by Peter Brooks]

For further details or to buy online click here

HARK TO THE BELLS

Anne Frith, Vivienne Osborne and Dorothy Smith. Published by A Deed Frith 2011. 68 pages. Colour cover and 20 black and white illustrations. ISBN 978-0-951598-57-3. Copies may be ordered from Beccles Books Ltd,
1 Exchange House, Exchange Square, Beccles, Suffolk NR34 9HH, or from the publisher, Mrs E A Frith, Woodlands, St Mary’s Road, Beccles, Suffolk NR34 9NQ, enclosing a cheque for £6 (including postage and packing) made out to E A Frith.

ANN FRITH’S Hark to the Bells, is another interesting booklet and a follow up to her previous books, Daniel of Beccles and Beccles Ablaze 1586, with all proceeds going to the Beccles Bells Restoration Fund and other charities.

Well researched, Hark to the Bells contains a ‘history of Beccles as told by the bells and their ringers’, with the contents wide and varied: ‘The Bells, the Bells’, ‘Diaries of James Gowing, Principal Bell-Ringer 1781–1830’, ‘Notes of Discord’, ‘Notes from a Bell-Ringer’s Diary 1889–1921’, ‘Honouring the Brave’, ‘*The Gotch’, ‘Lady Ringers’, and much more, up to ‘the Present Company of Ringers’.

* In case you’re wondering, a ‘gotch’ is a very large jug for beer or ale, and could contain up to 32 pints to slake the bell-ringers’ thirsts. The book reveals the Beccles gotch is still kept in a cupboard in the ringing chamber, but whether or not it is still in use... who knows?
[Reviewed by Webmaster]

BECCLES ABLAZE, 1586

Anne Frith, Dorothy Smith and Anne Bauers. Published by A Deed Frith 2010. 48 pages. Colour cover and 25 black and white illustrations. ISBN 978-0-951598-56-6. Copies may be ordered from the Thrift Bookshop, Hungate, Beccles, Suffolk, or from Woodlands, St Mary’s Road, Beccles, Suffolk NR34 9NQ, enclosing a cheque for £6 (including postage and packing) made out to E A Frith.

ANN FRITH has another little gem in Beccles Ablaze, 1586, which is a follow up to her previous book, Daniel of Beccles, proving to have been of international interest and with all proceeds going to charities.

Few centuries can have been as upsetting to the local population as was the sixteenth century and, to them, the Great Fire of 1586 devouring St Michael’s church, with its thatched roof, was catastrophic and must have seemed like the end of the world to them.

This little book contains two ballads describing the Great Fire of Beccles, and also the subsequent history of fire in the town.

There is a foreword by Dom Antony Sutch, who describes the ballads as being ‘full of folk wisdom and insight as well as puzzlement and judgementalism’.

There is also an interesting introduction, which gives a brief history of Beccles, and sets the scene for the Great Fire that took place on St Andrew’s Eve in 1586.

If you wish, the first ballad may be sung to ‘Greensleeves’ (Wilson’s new tune), whilst the second ballad goes to the tune of ‘La Banda la Shotte’.

All in all, very well illustrated with line drawings by Nona Ollerenshaw, which certainly complement the ballads. [Reviewed by Webmaster]

HIKEY SPRITES – The Twilight of a Norfolk Tradition

Ray Loveday. Published by E Ray Loveday. 40 pages, with 11 black and white illustrations, and two maps. ISBN 978-0-900616-87-7. Price £5 (including postage) from the publisher: Ray Loveday, 54c Pottergate, Norwich, Norfolk, NR2 1DY.

RAY LOVEDAY’S Hikey Sprites is a ‘must have’ for the enthusiast of all things Norfolk, especially if you’re interested in the mischievous creatures known be some as Hyter Sprites!

The author spent many hours of patient enquiry, walking hundreds of miles to find, and sketch, Hikey sites, with this book being the result of two years spent tracking down these elusive creatures!

Compiled from recollections of many older Norfolk folk, and full of authentic folklore, it offers a helping hand to the Hikey Sprites to give them a foothold into the future.

A beautiful little book, in the popular A5 size, packed from start to finish with anecdotes relating to the Hikey Sprites as seen through the eyes of local folk. Locator maps are also included showing the sites where the Hikey Sprites have been ‘seen’ whether Supernatural, and Mysterious, or Natural and Human. Some of the sites have also been nicely illustrated in pen and ink by the author. Certainly well worth buying, if only for the sake of satisfying one’s curiosity!
[Reviewed by Webmaster]

THE BOOK OF SHERINGHAM – Twixt Sea and Pine

Peter Brooks. Published by Halsgrove. 160 pages, with over 300 illustrations. ISBN 978-1-84114-944-8. Price £19.99.

PETER BROOKS, founder member of FOND, is well known as an author, with his latest publication The Book of Sheringham: Twixt Sea and Pine packed full of illustrations and interesting facts about the seaside resort on the North Norfolk coast.

Within the book’s 160 pages there are over 300 illustrations covering a range of topics from fishing and fishermen, the lifeboat service, town shops and the people who run them, sports, the war years when Sheringham was very much a‘front line’ town, and famous people who have either lived or had holidays in this popular seaside resort.

Among the more unusual aspects of town life recorded is the search for an airplane landing-ground during the 1920s, the reason why the German zeppelin Hindenburg flew over the town in June 1936 and the fishermen who visited Great Yarmouth and allegedly caused a riot.

The Book of Sheringham costs £19.99 and is available from all good bookshops, or direct from Halsgrove, Tel: 01823 653777 or online at www.halsgrove.com

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Peter Brooks moved to Sheringham in 1963, where he was the environmental health officer to the town council, and almost immediately began collecting postcards, photographs and books relating to his new home town.

Always interested in local history, Peter has written many books on the subject with The Book of Sheringham being the largest and most comprehensive by far.

This book should appeal to anyone wishing to know more of the history of Sheringham, local and furriner alike – it certainly does to this Webmaster, but then I’m slightly biased I suppose, having been bred-and-born in the town. For me, Sheringham will always be home!
[Reviewed by Webmaster]

For further details or to buy online click here

THE BROADS IN PRINT: The Days of Discovery –
Early 1800s to 1920

David Clarke. Published by Joy and David Clarke 2009. 112 pages.
98 colour illustrations and 48 monochromes. ISBN 978-0-900616-86-0. Price £10.95.

DAVID CLARKE’S The Broads in Print is intended to be an accurate listing of the major books and pamphlets published about the Norfolk and Suffolk Broads up to 1920. Each chapter briefly describes their format and content, with the majority illustrated in colour or within the text. Its publication comes nearly ninety years after the last real attempt to compile a listing, that being done by the then City Librarian, Geo A Stephen.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
David Clarke has spent his working life renovating and managing houses and flats within Norwich. With his wife Joy, he has also been an antiquarian bookseller and collector for many years, specialising in Norfolk History.
[Reviewed by Webmaster]

For further details or to order click here

David now owns a bookshop in Davey Place, Norwich – The City Bookshop – which specialises in new and secondhand antiquarian books.

He also has a website www.citybookshopnorwich.co.uk

THE COUNTRY HOUSES OF NORFOLK:
Part One – The Major Houses

David Clarke. Published by Joy and David Clarke 2006. A5 size. 104 pages.
80 monochrome illustrations. ISBN 0-900616-76-8. Price £8.95.

DAVID CLARKE’S The Country Houses of Norfolk: Part One – The Major Houses is the first in a volume of a series with the aim of introducing Norfolk Country Houses to those interested in their architecture, history and families.

This volume gives an insight into the major halls in the county, many well known but others still privately owned and not generally open to the public.

Very well researched and written, with a great many photographs of interest to compliment each article. [Reviewed by Webmaster]

For further details or to order click here

THE COUNTRY HOUSES OF NORFOLK:
Part Two – The Lost Houses

David Clarke. Published by Joy and David Clarke 2008. A5 size. 120 pages.
82 monochrome illustrations. ISBN 978-0-900616-82-2. Price £9.75.

DAVID CLARKE’S The Country Houses of Norfolk: Part Two – The Lost Houses is the second in a volume of a series with the aim of introducing Norfolk Country Houses to those interested in their architecture, history and families.

This volume clearly describes and illustrates, with the use of a great many photographs, nearly sixty large houses in Norfolk that have been ruined or demolished within the last one hundred years.

Again, a well researched book. [Reviewed by Webmaster]

For further details or to order click here.

THE COUNTRY HOUSES OF NORFOLK:
Part Three – The City and Suburbs

David Clarke. Published by Joy and David Clarke 2011. A5 size. 120 pages.
76 monochrome illustrations. ISBN 978-0-900616-97-6. Price £9.95.

DAVID CLARKE’S The Country Houses of Norfolk: Part Three – The City and Suburbs is the third in a volume of the ongoing series describing the country houses of Norfolk, and follows the previously-published books, The Major Houses and The Lost Houses, both of which have necessitated reprinting.

The emphasises the great public interest in the 'big house' and those who live (or lived) there and provides the encouragement for the author to continue researching this fascinating subject.

This book details the mansions built within about a four or five mile radius of Norwich, taking the present ring road as a starting point. [Reviewed by Webmaster]

For further details or to order click here.

NORFOLK DIALECT AND ITS FRIENDS –
Ten years of FOND memories

Robin Limmer. John Nickalls Publications 2009. 224 pages. Over 100 black and white illustrations. ISBN 978-1-904136-29-3.

ROBIN LIMMER’S Norfolk Dialect and its Friends is not just the story of FOND’s first ten years of successful efforts to preserve the unique sound and character of the county’s native tongue – neither is it just about helping the broadcasting media get the accent right.

It is, in fact, also an appreciation of all things Norfolk as seen through the eyes of both well-known and lesser-known people who were either born here or have become ‘Norfolk by adoption’. In the book there are tributes to such icons as Ted Ellis, Sidney Grapes, Dick Bagnall-Oakeley, Sid Kipper, and the Singing Postman, to remind us why this county is so special! Now reprinted and available from FOND.
[Reviewed by Webmaster]

For further details or to order click here

WALKING ON BURIED HISTORY

Charles Lewton Brain. The Larks Press 2009. 80 pages. 11 black and white illustrations and 1 map. ISBN 978 1904006 47 3. Price £7.99.

CHARLES LEWTON BRAIN’S book contains twenty-nine short articles which were originally published in the Eastern Daily Press during the 1970s.

The author was born in 180 in Swanton Morley where his parents were Headmaster and Mistress of the local school, and, after a few years as one of their pupils, he went on to study at the King’s Lynn Grammar School for Boys, followed by employment in one of the town’s banks.

WWI saw him serving in the Royal Artillery experiencing active service in the trenches and then three years in Palestine and Egypt. On demobilization he found employment in ‘a dark office’ in London.

On retirement in 1947 he and his wife returned to Norfolk, setting up home in Heacham, from where he enjoyed nothing more than exploring his native county, often travelling several miles on what his daughter has described as ‘an ancient bicycle’.

Following a chance meeting with amateur archaeologist Ivan Thatcher, who introduced him to the delights of researching the past, Charles became a member of the Norfolk Archaeological Research Committee and the author of a booklet listing over a hundred previously unknown prehistoric sites in the Heacham area alone.

Walking in Buried History is a joy to read, written by a local man who highlights aspects of our county – such as unrecorded Roman roads, how to make a dewpond, the importance of Mounds, Mottes and Barrows (the latter on Harpley Common possibly being of some significance), long-lost villages and the relationship between oysters and animals with archaeology which we may, and often do, overlook. [Reviewed by Peter Brooks]

For further details or to buy online click here

THE MOTHER OF NECTON: A Century of Norfolk Life

Mary Nichols. The Larks Press 2009. 184 pages. 36 black and white illustrations and a village map. ISBN 978 1904006 48 0. Price £9.50.

MARY NICHOLS has written more than thirty historical novels, including some romantic tales for Mills and Boon, but this is her first work of non-fiction and this reviewer is certain it will join the ranks of her popular novels. Why? Because the story of her grandmother, Eliza Ong, the village’s unregulated and uncertificated midwife, is told with a mixture of love, respect and an understanding of the hard life she lived, all in a style of writing which is eminently readable and in its way is a masterpiece.

The way historical facts, village history, our native dialect and human emotions are brought together to record the story of just one lady and a village we take for granted as we drive swiftly past on the busy A47.
[Reviewed by Peter Brooks]

For further details or to buy online click here

CASTLE ACRE: A Social History

Mary-Anne Garry. The Larks Press 2009. 84 pages, 18 black and white illustrations and 1 map. ISBN 978 1904006 46 6. Price: £5.50.

MARY-ANNE GARRY decided to concentrate her research on the lives of ordinary villagers in Castle Acre during the eighteenth century, as English Heritage had already produced a guide to the Castle and Priory.

Her journey through time is both prolific and enlightening: arguments over the appointment of a new vicar; the activities of the village ‘Crier’; the village theatre (in truth, a barn) situated in the specially renamed Drury Lane; the lewd songs by ‘gang’ girls as they returned home after a hard day’s work in the fields; the stigma of poverty of the working men set against the wealth of the gangmasters – all are well documented.

Dedicated research has resulted in this reviewer appreciating that however small or large a village may be and whatever special attraction(s) it may have it pays to look beyond the obvious to discover what lies behind the modern façade and how the community and environment have changed and developed over the years. [Reviewed by Peter Brooks]

For further details or to buy online click here

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