The Blues as sung in English – and extraordinarily some of the songs began here in London before they crossed the Atlantic. ibid.
Soho was now dancing to its own version of jazz, calypso and Latin American rhythms. ibid.
One of the many British Blues bands formed in sixties London was Manfred Mann fronted by singer Paul Jones. ibid.
Jamaican music in the form of blue-beat, ska and later Reggae became an important fixture in the city’s soundscape. ibid.
The impeccable attack of Ian Dury. ibid.
All Set For Festival: London’s South Bank exhibition is ready to show the world what Britain can do. Pathé News 1951
The South Bank exhibition: Britain’s proof to a doubting world that she still leads in science and discovery draws to a close. ibid.
At dawn Londoners come oozing out of the ground, tired and red-eyed and sleepy, the fires are dying down. I saw them turn into their own street to see if their house was still standing. Edward R Murrow, CBS radio reporter, 1940
I was moving through the terrain of inner urban sprawl, a geography of sensory deprivation, a zone of duel carriageways and petrol stations, business parks, and sign posts to Heathrow, CCTV cameras crouched over warehouse gates, the traffic signals presided like small-minded deities over their deserted crossroads; the entire defenceless landscape was waiting for a crime to be committed. J G Ballard, Kingdom Come, 2006
A small revolution was taking place, so modest and well behaved that almost no one had noticed. Like a visitor to an abandoned film set, I stood by the entrance to Chelsea Marina and listened to the morning traffic in the King’s Road, a reassuring medley of car stereos and ambulance sirens. Beyond the gatehouse were the streets of the deserted estate, an apocalyptic vision deprived of its soundtrack. Protest banners sagged from the balconies, and I counted a dozen overturned cars and at least two burnt-out houses. J G Ballard, Millennium People p1
But I was thinking of another time, a brief period when Chelsea Marina was a place of real promise, when a young paediatrician persuaded the residents to create a unique republic, a city without street signs, laws without penalties, events without significance, a sun without shadows. ibid. pp293-294
When one talks of the Thames Docks beauty is a vain word. But romance has lived too long upon this river not to have thrown a mantle of glamour upon its banks. Joseph Conrad, 1906
The Thames is so wonderful because the mist is always changing its shapes and colours, always making its light mysterious. Arthur Symonds, 1909
In 1870 there were three hundred music halls in London alone. Roy Hudd
A brash confident city. Danny Baker
From the beginning Londoners were convinced that this was a deliberate attack. And from the very beginning they wanted to know whodunnit. Adrian Tinniswood, author By Permission of Heaven: The Story of the Great Fire of London
Fires were breaking out all over London in separate incidents. ibid.
Here by permission of Heaven, Hell broke loose on this protestant city from the malice of barbarous papists … The Monument original inscription
London is one of the most enchanting places I’ve ever been on this planet. Don Johnson
In London, love and scandal are considered the best sweeteners of tea. John Osborne
I’ve been walking about London for the last thirty years, and I find something fresh in it every day. Walter Besant
The world can never be in the state of right order, strong government, and good influence unless London is truly and literally established as its capital. Kedar Joshi
79,800. Thames, the most loved of all the Ocean’s sons,
By his own sire, to his embraces runs,
Hasting to pay its tribute to the Sea,
Like mortal life to meet eternity. John Denham, Cooper’s Hill, 1642
The Thames became an open sewer. The newspapers dubbed the crisis The Great Stink. Jeremy Paxman, The Victorians: Painting the Town: Their Story in Pictures, BBC 2009
Within thirty minutes the boat will be run down by a larger vessel, and fifty-one young people will die needlessly. The sinking of the Marchioness was the UK’s worst river disaster in over fifty years. Marchioness: Party Boat Disaster, Channnel 5 2014
For centuries there had been accidents on the River. ibid.
The Bowbelle struck The Marchioness from behind. ibid.
The streets of London are paved with gold. Proverb
Crowds without company, and dissipation without pleasure. Edward Gibbon, 1737-94, Memoirs of My Life ch5
London in 1886: then the largest city in human history and the centre of the known world. The Secret History of our Streets I: Deptford High Street, BBC 2012
Charles Booth, Victorian London’s social explorer. Booth produced a series of pioneering maps that colour-coded the streets of his London according to the ever shifting class of its residents. ibid.
The story of Deptford High Street is a story of how it lost both its wealth and the community which had given it life. ibid.
Post-war prosperity rejuvenates Deptford. ibid.
They make a propaganda film arguing for the destruction of nineteenth century London: Deptford 1943. ibid.
A vast modernist social experiment is to be carried out in the working-class east and south. ibid.
Deptford Council comes up with a plan to close down its market. ibid.
The residents weren’t shown these maps and they were never consulted about these plans to pull down the streets ... Near total destruction of its past. ibid.
Reginald Road: the health inspectors’ verdicts are kept private; three years on Reginald is declared a slum and residents are instructed to leave. ibid.
Built for them in the Georgian era but fell into a steep decline when it was abandoned by them. A century later the middle classes returned to restore it. The Secret History of Our Streets II: Camberwell Grove
Four miles from the centre of London lies Camberwell Grove ... built in Georgian and Regency times ... You enter another world. ibid.
In the 1860s the railway cut into Camberwell Grove. ibid.
In 1951 nearly half a million households in London were still without a bath which was plugged into the mains. ibid.
Between 1967 and 1976, 70,000 houses were demolished in London. ibid.
By the mid-70s the vast new Ayelsbury estate ... was already suffering from its severe design flaws. ibid.
Its prime location made the Caledonian Road right for exploitation. The Secret History of our Streets III: Caledonian Road
In 1826 London’s Victorian property boom was in full swing. ibid.
A brand new prison: Pentonville opened in 1842. ibid.
The rail company had the power to get what it wanted. ibid.
In the 1950s with their leaders being locked up in Pentonville, the road had become the focus of tension between Irish republicans and authorities. ibid.
Caledonian Market was closed down for good in 1963. It was the end of an era. ibid.
The Council decided the whole area needed modernising. ibid.
State of the art council estates: once more the people of the Caledonian Road were given no choice. ibid.
The dream of modern living didn’t stand up to reality. ibid.
British Rail had plans to bring the Channel Tunnel to Kings Cross. ibid.