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It’s Not All Bells and Tinsel – The Big Friday Find
Sometimes you find an image so powerful that it sets off a series of thoughts. This week, while hunting for sometimes completely different, I came across this. It’s the interior of a boarding house...
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Let It Snow?
There’s something magical about snow. Above: Heaton Park in the snow, 1930 (source) Especially at night. Above: Piccadilly Gardens covered in snow, 1947 (source) Indeed, Manchester is no stranger to...
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He’s Behind You!
We have some picturesque posters from past pantomimes in our collection. They conjure up a very different world. The Christmas visit to a panto is still very much part of festive traditions. Oh no it...
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The Big Friday Find – Archives+ The Year in Review
2013 was the year that the Archives+ project kicked into gear. We thought for this week’s Friday Find we would take you through a whistle-stop tour of the highlights of our year. April Archives+ staff...
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Get Your Skates On!
As we move from Christmas to the New Year, it’s nice to look back at winters past. Some of you may have taken a turn on the ice rink at Spinningfields this Christmas. Others may remember the Silver...
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Christmas shopping and the January sales
The retail world is changing fast, with online sales on the increase. The very real experience of battling through the crowds for the Boxing Day and January sales, of queuing outside the department...
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Keep it Clean! – The Big Friday Find
My colleagues and I really do find fascinating items for this post – we don’t make it up! This week we are in the middle of packing up and moving from our Marshall Street home to the newly refurbished...
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A Room With A View – The Big Friday Find
It hasn’t really been a good week for finding interesting things to show you. This week we’re starting to move ourselves into Central Library, alongside the archives which have been coming over for a...
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Transports of Delight – the Big Friday Find
It’s been a week when cars and alcohol consumption have been in the news. So when we came across this photo of a garage in Rusholme, we couldn’t help noticing the advertising on the surrounding...
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Crime and Punishment in Manchester, c. 1790 – 1890
This is my first time writing for Archives+ blog, and what better way to start than by writing about crime?! When I first started researching this post I set myself a wide brief of ‘crime and/or...
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A Common Lodging House Story – The Big Friday Find
This weeks Big Friday Find was prompted by a request for more information about the picture from the late 1890s used in this previous post. Looking through the photographs and trying to find out more...
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A song and dance
My interest in folklore and cultural tradition goes back a long way. Folk Life Studies was part of my undergraduate English degree at the University of Leeds back in the 1970s and I studied part time...
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Every Picture Tells a Story – The Big Friday Find
While looking through the photographs of Manchester around 1900 on images.manchester.gov.uk I noticed one name that came up again and again. Who was this H Entwistle and why was he taking all these...
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World War One soldier’s experience
Corporal Stewart Cook is a historian who demonstrates the life and equipment of the British Tommy (Tommy Atkins) during World War One. So far we have delivered six workshops in schools and the...
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A Flowery History – The Big Friday Find
City centre Manchester changes at a frightening speed. If you don’t visit for a few weeks buildings disappear and new ones shoot up in their place. Shops move from one place to another, some...
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A Pearl fisher from Cheetham Hill – The Big Friday Find
Debbie Cameron, a volunteer with the archives, has done an amazing piece of research for this week’s story. Truth really is stranger than fiction! It’s fantastic that our Archives+ blog is reaching...
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The Wheels Go Round – The Big Friday Find
Cycling makes sense in a city on the flat. We even have a bike in the archive, not for riding round the strong rooms like Arthur Waley was once reputed to do at the British Museum, but as a form of...
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Spinning Yarns – The Big Friday Find
Looking through our image collection this week, this lovely photograph caught my eye. It’s part of Spinning the Web, a website set up to celebrate the cotton industry in Lancashire. The photograph...
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Investigating Jerome Caminada, Manchester’s Sherlock Holmes
Whilst researching the adventures of Detective Jerome Caminada for my book, The Real Sherlock Holmes, I came across some unexpected treasures in the Greater Manchester County Record Office, which...
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A Quick Peek at Archives+ – The Big Friday Find
We’re sorry that it’s been quiet on the Archives+ blog for a few weeks now. As I’m sure you’re aware, we’re all working hard to get Central Library ready for reopening on March 22nd. Things have come...
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