The Treaty of Ghent, also known as the Peace of Christmas Eve, was the pact signed in the city of Ghent, Belgium (chosen because Belgium was a neutral country) that officially ended hostilities between the fledgling United States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Peace talks started in Ghent in August…
Join us on December 14 at 2 pm EST for a members-only talk on all things about setting productivity goals for 2024! (Be sure to SAVE YOUR SPOT via the button below!) When we struggle with productivity, we often find ourselves asking why any one particular method won’t work for us. Or why we aren’t more…
“This is the way the world ends / Not with a bang but a whimper” T.S. Eliot wasn’t describing the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire when he wrote those words in his poem, “The Hollow Men.” Nonetheless, his lines are an extremely apt way to describe the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, which…
It’s almost time to break out the pumpkin (or apple, or pecan) pies, candied yams, cranberry sauce, and, of course, roast turkey. For many Americans, a family meal featuring traditional fare is the basis of a Thanksgiving celebration. But you may surprised, as I was, at just how far back in history our Thanksgiving tradition…
Royal births should be happy events, a cause for proclamations and national celebrations. However, more than 200 years ago this month, a highly anticipated royal birth in Regency England ended in a tragedy that rocked the nation and set off a race to produce a legitimate heir to the crown. Before we get into that,…
There must be something about the month of November and plots to kill the British king. The dastardly treason of Guy Fawkes and his band of conspirators is well-known, and the foiling of that plot is still celebrated more than 400 years after the event, marked with fireworks, parades and bonfires throughout Great Britain on…
Halloween may be over, but as we get into early November there are a few more British traditions that were likely familiar to anyone living in Regency England. The most obvious one is Guy Fawkes Day. November 5, 1605, is the date that the infamous Gunpowder Plot was foiled, preventing Guy Fawkes and his…
What is it about ghosts and theaters? There seems to be something about the excitement and intense emotions exhibited during a performance that encourages spirits to hang around, like afterlife groupies hoping to get invited backstage. In my last post I talked about the ghosts who haunt the Theatre Royal Bath. However, ghostly apparitions…
With Halloween approaching, I thought it would be fun to talk about ghosts. And not just any ghosts, but the ghosts that haunt Britain’s historic theaters. These old theaters are rife with ghosts and psychic phenomena. Curiously, a lot of those ghosts are known individually as the Grey Lady, though they each have a different…
Step aside, Hammersmith Ghost. There were other specters who spooked Regency imaginations and inspired the popular press. Here are a few noteworthy examples: Queen Elizabeth I Here’s a phantom that must have haunted Napoleon’s nightmares in the early years of the 19th century while he was planning to invade England. In this 1803 print published…