Allied Fighters 1939-45 offers an highly-illustrated guide to Allied fighter aircraft that fought in Europe during World War II. Featuring all the main models flown by the Allied air forces from 1939 to 1945, the book offers a wealth of detail, including unit markings, organization, numbers of aircraft flown by campaign and exhaustive specifications for each model. The book is arranged first by country and then chronologically by campaign so that every aspect of the air war in Europe is covered. The guide features fighters from throughout World War II, including early models, such as the Morane Saulnier MS.406C.1, Hawker Hurricane Mk I and Fokker D XXI, and the most advanced fighters of the period, such as the Lavochkin La-7, P-51K Mustang and Gloster Meteor Mk I.The book also covers aircraft that were used for air-to-air combat (Supermarine Spitfire), ground attack (P-47 Thunderbolt), bomber escort (P-51B Mustang), night defence (Bristol Beaufighter) and photographic reconnaissance (P-38 Lightning). Packed with more than 200 profiles and dozens of archive photographs of every major Allied fighter aircraft, Allied Fighters 1939-45 is a core reference volume for modellers and World War II aviation enthusiasts.

Key title in the new Uniform Legends series. Up close and personal accounts of pilots who were there, first written in the 1960's when many of the surviving British and German airmen were in or entering their middle years

Wonderful account of one of the top Battle of Britain fighter pilots. Written by one of the foremost military aviation authors who was an RAF Officer himself and personally knew Lacey.

Numerous back-to-back houses, two or three stories high, were built in Birmingham during the 19th century, the majority of them were still in quite good condition in the early 20th century. Most of these houses were concentrated in inner-city areas such as Ladywood, Handsworth, Aston, Small Heath and Highgate. By the early 1970s, almost all of Birmingham's back-to-back houses had been demolished. The occupants were re-housed in new council houses and flats, some in redeveloped inner-city areas, while the majority moved to new housing estates such as Castle Vale and Chelmsley Wood. In fact, back-to-backs were once the commonest form of housing in England, home to the majority of working people in Victorian cities, but they have now almost entirely vanished from our urban townscape. Author Ted Rudge, who is a National Trust guide at the Birmingham back-to-backs in Hurst Street (built in 1831), has collected many personal stories from people who grew up in these infamous houses. For some it was a harsh life, cramped and overcrowded, but it was also a place where life-long friendships and relationships were made. The approach of telling the story through oral history, before these stories are forgotten, will be a shock to many modern people who are completely oblivious that these living conditions were standard across much of the country. What was it like to live in a house with one bedroom and no running water? How did eleven families share two toilets? The rise and fall of the back-to-back is a sobering tale of how our nation houses its people, and illuminates the story of the development of urban Britain.

This insightful book traces the evolution of corporate power in the United States, from social control over corporate power under early state laws to the modern liberation of the corporation serving primarily private purposes. It illustrates how the transition of attitudes towards corporations and dynamic changes in public policy have ushered in an age of financial fragility, income inequality and macroeconomic instability. The book employs an evolutionary methodology to consider the role of the corporation in the US economy, and how that role as a tool for public purposes, defined by special charters, changed with the widening of markets and increasing industrial capacity for mass production. Evaluating the stages of capitalist development, chapters demonstrate how the co-evolution of law, economics and finance altered economic organization, leading to the evolution of core economic concepts such as capital, income and resources. The book examines the transition of corporate purpose towards generating wealth and enhancing profits in the early twentieth century and analyzes recent trends through illuminating case studies in financialization. It concludes with crucial insights into the future of the corporation, offering potential pathways for economists to intervene and address the systemic problems that are endemic to the modern financial era. A rousing and provocative call to arms for modern economists, this book is key reading for scholars and researchers of economics, particularly those focusing on the evolution of economic and business institutions and its impact on the social fabric of the US. Practitioners and policymakers will also benefit from its empirical perspectives on financialization.

From long before the first Spring Grove House was built the two Cedars, which eventually stood to the south of it, were in place. Legend has it that they were sent by the Duke of Marlborough to the Duke of Northumberland who planted them to mark the boundaries of his Syon House estate. One remains to the South East of the house, close to the new theatre block. The other larger and more majestic tree stood close to the SW corner dominating the house and the memories of those who visited it. Pollarded close to the ground by heavy chains, there were four magnificent arms that gave tremendous cover. Beneath this tree Sir Joseph Banks and Captain Cook are said to have planned their voyage to Australia. During the 1950 Christmas holiday there was a heavy fall of snow and, shortly before the school reassembled, the tree collapsed. Almost 60 years later to the day, in December 2010, the L.T.Brown Memorial Lebanon Cedar, funded by past pupils at the Spring Grove Schools, was planted at the SE corner of the house which is now part of West Thames College. It is hoped the tree will link the house of the 19th and 20th Centuries and its schools to the college of the 21st. "A t Isleworth we occupied a building that had been the home of Alfred Pears and, before him, Sir Joseph Banks. The atmosphere of a 'home' persisted during our period of occupation and staff and pupils worked together like members of one large family. The red brick house, set in its well-kept grounds, always seemed to be a friendly place but a school is more than just a building. The Spring Grovian virtues of happiness and friendliness continue to flourish as of old." - An unattributed view of a senior pupil in the "Spring Grovian" magazine in 1960.

Here is the history of how exciting and innovative environmental education has been provided by the Countryside Education Trust for 40 years. People of all ages have visited the farm-based residential centre, a study centre in beautiful ancient woodland, or taken part in a range of countryside activities.

This timely book studies the economic theories of credit cycles and disturbances in the 20th century, presenting a nuanced view of the role of finance in the economy after the financial crash of 2008. Focusing on the work of economists from Marx onwards, Jan Toporowski moves beyond conventional monetary theory to offer an insightful critical alternative to current financial macroeconomics. The book features an extended discussion of Marx's approach to credit and finance, new insights to Minsky's ideas and a reconsideration of the financial theories of Kalecki and Steindl. Economic researchers and postgraduate students seeking to extend their knowledge of critical approaches to finance will find this an invaluable read, as well as practitioners and policy makers who seek to understand financial instability and unstable markets. This will also be an insightful read for economic historians looking to understand the nuances of different key economic theories and their practical applications. This timely book studies the economic theories of credit cycles and disturbances in the 20th century, presenting a nuanced view of the role of finance in the economy after the financial crash of 2008.

Thousands of years ago, in a part of the world we now call ancient Mesopotamia, people began writing things down for the very first time.

What they left behind, in a vast region that once sat between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, preserves leaps in human ingenuity, like the earliest depiction of a wheel and the first approximation of pi. But they also capture breathtakingly intimate, raw and relatable moments, like a dog's paw prints as it accidentally stepped into fresh clay, or the imprint of a child's teeth.

In Between Two Rivers, historian Dr Moudhy Al-Rashid reveals what these ancient people chose to record about their lives, allowing us to brush hands with them millennia later. We find a lullaby to soothe a baby, instructions for exorcising a ghost, countless receipts for beer, and the adorable, messy writing of preschoolers. We meet an enslaved person negotiating their freedom, an astronomer tracing the movement of the planets, a princess who may have created the world's first museum, and a working mother struggling with 'the juggle' in 1900 BCE.

Together, these fragments illuminate not just the history of Mesopotamia, but the story of how history was made.

The story of Napoleon and Betsy Balcombe is an unusual and fascinating tale. A fallen Emperor who once controlled most of Europe makes friends with an impudent, pretty and spirited young English girl, just about the celebrate her thirteenth birthday. Betsy produced a book full of interest, but notwithstanding that the book wanders backwards and forward chronologically, the general tenor of the relationship between this young girl and Napoleon is beyond question, and it was of an unusual and extremely friendly nature. Napoleon's fall from an unprecedented position of power to humiliating confinement must have been an impossible burden to have lived with, and yet, despite this - or possibly because of it - Napoleon befriended this child and held genuine affection for her. Despite the naivety, the warmth of the friendship between the ex-emperor and little 'Mees' Balcombe shines through, and her text is well-worth providing in this new edition. Napoleon was at the Briars for eight weeks, but the family were very close to the community at Longwood, some two miles further up hill and inland, and visited weekly, sometimes more often.It was here, as Betsy matured and grew more responsible, that the friendship developed, to the extent that she assisted Napoleon with his attempts at English. She was daring as well as impudent and with an irrepressible sense of humour she unlocked the inner child in Napoleon that led to the famous friendship. He found her boldness amusing and occasionally alarming. It must have been a welcome diversion from his darker thoughts.

NOT ONLY... beer in Berlin, absinthe in Prague, baths in Budapest, Dracula in Transylvania, trenches in Gallipoli, a plethora of Greco-Roman ruins, fairy chimneys in Capadocia, lost cities, souks and castles in Syria, angry Kurds, absent Armenians, Mounts Nemrut and Ararat, depressed in Iran, harassed in the Stans, filthy Chinese food and filthier loos, the Wall and the Warriors... BUT ALSO... a lost car in Calcutta, road rage in India, charred corpses in Nepal, Everest in Tibet, the Potala Palace, chanting monks, appalling roads, disgusting food, unspeakable bogs, magical Mount Kailash, mayhem in the Stans, Stalingrad, Crimea, the Light Brigade, Auschwitz and in Bruges... "Every traveller should make it his life's work to leave Swindon... few go to such extremes..." Dom Joly. "Lies, it's all lies..." Chairman Mao. The author is an Old Etonian, Cambridge graduate, retired investment banker and completely unrepentant.