Do motorists pick up a phantom hitchhiker on Blue Bell Hill during stormy nights? Does Satan appear if you dance round the Devil's Bush in the village of Pluckley? Do big cats roam the local woods? And what happens if you manage to count the 'Countless Stones' near Aylesford? For centuries strange urban legends have materialised in the Garden of England. Now, for the first time, folklorist and monster-hunter Neil Arnold looks at these intriguing tales, strips back the layers, and reveals if there is more to these Chinese whispers than meets the eye. Folklore embeds itself into a local community, often to the extent that some people believe all manner of mysteries and take them as fact. Whether they're stories passed around the school playground, through the internet, or round a flickering campfire, urban legends are everywhere. Kent Urban Legends is a quirky and downright spooky ride into the heart of Kent folklore.

This book contains a selection of photographs which complement Jim Roberts' previous books on the history of Llandudno. The 280 illustrations featured have, in the main, never before been published, and many of the historic images had rarely seen the light of day before they came into the author's possession in the year 2000, following the publication of his A Century of Llandudno. Throughout the book attempts have been made to highlight significant historical events and relate them to the town as it is now. In this way the reader is confronted by a bygone age, and is encouraged to compare historic views with images of the corresponding modern scene. The photographs show streets and buildings, and we see the town developing and spreading across the Creuddyn by means of early engravings and more recent aerial shots. In addition to the physical environment the book deals with other aspects of the town's 150-year history: social conditions, leisure activities, entertainment, employment, tourism, transport and shopping all receive attention. From the mid-nineteenth century the area between the Ormes underwent rapid and dramatic change, and while many of these developments were reflected all round Britain's coastline, much of what has occurred here is unique to Llandudno and this book attempts to reflect this.

Surrey's landscape, shaped by the Devil's mischief and the whims of dancing Pharisees, is home to a wealth of tales. For Surrey is a place where dragons have stalked, dripping poisoned saliva from their yellow teeth; a place where horses have sprouted wings in order to rescue bewitched villagers; a place where pumas with the gift of speech have prowled the countryside. From the legends of Stephen Langton to the marvels of Captain Salvin and his flying pig, Janet Dowling has vividly retold these myths and stories of Surrey, and brought to life the county's heroes, villains and saints.

County Antrim, home to the Giant's Causeway, has a rich heritage of myths and legends which is uniquely captured in this collection of traditional tales from across the county. Featured here are stories of well-known figures from Irish folklore, including Conal Cearnach, with his association to Dunseverick Castle, and Deirdre of the Sorrows, whose mournful plight is linked to the rock at Ballycastle, known as Carraig Usnach. Here you will also find tales of lesser-known Antrim characters such as the heroic outlaw Naoise O'Haughan and local lad Cosh-a-Day, along with fantastical accounts of mythical creatures, including the mermaid of Portmuck, the banshee of Shane's Castle, and the ghostly goings-on in Belfast. These stories bring to life the county's varied landscape, from its lofty mountains to its fertile lowlands and dramatic coastline.

Existential Edinburgh is a personal journey through a city that has for centuries inspired many. An exploration, an evocation of the city's past and present it weaves together personal experience, memory and history. It takes the reader beyond the city's historic centre, looking out to surrounding areas that are inseparable from Edinburgh's story. There are companions on this journey, well-known figures from the past and the not so well-known.

A collection of approximately 100 detailed historic photographs from the Francis Frith archive with extended captions and full introduction, this volume should be suitable for tourists, local historians and general readers. It includes a voucher for a free mounted print of any photograph shown in the book.

The South Downs has throughout history been a focus of English popular culture. With chalkland, their river valleys and scarp-foot the Downs have been shaped for over millennia by successive generations of farmers, ranging from Europe's oldest inhabitants right up until the 21st century. '... possibly the most important book to have been written on the South Downs in the last half-century ... The South Downs have found their perfect biographer.' Downs Country

Approximately 100 photographs from the Francis Frith Collection of the town and surrounding villages spanning over 100 years. With extended captions and full introduction.

Explore Dun Laoghaire and its coastal surroundings with local painter, historian and writer Peter Pearson as he reveals the story behind its transformation from rocky granite shoreline to grand Victorian 'watering place'. Peter Pearson is a Dun Laoghaire man, familiar with every brick and stone of the harbour and town. Here he traces the social, historical and architectural development of Dun Laoghaire, Sandycove and Dalkey, from a stretch of granite coastline with a small fishing village up to the present day. Pearson tells the story of a harbour designed to be a refuge from storms. Begun in 1816, and built in Dalkey granite, it is one of the most attractive artificial harbours in the world. It witnessed one of the world's first lifeboat services, the fastest mail and passenger boats of the day, and the arrival of the first railway line in Ireland. Pearson also examines the social dimension, from the early settlement and development of houses and villas, with evocative names like Sorrento and Vico, to the slum alleys of Kingstown and the first council housing. With over 250 illustrations, including early maps and many previously unseen photographs and images, this is a fascinating journey through the history and heritage of Dun Laoghaire, Sandycove and Dalkey. Praise for Peter Pearson's Decorative Dublin: 'Beautifully illustrated ... contains endless riches.' The Sunday Tribune '[Pearson] writes with enthusiasm and knowledge about his subject.' Frank McDonald, The Irish Times 'Pearson's is an infectious passion.' Books Ireland

Cheshire is a county that associates with the giants of English literature, such as Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and The Wierdstone of Brisingamen, but how did these fabulous tales develop from a supposedly flat county of boggy, cheese-making plains? This book uncovers some of the surprise and charm hidden in the folds of this unassuming landscape. For hundreds of years, Cheshire folk have been quietly telling their own tales about some of Britain's great heroes, as well as wrestling with their own demons, dragons and boggarts. Let the Journey Man guide you along the canals, through the forests and safely past the sniddlebogs to some surprisingly spectacular heights where you can experience Cheshire's own heroes alongside its eccentric traditions and fast-disappearing dialect. It's not all salt and cheese... The Journey Man is an internationally travelled storyteller who has settled in Cheshire. He has been telling stories for some twenty years, and has been given the opportunity to gather and retell the folk tales and history of Cheshire. He now visits schools throughout the North West of England, as well as leading storytelling walks for all ages.

A delightful romp through America's Golden Age of Cocktails The decades following the American Civil War burst with invention-they saw the dawn of the telephone, the motor car, electric lights, the airplane-but no innovation was more welcome than the beverage heralded as the "cocktail." The Gilded Age, as it came to be known, was the Golden Age of Cocktails, giving birth to the classic Manhattan and martini that can be ordered at any bar to this day. Scores of whiskey drinks, cooled with ice chips or cubes that chimed against the glass, proved doubly pleasing when mixed, shaken, or stirred with special flavorings, juices, and fruits. The dazzling new drinks flourished coast to coast at sporting events, luncheons, and balls, on ocean liners and yachts, in barrooms, summer resorts, hotels, railroad train club cars, and private homes. From New York to San Francisco, celebrity bartenders rose to fame, inventing drinks for exclusive universities and exotic locales. Bartenders poured their liquid secrets for dancing girls and such industry tycoons as the newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst and the railroad king "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt. Cecelia Tichi offers a tour of the cocktail hours of the Gilded Age, in which industry, innovation, and progress all take a break to enjoy the signature beverage of the age. Gilded Age Cocktails reveals the fascinating history behind each drink as well as bartenders' formerly secret recipes. Though the Gilded Age cocktail went "underground" during the Prohibition era, it launched the first of many generations whose palates thrilled to a panoply of artistically mixed drinks.

From the 'House in the Midst of the Boar Wood' to its present position at the heart of Scotland's burgeoning 'Silicon Glen', Bathgate and it surrounds have played a subtly significant part in Scotland's history. The preceptory of the Knights of St. John, where William Wallace last met his nobles before the ill-fated battle of Falkirk in 1298, can still be seen at Torphichen. Birthplace of the inventor of chloroform, James Simpson, and site of the world's first oil refinery, the area may claim indeed a worldwide importance. But this book presents the reader with a more vivid picture of the past than even famous names can. The 200 photographs on its pages record the Procession Days, charabanc outings and everyday working lives of a vanished era. Here both the children's games in the quiet streets of old Bathgate and the hard labours of their elders almost come alive again for us. Nor yet is the more recent, equally rich, history neglected. The post-war years were not easy ones, with the decline in industry and the closure of the British Leyland. Education of the next generation, considered crucial by forward-thinking locals since the seventeenth century, was an issu once more at the forefront and Bathgate's schools received international attention for their pioneering techniques. Here William Hendrie, himself a local former headmaster, has gathered and expertly elucidated a collection of photos ranging from church to colliery and station to school. They should appeal to any who feel that Bathgate is a town unjustly 'passed by many, and visited by few'.

Vital and colorful, witty and entertaining, full of the youth and vigor and optimism of the frontier, the weekly issues of St. Paul's "Minnesota Pioneer" from the spring of 1849 to the summer of 1852 reflect the robust personality of James M. Goodhue (1810-1852) and through him the world of the American frontier.
Like most nineteenth-century newspapermen, Goodhue was part of an outspoken political and business community, and he cared little about hiding his opinions. He was the booster, praising his beloved Minnesota in extravagant metaphor; the politician, scourging his enemies with fury; the reformer, storming against evils of the day; the moralist, lecturing his readers on their ethics and manners; the city and state planner, offering practical ideas for the improvement of his city and territory; the prophet, envisioning the Minnesota of the next century; and the reporter, recording the life of the new territory. Goodhue's "piquant" personality was suited to the stormy early days of Minnesota.
Woven throughout his life story are entertaining selections from Goodhue's writings in the "Pioneer," the progenitor of the" St. Paul Pioneer Press." Twenty drawings by druggist Robert O. Sweeny, who sketched Minnesota scenes in pen and ink on the backs of prescription blanks, show the Minnesota that Goodhue knew and helped shape in its first years.""

Approximately 100 photographs from the Francis Frith Collection of the town and surrounding villages spanning over 100 years. With extended captions and full introduction.

The acclaimed author of A Prayer for the Dying brings all his narrative gifts to bear on this gripping account of tragedy and heroism-the great Hartford circus fire of 1944.

Halfway through a midsummer afternoon performance, Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus's big top caught fire. The tent had been waterproofed with a mixture of paraffin and gasoline; in seconds it was burning out of control, and more than 8,000 people were trapped inside. Drawing on interviews with hundreds of survivors, O'Nan skillfully re-creates the horrific events and illuminates the psychological oddities of human behavior under stress: the mad scramble for the exits; the hero who tossed dozens of children to safety before being trampled to death.

Brilliantly constructed and exceptionally moving, The Circus Fire is history at its most compelling.

This book is part of the Images of England series, which uses old photographs and archived images to show the history of various local areas in England, through their streets, shops, pubs, and people.

From an obscure, misty archipelago on the fringes of the Roman world to history's largest empire and originator of the world's mongrel, magpie language - this is Britain's past. But, today, Britain is experiencing an acute trauma of identity, pulled simultaneously towards its European, Atlantic and wider heritages. To understand the dislocation and collapse, we must look back: to Britain's evolution, achievements, complexities and tensions. In a ground-breaking new take on British identity, historian and barrister Dominic Selwood explores over 950,000 years of British history by examining 50 documents that tell the story of what makes Britain unique. Some of these documents are well-known. Most are not. Each reveal something important about Britain and its people. From Anglo-Saxon poetry, medieval folk music and the first Valentine's Day letter to the origin of computer code, Hitler's kill list of prominent Britons, the Sex Pistols' graphic art and the Brexit referendum ballot paper, Anatomy of a Nation reveals a Britain we have never seen before. People are at the heart of the story: a female charioteer queen from Wetwang, a plague surviving graffiti artist, a drunken Bible translator, outlandish Restoration rakehells, canting criminals, the eccentric fathers of modern typography and the bankers who caused the finance crisis. Selwood vividly blends human stories with the selected 50 documents to bring out the startling variety and complexity of Britain's achievements and failures in a fresh and incisive insight into the British psyche. This is history the way it is supposed to be told: a captivating and entertaining account of the people that built Britain.

The latest cookbook by the "Culinary Ambassador of the Chesapeake" encourages us to cook in a way that is not only healthy for us but also for the Bay. Captain John Smith, upon entering the Chesapeake, wrote in his diaries that the fish were so plentiful "we attempted to catch them with a frying pan." That method sums up classic Chesapeake cooking-fresh and simple. In The New Chesapeake Kitchen, celebrated Maryland chef John Shields takes the best of what grows, swims, or grazes in the Bay's watershed and prepares it simply, letting the pure flavors shine through. Honoring the farmers, watermen, butchers, cheese makers, and foragers who make the food movement around the Chesapeake Bay watershed possible, along with the environmental and food organizations working to restore the Bay, the land, and food security, Shields promotes a healthy locavore diet and a holistic view of community foodways. In this scrumptious book, enhanced with beautiful full-color images by former Baltimore Sun Magazine photographer David W. Harp, Shields urges readers to choose local, seasonal ingredients. Presenting what he dubs "Bay- and body-friendly food," he advocates for a plant-forward and sustainable diet, one that considers how food consumption affects both your health and the environment. Shields presents creative and healthy options that nourish us while protecting the Bay, including one-pot recipes for meals like Fishing Creek Seafood Chili, Old Line Veggie Creole Oyster Stew, and Spring Pea Soup with Tarragon-Truffle Oil. To round it out, this holistic cookbook includes directions for canning, preserving, and fermenting. Shields offers many vegan- and vegetarian-friendly options, as well as innovative new takes on Chesapeake classics. You'll find recipes for dozens of delicious dishes, from Aunt Bessie's Crab Pudding and Hutzler's Cheese Bread to "I Can't Believe It's Not Crab" Cakes, Blue Cat Seafood Hash, and an array of savory soups, braised meats, luscious desserts, and green breakfast smoothies-even recipes for a locavore cocktail party!

An brilliant introductory course in the art of playing the Bodhran, covering all the basic techniques needed to accompany traditional Irish and other music. Ideal for beginners, this illustrated booklet is crammed with useful features, diagrams and examples. Also included is a demonstration CD that shows all the techniques that are discussed in the book.

A popular guide to the state's canoe country from Rainy Lake east to Lake Superior tells of the famous explorers, great fur traders, voyageurs, Indians, and loggers who passed that way. Photographs and maps support the fascinating, authoritative text.