Category Archives: Uncategorized

Mining in Kent exhibition – Book a Tour!

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We will be holding a series of guided tours of the Mining in Kent exhibition. Join us on a tour to find out more about the exhibition, hear about the exhibition highlights, and get the answers to any questions you might have about mining in Kent!

The exhibition tells the story of the history of mining in Kent, from the early days of discovering the Kent coalfield to the impact of the 1984 Miners’ Strike. Illustrated by original archive material from Special Collections and Archives we explore the main coalfields in the county and what life was like for a Kent miner. We look at the history of miners’ strikes in 1926, 1972, 1974 and 1984 and how these were portrayed by cartoonists in the national press. We take a deeper look at the impact of the 1984/1985 miners’ strike in Kent and the different forms of support that arose for the miners and the mining community, from Kent students to stand-up comedians.

Tours will be led by Karen Brayshaw (Special Collections and Archives Manager) or Beth Astridge (University Archivist).

Tours will be held on:

 

  • Wednesday 10th July 12pm – with Karen Brayshaw
  • Monday 22nd July 1pm – with Beth Astridge
  • Friday 9th August 12.30pm – with Karen Brayshaw
  • Tuesday 10th September 12.30pm – with Beth Astridge
  • Thursday 26th September 12.30pm – Karen Brayshaw

If you would like to join us for a guided tour of the Mining in Kent exhibition – please  email specialcollections@kent.ac.uk to book your place!

Two yellow stickers with red and black text reading "Support the Miners, NUM, Stop Pit Closures"

NUM Support the Miners stickers, from the Richard Richardson Mining Collection

Mining in Kent: An Exhibition exploring the history of mining in Kent

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2024 marks both the 40th anniversary of the 1984 Miners’ Strike, and the 100th anniversary of the cutting of the first mineshaft at Betteshanger Colliery, the largest of Kent’s mines.

Front page of a Kent Area National Union of Mineworkers Leaflet titled Solidarity with the Miners, with the title in red text above an image of miner wearing a miner's helmet and head lamp, and the caption 'Coal Not Dole' at the bottom.

Kent Area NUM Leaflet – Solidarity with the Miners (Richardson Mining Collections, Box 6)

Using archive material from Special Collections and Archives, this exhibition tells the story of the history of mining in Kent,  from the early days of discovering the Kent coalfield to the impact of the 1984 Miners’ Strike.

The exhibition showcases material from the following archive collections:

  • The Richard Richardson Mining Collection
  • The British Cartoon Archive
  • The British Stand-Up Comedy Archive
  • The Labour and Socialist Newspapers

With thanks to Beth Astridge and Karen Brayshaw – and especially to our volunteer Amy Green, who have worked on the research and curation of this exhibition.

We will be publishing several blogs of the next few months giving further insight into some of the stories and items on display in the exhibition. So do keep checking here for further blog entries!

 

Cartoon showing the ups and downs of Arthur Scargill's leadership of the miners' strike with him moving up ladder in March 1984, and sliding down a snake in March 1985.

Nicholas Garland in this cartoon illustrates the rise and fall in the prospects of Arthur Scargill and the NUM from the beginning of the strike in 1984 to the end in 1985. (Reference: British Cartoon Archive, NG2969, Nicholas Garland, Sunday Telegraph, 12th March 1984)

 

 

Its Inmates Absurd: The Velvet Underground at the University of Kent 1971

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This is a guest blog from our volunteer Peter Stanfield, Emeritus Professor of Film at the University of Kent. Peter has been studying our editions of the University of Kent’s student newspaper ‘InCant’ to build our knowledge of the bands and artists playing on the University Campus in the 1960s and 1970s. If you have any memories of this gig – please do let us know! Email specialcollections@kent.ac.uk.

 

Its Inmates Absurd: The Velvet Underground at the University of Kent 1971

“After about the first two years we got talking. . .”

– Maureen Tucker on rehearsing with the Velvet Underground

As a live proposition, The Velvet Underground, sans Lou Reed, existed for an improbable 2 ½ years, which included two tours of Europe in 1971 and 1972. In England, Autumn 1971, most of their gigs were on the burgeoning university and college circuit. On November 4, they made an appearance at the University of Kent. The big recent attractions on campus had been The Who, Eliot Dining Hall, May 1970 and in March 1971, in the Sports Hall, Led Zeppelin. More generally, student entertainment was provided by middle-ranking progressive rock bands – Mick Abrahams, Colosseum, Blodwyn Pig and local heroes Caravan. Kent alumni Spirogyra were an ever present feature. In all likelihood, the bookers thought the Velvet Underground would fit right into this scene. For their drummer, Maureen Tucker, the VU were always the exception to such trends.

Image of Maureen Tucker, holding drum sticks, playing the drums for the Velvet Underground.

Image of Maureen Tucker playing in the Velvet Underground at the University of Kent, InCant Student Newspaper, 17th March 1971

The Velvets performed in the Rutherford Dining Hall to a positive response, if the reviewer for the student paper InCant was any indicator. He or she considered them to be a ‘genuine rock and roll band in the American sense, as opposed to the likes of Deep Purple, Black Sabbath’. The reviewer delighted in their choice of covers ­ – Dixie Cups’ ‘Chapel of Love’ and standards ‘Turn On Your Love Light’ and ‘Spare Change’. Lou Reed songs ‘Sweet Nuthin’, ‘Sister Ray’, ‘After Hours’ and, the ‘beautifully corny’ (!?!), ‘White Light/White Heat’ were highlights, with the latter described as ‘funky’ by Doug Yule. InCant’s critic agreed.

Black and white image of an article from InCant student newspaper about a Velvet Underground gig showing two photographs of performers and text descriptions

Review of Velvet Underground gig, InCant Student Newspaper, November 17th 1971.

The interview with the only original member of the band, Maureen Tucker, is a peach. Asked about the shifts in the line-up, she said:

It’s been such a gradual change that to me anyway there’s been no apparent effect. After about the first two years we got talking . . . it was a mutual agreement that we were kind of getting sick of going on stage playing 30 minute songs. It’s just not original after a while, so Lou (Reed) started writing more four minute songs, rock and roll songs. Now it’s even more regular rock and roll than it ever was.

 

What happened to Nico? She wanted to go off on her own and be a big star

Image of a text article from InCant newspaper about a performance by the band, Velvet Underground

News item on the Velvet Underground concert, InCant student newspaper, Nov 17th 1971

Like most of the events held by the Student’s Union, The Velvet Underground gig lost money; the organisers putting lack of interest, it was suggested, down to the fact the band’s line-up had changed. On that basis they had tried to cancel but were unable to break the contract. Steeleye Span proved to be a bigger draw.

Black and white image of a performer singing at a microphone playing a guitar. He is wearing jeans, a white mickey mouse t-shirt and a thin scarf or tie around his neck.

Image from news article in InCant student newspaper, Issue No 70, 17th November 1971, p6

Back in April 1971, student Helen Chastel had provided InCant with a review of Loaded, soon to be released in the UK. It is one the best summaries of the VU I’ve read.

Proposition: for consistent and versatile genius in rock the Velvet Underground (or V.U.s to the cognoscenti) are equalled only to Dylan and the Stones. Don’t ask questions if you dispute it, write your own review. If you deny it, you are a Quintessence or Andy Williams fan and not worth bothering with.

Helen clearly didn’t think they belonged with the progressive mediocrities. She was a total fan, she’d bought her copy of Loaded in Washington last Christmas while on an exchange to the States and she knew someone who knew Lou Reed – ‘virtuoso extraordinaire, ex-child prodigy, now repudiator of drugs and hippies, mythical recluse . . . Sainthood is all in the mind.’

How many recognise themselves in the line ‘The deep sleep of a suburban upbringing can be shattered by sudden exposure to such a group’? Faced with VU & Nico, Helen ‘saw darkness of which I knew nothing, saw an extreme weariness, people born to die. Eliot (her college at Kent) life became petty, its inmates absurd.’ Reed, she wrote, had a ‘clear and cliché-less view of modern city life’, White Light/White Heat extended even further ‘into a chaos of light, blood, heat and noise . . . The third album is a surfacing, a return to verbal precision’. . . Lou Reed, Saint of the City. Helen Chastel, Saint of VU fans. . .

Image of a text article from a student newspaper titled "Velvet Underground", by Helen Chastel

Review of the Velvet Underground album ‘Loaded’ by Helen Chastel, published in InCant, the University of Kent Student Newspaper, issue No 62, 17th February 1971, p6.

On that same tour of British Universities, the VU entertained Warwick University’s student cohort. Genesis P-Orridge’s COMUS providing support (they also played at Kent in May 1972). Ad and review from the Warwick Boar student paper.

Image of an advert for gigs in Warwick

Gig advertisement for Warwick University

‘The Velvet Underground from whom great things were expected . . .’ Like at Kent, attendance fell below expectations.

Image of an article reviewing 'Ents' at Warwick University including two photographs and a text description of the gigs

Review of ‘Ents’ at Warwick University including the Velvet Underground

 

For Peter’s original blog see the following link:

https://www.peterstanfield.com/blog/2024/2/8/velvet-underground

Archive Volunteer opportunity – bands and live music at the University of Kent

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Do you have an interest in folk, jazz and prog rock bands of the 1960s and 1970s?

Did you know that in the early days of the University, we had some amazing visiting bands play on campus! Some of them were big concerts such as Led Zeppelin in the Sports Hall in March 1971, followed by The Kinks in 1973.

Page of a newspaper showing an article titled The Kinks Rock on about a Kinks concert on the University of Kent campus in 1973

Article on The Kinks concert, March 1973, InCant (student newspaper)

Other bands played in Elliot or Rutherford Dining Hall, like The Yardbirds in Eliot Dining Hall in 1967, while The Gulbenkian also hosted some major artists, such as jazz legend Stan Tracey in 1970.  Some gigs were smaller, more intimate affairs, often featuring jazz and folk artists in one of the College Junior Common Rooms.

Canterbury was also an important part of the development of ‘Prog Rock’ (Progressive rock – a genre of rock music associated with experimentation and instrumentation), with the emergence of the Canterbury Scene. Many prog rock bands played on campus including Soft Machine, Caravan, and Hatfield and the North.

Two psychedelic looking figures with distorted faces, with the words Caravan and Juicy Lucy above the, and Keynes Fallout in the bottom left corner.

Poster for Caravan and Juicy Lucy – playing at the Keynes Fallourt concert. (Poster in the University Archives)

There is all this to learn and more in the archives at the University!  In preparation for celebrating the 60th anniversary of the University, we would like to offer a student volunteer placement in 2024 to help us with research in the archives into the bands and live music performances that took place on campus. This will involve looking at contemporary issues of the student newspaper and other sources to log dates, times and places for bands such as Manfred Mann, Pentangle, and Steeleye Span.

Do get in touch if you are interested in working with us on this fantastic project.

Email: specialcollections@kent.ac.uk

 

The Theatre of War: Interpreting the First World War in Pantomime

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This blog post follows on from the recent post ‘What Did You Do In The War?’ and focuses specifically on the souvenir edition for the performance of Dick Whittington that took place in Salonika during Christmas 1915. In contrast to the First World War programmes for Bluebeard/Gluebeard and the flyer for the pantomime Aladdin, which was performed during the Second World War, which featured in the previous blog post, the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington provides readers with the opportunity to follow the story of the pantomime, examine the dialogues and songs, and see how what troops were experiencing during the First World War became incorporated into the story of the pantomime. In this souvenir edition, Dick Whittington is divided into 3 acts and each section of the blog post focuses on a few examples to demonstrate how the experience of the First World War in Salonika became integrated into this well-known tale.

As well as being a form of humorous and slapstick entertainment, pantomime served as a means of addressing social issues, providing a satirical commentary on serious topics. The pantomime also generally touched upon aspects of everyday life and the experiences of the troops where they were stationed. It is not surprising, then, to see references to the ongoing reality of the First World War within this souvenir edition of Dick Whittington, as well as the context around the First World War more broadly.

Act 1

The below section from Act 1 rather comically refers to the efforts of the 85th Field Ambulance to put on this pantomime in the first place, commending themselves on providing entertainment. Rather than overtly refer to themselves, they cast themselves as ‘Karno’s Ambulance’, who the character Jack says have been conferred by the King ‘the distinction of wearing a scarlet ribbon upon the shoulder in recognition of their valuable services in amusing the other troops’.

Extract from Act 1 – Alderman Fitzwarren’s Store in Chelsea from the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington by Frank Kenchington. Performed in Salonika in 1915.

Whilst not overtly stated, calling themselve’s ‘Karno’s Ambulance’ may also be nodding towards the comedian of slapstick and theatre empresario Fred Karno, who was known for his chaos on stage. In fact, disorganised troops of soldiers referred to themselves as ‘Fred Karno’s Army’ during the First World War, perhaps to reflect the chaotic situation in which they found themselves.

The above example also addresses the sorry taste of tea, which Jack complains about to the character Fitzwarren, who tells Jack that it’s the same tea that is sold to the Army. Tea was a staple in the trenches during the First World War and was regularly drank to mask the taste of water, which was transported in petrol tins. Perhaps the tea drank by those in Salonika was not as tasty or as much of a luxury!

Attitudes around recruitment and joining the Army during the First World War are also present, with the character Horlicks attempting to persuade both Fitzwarren and Dick to sign up and ‘pull together’ and ‘rally round the flag and so forth’.

Extract from Act 1 – Alderman Fitzwarren’s Store in Chelsea from the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington by Frank Kenchington. Performed in Salonika in 1915.

There were many reasons that men joined the army during the First World War and this idea of patriotism and peer pressure resonates in this discussion between these 3 characters. Like recruitment posters of the time (very much thinking about the 1914 Lord Kitchener Wants You poster), this dialogue taps into the sense of fighting for one’s fatherland and emotional ties to the war, particularly about everyone doing their part towards the war effort.

Blockades causing food rations and shortages – both on the Allied and Axis sides – were a tactic frequently employed during the First World War and hunger was used as a deadly weapon. For example, ships going to Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey, were blockaded by the British and French, causing malnutrition and starvation even after the end of the war. Dick Whittington offers a snippet into this reality from the British perspective in the below dialogue between Fitzwarren and Sir Joseph, blaming the gritty texture of jam, which now has ‘hard and sharp pieces’, and its manufacture within Britain because Germany had successfully blockaded their ports.

Extract from Act 1 – Alderman Fitzwarren’s Store in Chelsea from the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington by Frank Kenchington. Performed in Salonika in 1915.

Act 2

Whilst this performance of Dick Whittington took place in Salonika, other areas where fighting took place during the First World War are also referenced. As seen in the below exchange between Dick and his love interest Alice in Act 2, Dick refers to his time in Flanders and ‘the awful ear-splitting stuff’ that he put up with whilst there.

Extract from Act 2 –On Board The Good Ship “Passover” from the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington by Frank Kenchington. Performed in Salonika in 1915.

Between 1914 and 1918, Flanders suffered heavy bombardment and saw largescale destruction and death, with important cities and villages completely demolished. Notable battles occurred in Flanders, such as the Battle of Passchendaele between July and November 1917, which saw the loss of roughly 275,000 men on the British side and at least 220,000 German soldiers. Dick’s comment may only be a passing reference but still nods towards this devastation.

Interestingly the 85th Field Army are again referred to as ‘Karno’s Field Ambulance’, highlighting the contributions that they made ‘Out of England, with heart aflame,/ For a job “somewhere in France”,/At the dawn of 1915’ and their recognition as ‘Glorious Karno’ by ‘everybody’. Even beyond Flanders, in areas such as Mont Noir, the successes of ‘Glorious Karno’ are showcased.

Extract from Act 2 – On Board The Good Ship “Passover” from the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington by Frank Kenchington. Performed in Salonika in 1915.

Act 3

Linked to the discussion about Flanders with the section of this post focusing on Act 2, Ypres is specifically mentioned in the chorus marking the finale of Act 3 and the end of the pantomime.

Extract from Act 3 – Outside Fitzwarren’s Canteen – In The Mists, In The Mountains, “Somewhere In Greece” from the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington by Frank Kenchington. Performed in Salonika in 1915.

The first verse is particularly striking and again reflects societal attitudes about joining the war effort. Reminiscent of Jessie Pope’s poem Who’s For The Game, joining the war was treated as a game by the men, who were not scared of ‘dud German shells’. This of course is far from the futile reality of war but again shows how this pantomime performance made recognisable and provided commentary on general attitudes of the context in which it was created.

Even the traditional location of Dick Whittington has been influenced by where the 85th Field Ambulance found themselves during the First World War. Not only are various places in which troops fought mentioned throughout the performance, but, rather than maintain the setting of London for performance of Dick Whittington, as would normally be the case, the pantomime has moved to Greece where the troops have found themselves. This location change was made clear from the very opening of Act 3, in which we see that Fitzwarren’s Canteen is located “Somewhere In Greece”.

Opening of Act 3 – Outside Fitzwarren’s Canteen – In the Mists, On The Mountains, “Somewhere In Greece”, from the souvenir edition of Dick Whittington by Frank Kenchington. Performed in Salonika in 1915.

The myth of Dick Whittington stemmed from the streets of medieval London but, in this performance, it is very much the present and the experience of life in Salonika during the First World War that informs the vision, environment, and trajectory of the pantomime.

Conclusion

Themes and issues relating to life at the front and along the Home Front permeate this performance of Dick Whittington. A ‘Ration Song’ was included and there is even a character called Maconochie, no doubt called this because of the tinned food that troops ate, such as Maconochie beef and vegetable stew. Pantomime did not just provide entertainment and a distraction but, also, allowed troops to deviate from traditional stories and devise a setting in which they should share, laugh about, and understand the world in which they found themselves. These are only a few examples from this souvenir edition but there are many more – come visit us at Special Collections & Archives to check it out to learn more about the First World War and remember the experiences and lives of those who fought during the Great War!