As the sun dipped towards the horizon on the evening of May 26, 1940, the beaches of Dunkirk were a scene of unimaginable chaos. Thousands of exhausted soldiers stood in long, winding queues along the shore, their backs to the cold waters of the English Channel, their faces towards the advancing might of the German army. Trapped, surrounded, and with little hope of escape, they waited. The sound of distant gunfire rumbled in the background, punctuated by the shriek of German dive bombers cutting through the sky. And yet, within days, against all odds, these men would be part of a story so miraculous that it would forever be remembered as the “Miracle of Dunkirk.” How could such a desperate situation transform into one of the most daring rescues in military history? The answer lay not only in strategy but in the courage of thousands of individuals who rose to the occasion when it mattered most. The Encirclement: A Nation on the Brink Just weeks before, the British and French armies had been fighting valiantly across France, holding the line against the relentless Blitzkrieg of the German Wehrmacht. But the speed and ferocity of the German advance had stunned the Allied forces, and within days, they found themselves trapped. The port of Dunkirk was their last refuge, yet it quickly became a death trap. The British Expeditionary Force (BEF), Britain’s best-trained soldiers, were now pinned against the sea, with no clear way to escape. The German forces, led by Hermann Göring’s Luftwaffe, were poised to strike the final blow, and Adolf Hitler's Panzer divisions were closing in fast. With no time to spare, the British government realised the gravity of the situation. The loss of the BEF would be catastrophic; these soldiers were the backbone of the British Army. There was even talk in England of discussing a conditional surrender to Germany—a stark indication of how desperate the situation had become. Yet, in one of the many fateful twists of history, a “Halt Order” was issued by the German High Command. For reasons still debated by historians, Hitler ordered his Panzer divisions to stop, giving the British and French soldiers a three-day reprieve. This pause would prove to be the turning point, granting the Allies just enough time to attempt an audacious escape. Planning the Impossible: Operation Dynamo Begins On May 26, with the clock ticking, Vice-Admiral Bertram Ramsay sat in his underground headquarters beneath Dover Castle and devised a plan that bordered on the impossible. Codenamed Operation Dynamo, it was a desperate bid to evacuate as many troops as possible from the beaches of Dunkirk. But Ramsay faced a monumental challenge: Dunkirk’s shallow beaches meant that large naval ships couldn’t get close enough to pick up the soldiers. With German bombers prowling the skies, time was slipping away. In response, Ramsay made an extraordinary call to the British people—he asked for help. A fleet of small civilian boats, known as the "Little Ships," was needed to ferry troops from the beach to the larger vessels waiting further offshore. The request went out across England, and the response was overwhelming. Hundreds of small craft, ranging from fishing boats to pleasure yachts, were volunteered by their owners. Ordinary men and women, many of whom had never before seen combat, took their boats across the English Channel, sailing into a war zone to rescue their countrymen. From May 26 to June 4, these small boats plied the 46 miles between Dunkirk and England, often under heavy fire from German planes. One of the smallest to make the perilous journey was the Tamzine , an 18-foot fishing boat, whose courageous crew played a part in ferrying soldiers from the beach to safety. The courage of these civilians, who risked everything in the name of duty, would become one of the enduring symbols of the Dunkirk evacuation. Heroes in Command: The Leadership That Saved Thousands While the civilian flotilla was en route, the military leadership behind Operation Dynamo worked tirelessly to ensure the operation’s success. At the forefront was Vice-Admiral Bertram Ramsay, whose calm and decisive leadership transformed a chaotic retreat into an organised evacuation. Ramsay's strategic genius and unshakable resolve allowed him to coordinate the movement of troops, boats, and naval defences, despite the ever-present threat of German attack. On the beaches themselves, Captain William Tennant took charge of the desperate situation. Tasked with managing the flow of troops onto the waiting vessels, Tennant’s leadership was crucial. Under constant fire, he kept order amidst the panic, ensuring that tens of thousands of soldiers were rescued in a timely and efficient manner. Without Tennant’s presence of mind, the evacuation might have descended into chaos, and many more lives could have been lost. And then there was Winston Churchill. As Prime Minister, he understood the high stakes of the situation better than anyone. The loss of the BEF would have left Britain defenceless, and while the operation was underway, he remained steadfast in his belief that Britain could continue the fight, even if alone. His speeches during this time, particularly his famous “We shall fight on the beaches” address, electrified the British public and gave hope to a nation standing on the precipice of disaster. Soldiers on the Beach: Courage in the Face of Destruction The soldiers waiting on the beaches of Dunkirk were not simply passive spectators to their own rescue. Many had fought their way through the Battle of France, only to find themselves with their backs to the sea, facing the full force of the German war machine. Yet, despite their exhaustion and the constant threat of aerial attack, they remained disciplined, lining up in long, orderly queues along the shoreline as they waited for rescue. For days, these men endured relentless bombing from the Luftwaffe. The sand around them was littered with the wreckage of destroyed vehicles and the detritus of war, but they stood resolute, knowing that each passing hour could mean life or death. Among them were not only British soldiers but also thousands of French troops, who fought bravely to hold off the German advance. The French rearguard played a vital role in buying time for the evacuation to continue, their sacrifice ensuring that more British soldiers could be saved. The Unsung Heroes: The Royal Navy and the RAF While the story of the "Little Ships" has captured much of the public imagination, the role of the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force (RAF) in Operation Dynamo cannot be overstated. The Navy, under Ramsay’s command, deployed destroyers, minesweepers, and other vessels to protect the evacuation effort. These ships risked everything to ensure that the soldiers could be brought back to safety. Some, like the destroyer HMS Keith , were lost to German air attacks, but their crews continued to press on, driven by an unbreakable sense of duty. Meanwhile, overhead, the RAF engaged in fierce dogfights with the Luftwaffe, drawing German planes away from the beaches and providing vital cover for the evacuation. Though they were often outnumbered and outgunned, RAF pilots took to the skies with relentless determination, knowing that the success of the entire operation depended on their efforts. Men like James Nicolson, an RAF Hurricane pilot, fought with extraordinary bravery, risking everything to protect the soldiers on the ground. The Final Push: A Miracle Completed By June 4, the beaches of Dunkirk had been emptied. Over 338,000 men—British and French—had been rescued from the jaws of destruction. In the final hours, the last of the British soldiers were pulled to safety, followed by the French rearguard who had so bravely held the line. The sheer scale of the operation, and the number of lives saved, far exceeded initial expectations. What had begun as a desperate retreat had become a triumph of human spirit and perseverance. In the House of Commons, Winston Churchill delivered a speech that would echo through the ages. While celebrating the success of the evacuation, he reminded the nation that Dunkirk was not a victory. “Wars are not won by evacuations,” he declared soberly. Yet, the miracle of Dunkirk would stand as a turning point in the war, not only saving lives but also galvanising Britain’s resolve to continue the fight against tyranny.

Thomas Anthony DeSimone was one of the most volatile and feared figures in the New York Mafia during the 1960s and 1970s. Born into a family deeply connected to organised crime, DeSimone’s early exposure to the mob world shaped him into a ruthless and unpredictable enforcer. With close ties to the Lucchese crime family, his criminal career saw him involved in notorious heists, brutal murders, and a string of violent outbursts that left even seasoned mobsters unnerved. Thomas Anthony DeSimone, born on May 24, 1950, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, grew up in a family deeply entrenched in the world of organised crime. His father, also named Thomas DeSimone, was a recognised figure in the underworld, and his brothers Anthony and Robert followed in similar footsteps, becoming associates of the Gambino crime family. Anthony’s fate was grim, being murdered by Thomas Agro in 1979, while Robert’s involvement with the Mafia also shaped his future. DeSimone’s personal life was similarly complicated, with his sister Phyllis involved in a long-term affair with James Burke, a man who would later become one of DeSimone’s most influential criminal mentors. The mugshots of Henry Hill and Paul Vario. DeSimone’s early life was marked by a swift immersion into crime, setting him on a path that would ultimately lead to his notorious reputation. At the age of 15, DeSimone was introduced to Paul Vario, a caporegime in the Lucchese crime family. Through Vario, DeSimone met Henry Hill and James "Jimmy the Gent" Burke, two prominent figures in the Lucchese crew. Hill, in particular, recalled his first encounter with the young DeSimone, describing him as "a skinny kid who was wearing a wiseguy suit and a pencil moustache." Despite his youth, DeSimone's desire to belong to the Mafia world was evident from the start. Henry Hill and his family By the time he was 20, DeSimone was already participating in serious criminal activities, including truck hijackings, fencing stolen goods, and extortion. The mob’s world was brutal, and DeSimone thrived in its violence. He quickly gained a reputation for his unpredictability and short temper. His weapon of choice was a .38-caliber revolver, which he carried inconspicuously in a brown paper bag—something Henry Hill would later note as part of DeSimone’s ability to blend into the everyday surroundings while always being armed. The Air France Heist One of DeSimone's early criminal milestones came in 1967, when he participated in the infamous Air France robbery. The heist was a sophisticated operation, targeting a shipment of cash flown from Southeast Asia to New York. Air France was responsible for transporting large amounts of currency to the U.S., often storing these sums temporarily at John F. Kennedy International Airport. The cash was kept in a cement strong room, but lax security allowed DeSimone, Burke, and Hill to walk right in without arousing suspicion. Robert McMahon, an Air France employee, provided the key tip for the robbery, identifying a window of time when the security guard would be on break. On April 7, 1967, DeSimone and Hill entered the cargo terminal and used a duplicate key to access the room where the money was kept. In less than half an hour, the duo stole $420,000 in cash, without firing a single shot or alerting anyone. The robbery wasn’t discovered until three days later, making it one of the smoothest heists in the mob’s history. The Air France robbery solidified DeSimone's place within the Lucchese family, marking him as an effective and capable criminal. However, despite his skill in pulling off heists, DeSimone’s violent tendencies often overshadowed his abilities. James Burke (Jimmy the Gent), arrested and taken to Federal Court. The Murder of William Bentvena Perhaps the most infamous incident that cemented DeSimone’s violent reputation was the murder of William "Billy Batts" Bentvena in 1970. Bentvena, a made member of the Gambino crime family, had just been released from prison and was celebrating his return at a party held at Robert’s Lounge, a bar owned by James Burke. During the festivities, Bentvena made a seemingly innocent remark about DeSimone's former job shining shoes. DeSimone, who was deeply insecure about his lowly past, perceived the comment as an insult. William (Billy Batts) Bentvena Two weeks later, DeSimone enacted his revenge. Along with Hill and Burke, he lured Bentvena to a nightclub, where he attacked him with a pistol, savagely beating him to the point where they thought Bentvena was dead. The three men stuffed Bentvena’s body into the trunk of a car and drove off to dispose of it. However, during the journey, they realised that Bentvena was still alive, groaning from the trunk. DeSimone and Burke stopped the car and finished the job, beating Bentvena to death with a tire iron and shovel. The body was initially buried at a dog kennel, but when the property was sold months later, Burke ordered DeSimone and Hill to exhume the remains and dispose of them elsewhere, likely crushing them in a compactor or re-burying them under Robert’s Lounge. This murder, brutal even by Mafia standards, showcased DeSimone's lethal temper and his willingness to kill for even perceived slights. His violent nature became notorious within mob circles, but it was also a double-edged sword—DeSimone was feared, but his reckless actions put him on a dangerous path. The Murder of Michael "Spider" Gianco One of the most chilling examples of DeSimone’s lack of control came during a card game, where Michael "Spider" Gianco, a young bartender, inadvertently insulted him. The initial conflict began when Gianco forgot to bring DeSimone a drink, prompting DeSimone to shoot him in the leg in a fit of anger. The situation could have ended there, but a week later, when Gianco returned to work with his leg in a cast, DeSimone began taunting him again. Gianco, emboldened by Burke’s joking support, told DeSimone to "go fuck [himself]." The room fell silent, and DeSimone, now humiliated in front of his peers, shot Gianco three times, killing him instantly. Even James Burke, a hardened killer, was stunned by DeSimone’s senseless murder. DeSimone was forced to bury Gianco’s body himself, but it is believed that the remains were moved multiple times and may never be recovered. Henry Hill, who witnessed these murders, later described DeSimone as a psychopath, a man whose violent tendencies seemed uncontrollable. The incident with Gianco, in particular, highlighted DeSimone’s volatility and inability to tolerate even the slightest perceived disrespect. The Lufthansa Heist DeSimone's involvement in the notorious Lufthansa heist, which took place on December 11, 1978, added another major event to his criminal résumé. Organised by James Burke, the heist saw a group of mobsters steal $5.875 million (around $27.4 million today) in cash and jewellery from the Lufthansa cargo terminal at JFK Airport. It was the largest cash robbery in U.S. history at the time, and DeSimone was one of the key participants. The heist itself was carefully planned, with Burke selecting a crew that included DeSimone, Robert McMahon, Angelo Sepe, and several others. The Crime-Scene The plan was executed without a hitch, but trouble arose after the heist. Burke, notorious for eliminating anyone who could potentially link him to a crime, began systematically killing those involved in the heist. One of DeSimone’s assignments was to murder Parnell "Stacks" Edwards, who had failed to dispose of the getaway van, leaving it in a location where it was discovered by police. Edwards’ fingerprints were found in the vehicle, leading Burke to order his execution. DeSimone and Sepe tracked Edwards down and shot him multiple times, ensuring his silence. Disappearance and Death In the wake of the Lufthansa heist, DeSimone’s life took a dangerous turn. By 1979, his violent outbursts and unsanctioned murders, particularly those of Gambino family associates William Bentvena and Ronald Jerothe, had made him a target. It is believed that the Gambino family sought revenge for these killings, and on January 14, 1979, DeSimone vanished. His wife, Angela, reported him missing after he borrowed $60 from her and failed to return. Henry Hill, who had turned informant, later revealed that DeSimone had been lured to his death under the pretense that he was going to be "made" in the Lucchese family. Instead, he was executed by Gambino family members, possibly with John Gotti himself involved. While the exact details remain murky, several mob insiders, including Thomas Agro, claimed to have taken part in the killing. Some accounts suggest that DeSimone was tortured before his death as punishment for the murder of Bentvena, a personal friend of Gotti’s. Tommy Argo Despite his short life, DeSimone’s violent reputation left a lasting legacy in Mafia history. His story became widely known through Henry Hill’s memoir Wiseguy  and its cinematic adaptation Goodfellas . DeSimone, portrayed by Joe Pesci in the film, was depicted as an erratic, hot-headed killer, a characterisation that aligned closely with the real DeSimone's behaviour. His story serves as a stark example of the violent, unpredictable nature of life in the Mafia, where even those deeply entrenched in the organisation are not immune from retribution. DeSimone’s disappearance remains unsolved, and his body has never been recovered. It is believed that he was buried in The Hole , a notorious Mafia burial ground near JFK Airport. Today, Thomas DeSimone is remembered as one of the most dangerous figures in New York’s organised crime history, a man whose violent tendencies ultimately led to his own demise.

The Rolling Stones are a band that really need no introduction, they've have been stages around the world for over 60 years. Throughout their lengthy career, they've given us not just some of the most iconic music, but also a rich visual history through their tour posters. These posters have become a significant part of their identity, offering a glimpse into the band's artistic evolution and cultural influence over the decades. Let's take a look at 50 years of Stones posters, the design minds behind them, and how these visuals reflect the band’s changing style and ethos. The Rolling Stones have been the best of all possible worlds: they have the lack of pretension and sentimentality associated with the blues, the rawness and toughness of hard rock, and the depth which always makes you feel that they are in the midst of saying something. – Jon Landau The Early Days: Simple and to the Point When The Rolling Stones started touring in the early 1960s, posters were not yet the grand productions they would later become. Early designs were typically simple, with a black-and-white or two-tone colour scheme. These posters often featured a clean photograph of the band, names of the venues, and some basic typography. It was all about letting the music speak for itself, with the visuals serving as mere placeholders. In those early days, the posters were often designed by the venues themselves or smaller printing firms like J. T. Lissimore & Sons , a company responsible for many of the UK tour posters of that era. There was little room for artistic flair, with most designs following a basic template: band name, date, venue, done. When I think of Mick Jagger still singing that he can’t get any satisfaction in over forty years of being in the Rolling Stones, I have to conclude that he’s either lying or not all that bright – Henry Rollins​ The Late 60s and Early 70s: The Psychedelic Revolution By the late 1960s, things began to change. As the world entered the psychedelic era, so did The Rolling Stones' visuals. With album covers like Their Satanic Majesties Request  (1967) setting a trippy, colourful precedent, the tour posters soon followed suit. A pivotal figure in this evolution was David Byrd , an American graphic artist famous for his psychedelic designs for bands like The Who and Jimi Hendrix. For the Stones' 1969 U.S. tour, Byrd created a swirling, vibrant poster featuring bold colours and hypnotic shapes, perfectly capturing the mood of the time. This was no longer just about advertising a gig; the posters were becoming pieces of art in their own right. Byrd’s design was so well-received that it inspired a new generation of concert poster artists to approach their work with a sense of bold, experimental creativity. "The Rolling Stones are real groovy, man. They don’t try to be anything they’re not. They’re the essence of rock ‘n’ roll." - Jimi Hendrix The 1970s: Iconography and The Rise of the Tongue Perhaps the most famous Rolling Stones visual came not from a poster, but from an album. In 1971, their album Sticky Fingers  introduced the world to the now-legendary “tongue and lips” logo. Designed by John Pasche , a then-student at the Royal College of Art in London, this symbol would become synonymous with the band. Pasche, who was commissioned by Mick Jagger to create something “anti-authority” and rebellious, based the design loosely on Jagger's own lips and tongue. The tongue-and-lips logo quickly became central to the Stones’ brand, appearing on posters, album covers, and merchandise. Tour posters of the 1970s began to feature this bold, provocative logo prominently, solidifying the Stones' image as the ultimate rock 'n' roll rebels. The 1972 U.S. tour poster, which featured the tongue and lips over a striking black background, was a collaborative effort between Pasche and American artist Craig Braun , who had worked on the Sticky Fingers  album packaging. This partnership marked the beginning of The Rolling Stones’ strong relationship with visual artists, ensuring that their tours were always accompanied by eye-catching designs. The 1980s: Bright, Bold, and Full of Attitude As the band entered the 1980s, their image shifted again. The posters from this decade are filled with vibrant colours, geometric shapes, and a more polished, pop-art aesthetic. The band was older, more established, and their tours were now massive international events. The Stones worked with a number of different artists and agencies during this time, but one of the most notable was Peter Max , a German-American artist famous for his pop-art style. For their 1981 American tour, Max designed a poster that featured caricatured images of the band members, set against a bright yellow background. It was fun, bold, and perfectly encapsulated the energetic, larger-than-life personas of the band. "When you talk about The Rolling Stones, you’re talking about the blueprint of rock and roll. They’ve set the standard for all of us." - Steven Tyler The 1990s: Digital Age Meets Classic Rock The 1990s brought about the rise of digital design, and the Stones' posters reflected this shift. Posters from the Voodoo Lounge  tour (1994-95) and the Bridges to Babylon  tour (1997-98) embraced digital techniques, blending photography with computer-generated graphics. The Bridges to Babylon  tour poster is particularly memorable, with its striking lion image, designed by Stefan Sagmeister , an Austrian graphic designer known for his innovative and unconventional approach. Sagmeister’s use of the lion symbol, combined with intricate digital textures, added a modern twist to the band's classic rock image, signalling their evolution into a new era. 2000s Onwards: Nostalgia and Modernism Collide In the 2000s, the Stones leaned into a blend of nostalgia and modernism. While they embraced the sleekness of modern graphic design, there was always a nod to their iconic past. For instance, the tongue and lips logo remained a central feature, though often reimagined with modern twists. For the A Bigger Bang  tour (2005-07), the design team at Studio Number One —founded by artist Shepard Fairey —created a poster that blended the classic tongue-and-lips with bright, contemporary colours and abstract shapes. The aim was to keep the visuals fresh for new audiences while still maintaining that unmistakable Rolling Stones identity. Today: The Art World and The Rolling Stones In recent years, the Stones have collaborated with high-profile artists like Jeff Koons  and Ronnie Wood  (yes, their very own guitarist, who is also an accomplished visual artist) to create posters for their tours. Their 2019 No Filter  tour poster, for example, features a sleek, modern take on their iconic tongue logo, designed by Koons. The Stones' posters have always been a reflection of their journey as a band—constantly evolving, experimenting with styles, and working with some of the best creative minds in the business. Over the last 50 years, these visuals have become an essential part of their legacy, as recognisable as the music itself. And while the band continues to tour, you can be sure that the posters will keep evolving, too, blending timeless rock ‘n’ roll energy with the artistic trends of the day. From the simplicity of their early days to the bold experimentation of the present, Rolling Stones tour posters remain a fascinating part of rock history. Whether you’re a die-hard fan or simply appreciate good design, there’s no denying the impact these visuals have had on the way we experience live music.

London, a city steeped in history and mystery, has its share of well-known landmarks—the gleaming towers of the City, the majestic Buckingham Palace, and the famous West End theatres. Yet, hidden away from the bustling streets and modern attractions is a darker, almost forgotten chapter in the city’s history. Nestled within the vibrant South Bank, an area now synonymous with cultural regeneration and affluence, lies a small, rusted iron gate adorned with ribbons, feathers, and tokens. Behind that gate rests the Cross Bones Graveyard, a solemn reminder of a time when Southwark was not the glittering hub of art and commerce it is today, but London’s first red-light district—a place for the city’s outcasts. Southwark: London’s First Red-Light District To understand the significance of Cross Bones Graveyard, one must first take a step back into the past, to the Southwark of the Middle Ages. Located just south of the River Thames, this area was once marshland, a damp and undesirable place on the fringes of London proper. Yet, by virtue of its location, Southwark became a hub for those seeking entertainment and, often, illicit pleasures. Theatres, taverns, bear-baiting pits, and brothels flourished in this district—“amusements” that drew both locals and travelers alike. Southwark’s notoriety began as far back as Roman times when soldiers stationed in the area would frequent its taverns and brothels. This trend continued unabated for centuries, even through the Viking era and the Crusades. As London Bridge was established in the 12th century, connecting the southern bank of the Thames to the bustling city, Southwark became even more important as a center for commerce—and vice. Its red-light district became infamous, a place where visitors could indulge their desires, free from the restrictions and laws of the City of London, which ended at the river’s edge. Southwark, outside the city’s jurisdiction, allowed the flourishing of activities frowned upon by London’s more respectable citizens. The Winchester Geese and the Bishop’s Rule By the 12th century, Southwark had come under the control of one of the most powerful religious figures in England: the Bishop of Winchester. This arrangement may seem strange today, as the church is often perceived as a moral authority. Yet, in medieval England, the bishop wielded both religious and secular power. Among his many privileges was the right to license and tax Southwark’s brothels and prostitutes. The women who worked there were derisively called the “Winchester Geese,” perhaps because of their habit of baring their white breasts to attract customers. To be “bitten by a Winchester Goose” was to suffer a sexually transmitted disease, and prostitution in Southwark was fraught with such risks. Gonorrhea, syphilis, and other venereal diseases spread rampantly through the stews—the name given to Southwark’s brothels. These establishments, sometimes as few as five, sometimes as many as 18, depending on the year, became an indelible part of Southwark’s identity. The crown’s repeated attempts to control prostitution in Southwark were a testament to the area’s enduring notoriety. King Henry II attempted to regulate the stews through the “Ordinances Touching the Government of the Stewholders in Southwark,” a set of 39 rules implemented in 1161. These ordinances required the prostitutes to be registered, barred nuns and married women from joining their ranks, and placed various restrictions on their activities. Curiously, these regulations also sought to ensure the prostitutes’ autonomy, preventing them from being coerced into staying in the brothels and prohibiting them from taking their own lovers. Despite these attempts at regulation, Southwark’s red-light district persisted. The Bishop of Winchester continued to profit from the women who worked under his jurisdiction. Yet, for all the power the Bishop wielded over the lives of these women, one thing remained beyond his control: their deaths. According to Christian doctrine, prostitutes were not allowed to be buried in consecrated ground. The church denied them proper burial rites, and so, their bodies were laid to rest in a place far from the parish church—a plot of land that would later be known as Cross Bones Graveyard. Cross Bones: The Graveyard of the Outcasts The origins of Cross Bones Graveyard can be traced back to the Tudor period when Southwark’s red-light district was in full swing. Historian John Stow wrote in 1598 that “single women,” a euphemism for prostitutes, were forbidden the rites of the church so long as they continued their sinful lives. As a result, they were excluded from Christian burial and interred in a plot known as the “Single Woman’s churchyard.” Located far from the parish church, Cross Bones Graveyard became the final resting place for Southwark’s outcasts. It was a place for the poor, the diseased, and the unloved—those who lived their lives on the fringes of society. As Southwark evolved, so too did the use of Cross Bones. By the Victorian era, Southwark had become one of London’s most notorious slums, plagued by crime, poverty, and disease. Cross Bones was repurposed as a pauper’s graveyard, serving the parish of St. Saviour’s. The conditions in Cross Bones were as miserable as those who were buried there. In 1833, William Taylor, an antiquarian, wrote about the cemetery: “There is an unconsecrated burial ground known as the Cross Bones at the corner of Redcross Street, formerly called the Single Woman’s burial ground, which is said to have been used for this purpose.” As the decades passed, Cross Bones became increasingly overcrowded. Bodies were buried just two feet beneath the surface, and the stench of decomposition permeated the air. Residents complained that the cemetery was a public health hazard, particularly during the cholera epidemic that ravaged London. Although it was later discovered that contaminated water was the true cause of the outbreak, at the time, many believed the foul-smelling graves were to blame. By 1853, Cross Bones had become so overcrowded that the cemetery was officially closed. An 1832 letter from parish authorities described the situation in grim detail: “The ground is so very full of coffins that it is necessary to bury within two feet of the surface, and the effluviem is so very offensive that we fear the consequences may be very injurious to the surrounding neighbourhood.” The Forgotten Dead and the Resurrection of Cross Bones For many years after its closure, Cross Bones was largely forgotten, left to decay as Southwark transformed around it. The cemetery was briefly used as a fairground, but complaints from locals about the noise and disruption led to its abandonment. By the 20th century, the graveyard had faded into obscurity, overshadowed by Southwark’s ongoing redevelopment. That all changed in the 1990s when the London Underground embarked on a project to extend the Jubilee Line. The plan required the construction of an electricity substation on the site of Cross Bones Graveyard. Before the project could proceed, however, archeologists from the Museum of London were called in to investigate. They knew that the site contained an old burial ground, but the scale of what they found was shocking. Over the course of six weeks, archeologists excavated 148 skeletons from the top layers of the soil—an estimated one percent of the total number of bodies buried there. The skeletons told a tragic story of suffering and hardship. More than half of the remains belonged to children, a reflection of the high rates of infant mortality in 19th-century London. Many of the bones bore the scars of diseases such as rickets, scurvy, and syphilis. These were the bodies of the poor and the forgotten, buried in cheap coffins, their lives marked by illness and poverty. The discovery of these remains reignited public interest in Cross Bones. Local historian Patricia Dark described the cemetery as “a place where you can go and celebrate the people nobody remembers.” For many, Cross Bones became a symbol of the marginalised and the overlooked, a place where the dead could be honoured and remembered. The Southwark Mysteries and the Modern Revival of Cross Bones The revival of interest in Cross Bones was not solely driven by archeological discoveries. In 1996, local poet and playwright John Constable claimed to have been visited by the spirit of a medieval prostitute he called “The Goose.” According to Constable, the Goose began dictating poems to him, the first of which would later form the basis of his work The Southwark Mysteries . The verse Constable wrote down that night in 1996 reads: For tonight in Hell They are tolling the bell For the Whore that lay at the Tabard, And well we know How the carrion crow Doth feast in our Cross Bones Graveyard. Constable’s work breathed new life into the cemetery. In 1998, the first Halloween ritual at Cross Bones was performed, drawing attention to the site and its forgotten dead. For 13 years, until 2010, a community of people gathered annually to honour the memory of those buried in Cross Bones. They built altars, performed parts of The Southwark Mysteries , and carried out candle-lit processions to the cemetery gates. Today, these rituals continue on a smaller scale, with monthly vigils taking place at the site. Cross Bones has become a place of remembrance for many, not just for those connected to Southwark’s historical past but for those looking to remember their own dead. Constable and his supporters, known as the Friends of Cross Bones, have worked to transform the neglected graveyard into a wild garden, a sanctuary where visitors can reflect on the lives of those who were buried there. The Future of Cross Bones Graveyard As Southwark continues to evolve, the future of Cross Bones remains uncertain. In recent years, there have been plans to redevelop the site, raising concerns among the community that the graveyard could be lost forever. However, thanks to the efforts of Constable and the Friends of Cross Bones, there is hope that the site will be preserved. Transport for London, which now owns the land, has granted Constable and his volunteers access to the site, and Southwark Council has pledged £100,000 to create a permanent garden of remembrance at the cemetery. For those who gather at Cross Bones, the site represents more than just a historical curiosity—it is a place where the dead are honoured, where the forgotten are remembered. As Southwark continues to change, the graveyard stands as a reminder of the area’s darker past, a past that is often overlooked amidst the shiny new office towers and bustling tourist attractions. Yet, as Patricia Dark notes, Cross Bones is not just a place for the dead. It is also a place for the living, a place where people can come together to celebrate their shared humanity. In a city as vast and impersonal as London can sometimes feel, Cross Bones offers a space for reflection, connection, and healing. The graveyard that once housed the bodies of Southwark’s outcasts now serves as a testament to the resilience of the human spirit, a place where the wounds of history are slowly being healed, one vigil at a time. #london

On 6 July 1957, a significant event occurred in the world of modern music: it was that date when John Lennon met Paul McCartney. It was on that day, the Quarrymen skiffle band performed at the garden fete of St Peter's Church in Woolton, Liverpool. The show unfolded on a stage located in a field behind the church, with Lennon on vocals and guitar, Eric Griffiths on guitar, Colin Hanton on drums, Rod Davies on banjo, Pete Shotton on washboard, and Len Garry on tea chest bass. The group made their entrance via a lorry. In addition to music, there were craft and cake stalls, hoop-la games, police dog demonstrations, and the customary crowning of the Rose Queen. The fete was a much-anticipated event for the locals of the tranquil Liverpool village "The entertainment began at two p.m. with the opening procession, which entailed one or two wonderfully festooned lorries crawling at a snail's pace through the village on their ceremonious way to the Church field. The first lorry carried the Rose Queen, seated on her throne, surrounded by her retinue, all dressed in pink and white satin, sporting long ribbons and hand-made roses in their hair. These girls had been chosen from the Sunday school groups, on the basis of age and good behaviour. The following lorry carried various entertainers, including the Quarry Men. The boys were up there on the back of the moving lorry trying to stay upright and play their instruments at the same time. John gave up battling with balance and sat with his legs hanging over the edge, playing his guitar and singing. He continued all through the slow, slow journey as the lorry puttered its way along. Jackie and I leaped alongside the lorry, with our mother laughing and waving at John, making him laugh. He seemed to be the only one who was really trying to play and we were really trying to put him off!" - Julia Baird, Imagine This That evening the group were due to play again, minus Colin Hanton, this time at the Grand Dance in the church hall on the other side of the road. They were due on stage at 8pm, and admission to the show, in which the Quarrymen alternated on stage with the George Edwards Band, was two shillings. While setting up their equipment to play, the Quarrymen's sometime tea-chest bass player, Ivan Vaughan, introduced the band to one of his classmates from Liverpool Institute, the 15-year-old Paul McCartney. This historic occasion was the first time McCartney met John Lennon, one year his senior. McCartney wore a white jacket with silver flecks, and a pair of black drainpipe trousers. The pair chatted for a few minutes, and McCartney showed Lennon how to tune a guitar – the instruments owned by Lennon and Griffiths were in G banjo tuning. McCartney then sang Eddie Cochran's Twenty Flight Rock and Gene Vincent's Be-Bop-A-Lula, along with a medley of songs by Little Richard. "I remember coming into the fete and seeing all the sideshows. And also hearing all this great music wafting in from this little Tannoy system. It was John and the band. I remember I was amazed and thought, 'Oh great', because I was obviously into the music. I remember John singing a song called Come Go With Me. He'd heard it on the radio. He didn't really know the verses, but he knew the chorus. The rest he just made up himself. I just thought, 'Well, he looks good, he's singing well and he seems like a great lead singer to me.' Of course, he had his glasses off, so he really looked suave. I remember John was good. He was really the only outstanding member, all the rest kind of slipped away." - Paul McCartney, 1995 Lennon was equally impressed with McCartney, who showed natural talent for singing songs that the Quarrymen worked hard to accomplish. McCartney also recalled performing on the church hall piano. "I also knocked around on the backstage piano and that would have been A Whole Lot Of Shakin' by Jerry Lee. That's when I remember John leaning over, contributing a deft right hand in the upper octaves and surprising me with his beery breath. It's not that I was shocked, it's just that I remember this particular detail." - Paul McCartney 1995 The particular detail was later recalled by McCartney in his introduction to Lennon's first book, In His Own Write: "At Woolton village fete I met him. I was a fat schoolboy and, as he leaned an arm on my shoulder, I realised he was drunk. We were twelve then, but, in spite of his sideboards, we went on to become teenage pals." The Quarrymen's set, remarkably, was recorded by an audience member, Bob Molyneux, on his portable Grundig reel-to-reel tape recorder. In 1994 Molyneux, then a retired policeman, rediscovered the tape, which contained scratchy recordings of the band performing Lonnie Donegan's Puttin' On The Style and Elvis Presley's Baby, Let's Play House. The tape was sold on 15 September 1994 at Sotheby's for £78,500. At the time it was the most expensive recording ever sold at auction. The winning bidder was EMI Records, who considered if for release as part of the Anthology project, but chose not to as the sound quality was substandard. After the Quarrymen's show the group, along with Ivan Vaughan and McCartney, went to a Woolton pub where they lied about their ages to get served. Later on, Lennon and Pete Shotton discussed the young McCartney, and whether to invite him to join their group. For Lennon it was a dilemma – should he admit a talented member who may pose a challenge to his own superiority within the group, or should he persist without McCartney, retaining his leadership yet likely consigning the group to failure? They decided McCartney would be an asset, and roughly two weeks later Shotton encountered McCartney cycling through Woolton. Paul mulled over the invitation to join, and eventually agreed to join the Quarrymen's ranks.

In the annals of automotive history, the 1908 New York to Paris car race stands as a testament to human ingenuity, endurance, and a bit of lunacy too. Spanning over 22,000 miles and traversing continents, this epic race captured the imagination of people worldwide, pushing the boundaries of what was believed possible in the early days of motoring. The race attracted a diverse array of competitors from around the globe, each eager to prove the capabilities of their automobiles and demonstrate the potential of this emerging technology. Among the notable participants were the American teams represented by the Thomas Flyer and the Zust, the Italian team in the Itala, and the German Protos team headed by a German aristocrat. On February 12, 1908, amidst great fanfare and media attention, the race commenced from Times Square in New York City. The route took the competitors through the snow-covered roads of America, across the frozen Bering Strait into Siberia, through the rugged terrain of Asia and Europe, and finally culminating in the grand finale in Paris, France. The race was slated to commence at 11 a.m., yet Mayor George McClellan, tasked with firing the starting pistol, was conspicuously absent. Growing restless, a bystander took matters into their own hands, seizing the pistol and firing it themselves, prompting the racers to embark on their journey. Ahead of the competitors lay vast stretches of unpaved roads, with many regions devoid of roads altogether. Teams often resorted to riding on locomotive rails, their cars fitted with balloon tires, covering hundreds of miles where roads were non-existent. The journey was fraught with challenges from the outset. One of the French cars made it less than a hundred miles before quitting due to a busted differential. Adverse weather conditions, treacherous terrain, and mechanical breakdowns tested the resilience of both man and machine. Yet, amid the adversities, there were moments of triumph and camaraderie. The American Thomas Flyer surged ahead, crossing the United States and arriving in San Francisco in a remarkable 41 days, 8 hours, and 15 minutes—a historic winter crossing. Along the way, they welcomed a new member, Hans Hendrick Hansen, who defected from a French car team after a duel challenge with his teammate resulted in his dismissal. The journey then led to Valdez, Alaska, by ship, where harsh conditions necessitated a reroute across the Pacific to Japan. From there, they navigated to Vladivostok, Siberia, to embark on the daunting transcontinental crossing. Following a thorough examination of the Alaskan terrain, George Schuster concluded that navigating it by automobile was impracticable. Consequently, race organizers abandoned the Bering Strait plan, initially the race's winter challenge, instructing the Americans to return to Seattle and embark on a Pacific voyage. The detour through Alaska provided an opportunity for competitors to narrow the gap. By the time the Americans regrouped in Seattle and embarked for Japan, their rivals had gained a significant lead. To rectify the disparity, organizers granted the Americans a 15-day allowance, enabling them to finish two weeks after their counterparts and still clinch victory. Additionally, the German team incurred a 15-day penalty for transporting their Protos car from Utah to Seattle via train. Navigating through the soggy plains of Siberia and Manchuria during the spring thaw proved arduous, with progress often measured in feet rather than miles per hour. In Vladivostok, the Americans closed in on their competitors. A French driver, having bought all available gasoline, sought refuge with other teams. Despite the Italians accepting his offer, his sponsor withdrew him from the race, leaving him disappointed. Undeterred, the racers forged ahead through the challenging terrain of Siberia, Manchuria, and Russia. The Germans held the lead, closely trailed by the Americans, while the Italians lagged thousands of miles behind. Despite the challenges, the Thomas Flyer triumphantly reached Paris on July 30, 1908, covering approximately 16,700 km. The race garnered international attention, with The New York Times providing daily front-page coverage. Its significance extended beyond the competition, affirming the automobile's reliability as a practical mode of long-distance travel and catalysing the demand for improved roads worldwide. George Schuster, the victorious driver, was later honoured with induction into the Automotive Hall of Fame on October 12, 2010. Today, the iconic Thomas Flyer and its trophy are showcased at the National Automobile Museum in Reno, Nevada, preserving the legacy of this extraordinary journey.

In the world of literature, where words wield the power to evoke emotions and transport readers to far-off realms, the dedication page is often an overlooked gem. Traditionally a space for authors to express gratitude or pay homage, it has evolved into a canvas for wit and humour, offering a delightful prelude to the narrative that follows. #funnybookdedications

In the evening of July 27, 1890, Vincent van Gogh returned to his small room at the Auberge Ravoux in Auvers-sur-Oise, located north of Paris. Upon hearing his distressing groans, the innkeeper discovered van Gogh in agony, doubled over due to a gunshot wound in his chest. The innkeeper, Ravoux, promptly called for the village doctor, and van Gogh asked for his own physician, Paul-Ferdinand Gachet, to be summoned as well. Following a thorough examination of the patient, the doctors agreed that removing the bullet was not feasible. Therefore, at van Gogh's behest, Gachet loaded a pipe, ignited it, and positioned it in the artist's mouth. Van Gogh smoked peacefully as the doctor sat by his side, displaying keen attention. Over the course of ten weeks in Auvers, the two had cultivated a close and affectionate friendship. After moving to Auvers on May 20, 1890, Vincent van Gogh's brother Theo arranged for Dr. Gachet, known for his expertise in homeopathy and nervous disorders, to look after Vincent during his recovery from the asylum in Saint-Rémy. Theo had been referred to Gachet by the painter Camille Pissaro, who recognised the doctor's fondness for artists. Gachet was well-connected within the art world, counting Cézanne, Pissarro, and other Impressionist painters among his friends, and he was an enthusiastic art collector himself. Additionally, Gachet was a talented painter and engraver who signed his works under the name Paul van Ryssel. With his red hair, Gachet also possessed an uncanny resemblance to van Gogh, which only fostered a stronger bond between the two men. Van Gogh noted to his youngest sister, Wilhelmina, "I have found a true friend in Dr. Gachet, something like another brother, so much do we resemble each other physically and also mentally." Tempering the rapport, though, was van Gogh's observation that the "eccentric" doctor suffered from "nervous trouble" just as serious as the artist's. But despite these initial reservations, van Gogh soon began visiting Gachet's home regularly, sharing multi-course meals and painting portraits of the doctor and his daughter. One of these portraits, titled the Portrait of Dr. Gachet , is among van Gogh's most famous paintings and emphasizes the physician's melancholic nature more than his medical expertise. Describing the portrait to Gauguin, van Gogh wrote the doctor possessed "the heartbroken expression of our time." Upon settling in his new environment, the artist's productivity experienced a significant increase. Some catalogues have even credited van Gogh with around 70 works created during his stay in Auvers. In correspondence with Theo and his sister-in-law, Jo, he expressed his admiration for Auvers, describing it as "deeply beautiful, truly representing the countryside with its unique and picturesque qualities." However, as July approached, signs of trouble started to appear in his letters and artworks. In a letter to Theo, van Gogh described several paintings of wheat fields "under troubled skies," expressing how easily he could convey feelings of sadness and profound loneliness. His anxiety may have been heightened by the news that Theo, his financial supporter, was facing challenges with his employers and contemplating starting his own business. This situation likely intensified van Gogh's increasing distress. Theo heard the news the next day and rushed to Auvers to be by his brother's side. Comforted by Theo's presence, van Gogh told his brother, "I wish I could pass away like this." They were among his last words. He died on July 29 at 1:30 a.m. A small group of friends and family attended his funeral, abundant with sunflowers. Among the mourners was Gachet, who spoke a few words. "He was an honest man . . . and a great artist," Gachet eulogised. "He had only two goals, humanity and art." In recent years doubt has been cast on whether the gunshot was self inflicted, according to the groundbreaking research of Pulitzer Prize-winning biographers Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith, the painter didn’t shoot himself: he was killed. When they first exposed this theory in their 2011 biography Van Gogh: The Life , it was viciously attacked and contested. Rewriting history is not an easy task. Now, in a article published in Vanity Fair , the writers substantiate even further their controversial theory, which challenges the deep-seated assumptions about the (now) revered Dutch artist. According to Naifeh and White Smith’s research, van Gogh was shot accidentally by a man called René Secrétan , who broke a lifetime of silence after seeing Vicente Minnelli’s van Gogh biopic Lust for Life (1956), in which the painter is depicted as killing himself in the woods surrounding the French town of Auvers, just outside Paris. Secrétan admitted to being the leader of a group of young troublemakers who took pleasure in drinking and harassing the tormented artist. While he never confessed to shooting van Gogh, Secrétan did acknowledge that he would dress up as Buffalo Bill and wield a faulty pistol obtained from the Ravoux Inn's caretaker, where the artist resided. According to Naifeh and White Smith, two days before van Gogh’s death (July 29, 1890), a stray bullet shot from afar hit the painter in the abdomen while he was out in the fields of Auvers. Because it didn’t hit his vital organs, it took over 29 agonising hours to kill him. None of the reports of his death mention the word suicide, only that he had “wounded himself.” No one admitted to having found the gun, and the doctors could not really make sense of his wounds. A few days before the shooting, van Gogh had placed a large order of paints, and on the morning of the day he died, he had sent an upbeat letter to his brother Theo, with an optimistic take on the future. Crucially, no suicide note was ever found. Why did the suicide version take such a strong hold, then? Well, it simply provided a more logical narrative. Van Gogh’s earlobe episode, which had happened two years earlier, plus his history of nervous breakdowns and alcoholism, made him the perfect artist maudit : a troubled, unpredictable, erratic genius. Even friends of the artist, such as the painter Émile Bernard, liked to sensationalise van Gogh’s exploits. “My best friend, my dear Vincent, is mad,” he told an art critic in 1889. “Since I have found out, I am almost mad myself.” The police investigated the death, but according to Naifeh and White Smith, no records survive. The suicide rumours, thus, provided a “better story,” and gained momentum throughout the 20th century by the sheer force of hearsay. Naifeh and White Smith's rendition does not change the reality of van Gogh's tragic and untimely death, which might have been preventable. However, it presents a fresh perspective on the artist: depicting him as an individual filled with aspirations, faith in his art, and whose demise was accidental.

When Valerie Solanas entered Andy Warhol's sixth-floor office at 33 Union Square West on June 3, 1968, armed with two guns and consumed by a massive, paranoid grudge, things went south as quickly as you'd expect. Solana had gone to Warhol's office because she firmly believed he intended to steal her manuscript, he had ignored her calls so she went for a 'face to face'. By the time of the shooting, Warhol was "easily one of the most recognised and popular artists working in America," as noted by Jose Diaz, curator of the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, Pe nnsylvania, Warhol's birthplace. Warhol first found acclaim as a commercial artist in the 1950s, but it was his groundbreaking pop art paintings that propelled him to international fame. His works featured iconic imagery like Campbell's soup cans, Coca-Cola bottles, and stylised portraits of celebrities. In 1964, Warhol established the Factory, a sprawling warehouse in Midtown Manhattan adorned with foil-covered, silver-painted walls. Serving as a hybrid studio, laboratory, and social hub, it attracted individuals from all walks of life, from the most glamorous figures to fellow artists, celebrities, and musicians. As Diaz explains, it emerged as the epicenter of creativity in late '60s New York City, thanks to Warhol's influential presence. Notably, members of Warhol's Factory circle, including Edie Sedgwick, Ultra Violet, Viva, Candy Darling, and Nico, rose to fame through their appearances in his underground films produced at the Factory, achieving their own brief moments of stardom, as Warhol famously predicted. Valerie Solanas, a radical feminist writer and activist, played a minor role in the Factory's sphere. She founded the Society for Cutting Up Men (SCUM), of which she was the sole member. Starting in late 1965, Solanas made multiple attempts to persuade Warhol to produce a play she had penned titled Up Your Ass, but encountered little success. Warhol never promised to produce the play, but he gave the perpetually broke Solanas a role in his 1967 film I, A Man, for which she was paid $25. “The play was considered vulgar, humourless,” Diaz explains. “Even Andy and his crew thought it was a bit too much.” Solanas’ masterwork was her SCUM Manifesto , which she wrote between 1965 and 1967. It envisioned a world without men, calling on “civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females” to “overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation and eliminate the male sex.” As Breanne Fahs writes in her 2014 biography of Solanas , Valerie tried to get Warhol to help promote SCUM, even asking him in a letter in mid-1967 if he’d like to join the “Men’s Auxiliary,” the group of sympathetic men who were, according to the manifesto, “working diligently to eliminate themselves.” Andy Warhol being carried to an ambulance unconscious after a gunshot wound. At some point, Warhol misplaced the manuscript of her play (it later surfaced in a forgotten trunk, Diaz says), but Solanas instead came to believe that he was seeking to steal her intellectual property. On June 3, 1968, Solanas arrived at Warhol's new office located at 33 Union Square West. Warhol had relocated from the Factory in Midtown to more luxurious surroundings earlier that year. Armed with a .32 Beretta, she shot both Warhol and Mario Amaya, the London art gallery owner he was meeting with, before departing the building. Solanas' fired two bullets that ripped through Warhol's stomach, liver, spleen, esophagus, and both lungs. At one point, he was pronounced dead, but doctors managed to revive him. He endured two months in the hospital undergoing multiple surgeries and would subsequently be required to wear a surgical corset for the remainder of his life to support his organs. A maya wasn’t badly wounded. The front page of the Daily News on June 4, 1968 regarding Warhol being shot and critically wounded by one of his female stars, Valerie Solanas. Several hours following the shooting, Solanas approached a policeman in Times Square and surrendered her .32 semi-automatic along with a .22 revolver. "He had too much control over my life," she purportedly confessed to the officer, a statement that made headlines on the front cover of the New York Daily News. Solanas underwent multiple rounds of psychiatric evaluation and received a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. Despite this, she was deemed competent to stand trial and pleaded guilty to assault charges. A judge sentenced her to three years, inclusive of time served, and she was released in late 1971. Even after her release, Fah writes, Solanas remained steadfast in her belief that she could revolutionise the world with her SCUM Manifesto. However, as her mental health deteriorated, she became increasingly paranoid and unstable. She spent her final years residing alone in a single-occupancy welfare hotel in San Francisco, where she passed away in 1988. The shooting significantly altered both his personal life and artistic endeavours, leaving lasting physical and emotional scars. Warhol became notably more cautious, distancing himself from much of his filmmaking and controversial artwork, and instead directing his attention towards business ventures. Previously, Warhol had explored themes of death and violence in his art, including a series of paintings depicting sensationalised scenes of death and disaster drawn from newspaper headlines, such as car accidents and electric chairs. Post-shooting, he revisited the theme of death, painting a series of skulls and one of guns, a weapon with which he now had an intensely personal connection. “I said that I wasn’t creative since I was shot, because after that I stopped seeing creepy people,” Warhol wrote in his diary in November 1978. Andy Warhol's postoperative scars. Photographed by Richard Avedon, August 20th, 1969 Moreover, the shooting heightened Warhol's aversion to hospitals, leading him to explore alternative health therapies such as healing crystals. This reluctance had tragic consequences on February 21, 1987, when Warhol passed away from cardiac arrest following gallbladder surgery—a procedure he had postponed for several years due to his fear of medical facilities. "He could have arranged to have the surgery done earlier if he had been more proactive about his health," Diaz reflects. "However, he consistently avoided hospitals. He harbored a constant fear of falling ill. I believe his near-death experience intensified that apprehension." Sources https://www.warhol.org/timecapsule/andy-warhols-time-capsule-21/time-capsule-21-factory-shooting/ https://www.myartbroker.com/artist-andy-warhol/articles/andy-warhol-assassination-attempt-impact https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/who-was-valerie-solanas-andy-warhol-1202689740/ https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/obituaries/valerie-solanas-overlooked.html https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20160304-when-andy-warhol-was-shot

In 2014, Merrick Morton, a photographer living in Los Angeles and a former LAPD reserve officer, came across a neglected collection of LAPD crime photographs dating from the 1920s to the 1970s. These images were captured on cellulose nitrate-based film and negatives, which had deteriorated and were considered a fire hazard. Through collaboration with the Fototeka photo digitisation service and the US National Film Archive, these photographs were restored to a renewed lease on life. Detail of two bullet holes in car window, 1942 After undergoing restoration, the revamped collection features photographs of various crimes, often with a violent nature. It goes beyond the lighthearted moments involving marijuana plants and delves into a striking array of images. Among them are a peculiar photo of Maila Nurmi dressed as Vampira, snapshots capturing comedian Lenny Bruce's overdose in March 1966, and photographs documenting the Manson Family's arrival at their legal proceedings in 1970. Some captions are provided by the author James Ellroy from his book LAPD ’53 . “This is a pot pourri of crime,” says Ellroy. “It’s pathetic, it’s transgressive, it’s vile, it’s human.” Unknown lady, 1952 July 23, 1932. Passer-by shot dead in botched jewellery robbery. Los Angeles River on February 17, 1955 Bank robbery note, 1965 Chinatown: An assault victim poses for the camera – 1934. Detectives calculating the trajectory of a bullet – 1934 1930s Dead body laying on the ground with gun at side – 1926 Detail of bullet holes in screen, 1930 Homicide, El Monte, 6 May. This is a detective modelling a mask worn by one of Baxter Shorter’s crew. Shorter was in a gang with Emmett Perkins, Jack Santo and Barbara Graham. The three of them murdered an old woman called Mabel Monohan on 9 March 1953. Shorter was appalled by his gang’s violence. He ratted the others out, and Santo and Perkins kidnapped him from his pad on Bunker Hill, took him to the mountains and killed him. Shorter had a sister that lived in El Monte, and they were hunting through it for evidence: this mask was in her pad. – James Ellroy Crenshaw, 7 August 1953 Buried body parts, San Fernando Valley, 14 April. James Ellroy: “There were 81 murders in LA in 1953. This was the headline murder of the year – the ‘croquet mallet slayer’. Ruth Hilda Fredericks was tired of her husband Richard’s shit. She was good-looking and young and wanted to go on the party circuit and find a replacement man, so she ratted him out with the head-shrinker at his workplace and he got put away. When he escaped, he beat his wife to death with a mallet, severed her hands with a hatchet and buried them in their backyard, then dumped her body. He was sentenced to one to 10 years in prison.” Hollywood, 30 July. Kidnapping and shooting, Hollywood, 4 November. James Ellroy: This is a bar called the Melody Lane for lonely juiceheads. Some fuckers from out of state – a reform school graduate who did time for killing his dad and a friend of his – decided to heist it. That was a big mistake. Someone called the fuzz, then the men took a couple of police officers hostage when they came outside, and the LAPD surrounding the gin joint shot at them. One was shot in the neck, the other the chest. But the punks didn’t die on the spot. They survived. Olympic Boulevard and Alvarado, 9 June 1953. James Ellroy: “The liquor store killer was cold-blooded. He killed the owner, a man named Reposo, who was in his 70s. The guy sandbagged him, hit him from behind, and tapped the till for $25 bucks and his pockets for $60. A human being dies from brain damage for less than a hundred bucks. This is Harry Hansen, a pitbull and the premier homicide detective in the LAPD. He worked on the Elizabeth Short/Black Dahlia case till the end of his long life. He was traumatised he never found the killer. Reposo’s killer was never captured either.” Erwin Street, 12 December, 1953. James Ellroy: “A man named Manuel Vela was pounded by a guy named Joe at this tavern. He returned that night and fired four shots through the front door. A guy called Thomas Castillo was shot three times, almost hit in the heart, but he survived – so Vela dodged the death penalty.” Abortion, Highland Park, 28 April 1953. James Ellroy: “George R Davis was a quack. In 1952, he had testified at a trial of a woman accused of having illegal surgical equipment. He got her acquitted, but it alerted the cops to the fact that he was hinky. They surveilled him for six months, and found his secret abortion clinic behind a full-length mirror in his bedroom. Detectives found his surgical instruments in his stove. He got significant prison time – and his license to practice medicine was revoked.” Homicide, Foothill Boulevard, 22 February. James Ellroy: “See those hands? They’re the hands of a killer. Clarence E Vickery, aged 33, killed his friend Paul M Kenney at a gas station. They’d been friends for five years. When he woke up out of his alcoholic stupor, this had to be one of the world’s great ‘Oh shit’ moments. Kenney was beaten to death because one was a Scotsman and the other was a Dutchman, and when those paths intersected with a spur-of-the-moment drunk beef, the byproduct was his corpse.” Detail of two bullet holes in car window, 1942 Shoes, arm, and knife, 1950 Suicide 1 Suicide 2 Morgue, man with floral tattoo, 1945 Demand note. Bank robbery. Case information unavailable Date: 12/21/1961 Female assault victim exposes bruising and bandaged fingers. Date: 2/6/1950 Victim’s feet hanging off bed, 1934

Once a prominent figure but now largely overlooked, Johan de Witt held a pivotal role in Dutch politics. Elevated to the position of councillor pensionary in 1653, akin to a contemporary Prime Minister, he led the Dutch government until shortly before his passing in 1672. Born into a prosperous merchant family in Dordrecht on September 24, 1625, Johan de Witt received his education at Leiden University. There, he showcased exceptional aptitude in mathematics and demonstrated remarkable abilities in jurisprudence. His father, Jacob de Witt, held various esteemed roles in public service, encompassing treasurer of the Synod of Dort, burgomaster, and even acted as an envoy to Sweden. At the tender age of 19, Johan, alongside his elder brother Cornelius, embarked on a diplomatic mission to Sweden to visit their father. Subsequently, they journeyed to France, Italy, Switzerland, and England. Upon returning, Johan settled in The Hague, where he pursued a career in law. In 1650, following the demise of William II, Prince of Orange, Johan was among those who spearheaded the establishment of a fully republican regime. Consequently, he was appointed pensionary of Dordrecht. Johan distinguished himself as an exceptional statesman, emerging as one of the era's most adept diplomats. Merely three years later, at the youthful age of 28, he ascended to the position of councillor pensionary. Leveraging his acumen and diplomatic finesse, he orchestrated the transformation of his modest nation into a formidable global economic force. During Johan de Witt's tenure as Grand Pensionary, the Dutch found themselves in conflict with the English. However, within a year of his appointment, the Treaty of Westminster was concluded, swiftly bringing an end to hostilities. Notably, one stipulation of this treaty prohibited the Dutch from ever appointing William III as Stadtholder. This clause, insisted upon by Oliver Cromwell, stemmed from William's lineage as the grandson of Charles I, raising concerns about his potential future political influence. In the years that followed, De Witt managed to strengthen the Dutch economy and his great diplomatic skills led to the forming of the Triple Alliance between the Dutch Republic, England, and Sweden. This alliance forced Louis XIV to halt his offensive on Spanish Netherlands. In the year of 1672, dubbed the "disaster year" by the Dutch, the Republic faced aggression from both France and England during the Franco-Dutch War. Johan de Witt fell victim to a vicious assassination attempt on June 21st, resulting in severe injuries. Despite his resilience, he tendered his resignation as Grand Pensionary on August 4th. Yet, his adversaries remained unsatisfied. His brother Cornelis, despised particularly by the Orangists, faced unjust arrest on fabricated charges of treason. Subjected to torture, a common practice under Roman-Dutch law which mandated a confession for conviction, Cornelis refused to admit guilt. Nevertheless, he was sentenced to exile. When his brother went over to the jail (which was only a few steps from his house) to help him get started on his journey, both were attacked by members of The Hague's civic militia. The brothers were shot and then left to the mob. Their naked, mutilated bodies were strung up on the nearby public gibbet , while the Orangist mob ate their roasted livers in a cannibalistic frenzy. Throughout it all, a remarkable discipline was maintained by the mob, according to contemporary observers, lending doubt as to the spontaneity of the event. There are accounts of some among the mob taking parts of the bodies, and eating them. One man is even said to have eaten an eyeball. Although the stories may have been exaggerated, people did often take ‘souvenirs’ of executions, such as those who dipped handkerchiefs in the blood of King Charles I. The savage murder of a man that history has judged a highly competent leader is regarded by the Dutch as one of the most shameful episodes in their history.

The Shankill Butchers ride tonight You’d better shut your windows tight They’re sharpening their cleavers and their knives And taking all their whiskey by the pint — The Decemberists, “The Shankill Butchers” From 1975 to 1979 they terrorised Northern Ireland. Today the area they haunted, Shankill, has become synonymous with savagery. The Shankill Butchers were a loyalist (Protestant) gang, many of whose members belonged to the Ulster Volunteer Force. Headed by Lenny Murphy, a former convict, the gang brutally murdered 23 people within a period of four years. Catholics were abducted on the streets and slowly tortured. Some were ferociously beaten. Others were shot or had their throats cut open. The group's actions became so famous that they quickly became part of folklore. Catholics who were raised during the peak of the "Troubles" (as the conflict was later called) remember being cautioned by their mothers not to venture out after dark, or else they would fall victim to the Butchers. During the 1970s and 1980s, Northern Ireland experienced a violent conflict between Catholics and Protestants known as a civil war. Protestant loyalists aimed to keep the country within the United Kingdom, whereas Catholic nationalists sought for it to separate from the United Kingdom and join a united Ireland. Despite being the majority in Northern Ireland, Catholics believed they were facing discrimination under the Protestant-controlled Stormont government. Protestants received favorable treatment in terms of job opportunities and housing. In 1964, nationalists initiated a nonviolent civil rights movement aiming to eliminate employment and housing bias, advocate for police reform (as the police force was predominantly Protestant), and call for the repeal of the Special Powers Act, which permitted arrests and detentions without due process. Initially, the demonstrators aimed to maintain nonviolent intentions and methods. The civil rights campaign leaders were confident in their ability to achieve political change without the need for violence. However, the situation took a turn in August 1969 when clashes broke out between Catholic nationalists and the royal police force, perceived as a symbol of an oppressive government. This led to two days and two nights of rioting during the "Battle of the Bogside," triggering a wave of violence across Northern Ireland. Subsequently, the British Army was deployed to quell the unrest and restore order. The nation was now divided into three armed and increasingly hostile factions: the Catholic majority (including the Irish Republican Army), the Protestant minority (including the Ulster Volunteer Force), and the British Army (which Catholics perceived as siding with the Protestants). At first the IRA merely targeted Protestant businesses, planting 150 bombs, but largely avoided killing civilians for fear of alienating its growing support among the Irish public. Yet as the violence escalated, first one soldier and then another was killed. Famously, a 19-year-old soldier stranded in Belfast was seized and held captive by a mob of women before being killed by a Catholic of around his own age. He died begging for his mother. Looking back on his time in the IRA some decades later, leader Tommy McKearney tried to explain his motivations for engaging in acts of violence. “At that stage I believed that it was essential that I take part in the struggle. Coming from the community I come from, and came from at that time, with the history we have, it’s not seen as criminal. I didn’t see it as a criminal activity. I didn’t see it as any different than any other man joining an army to take part in a defense of war would.” His fellow IRA member Richard Macauley avers: “In a war one does things one wouldn’t normally consider doing.” Soon these words would take on a grim new meaning. At the time, however, most people on both sides of the conflict had only a vague inkling of the horrible forces that war could unleash. “I think there was a fear in the Protestant community,” reflects one loyalist woman, “that whatever we had unleashed would be something we would find very, very difficult to curtail.” In 1973, a young man named Lenny Murphy was acquitted for a murder he had almost certainly committed: the shooting of a Catholic, William Edward Pavis, in broad daylight. The one witness to the crime, Murphy’s accomplice, died in jail of cyanide poisoning after writing a note exonerating Murphy and taking full responsibility for the murder. Investigators at Scotland Yard believe Murphy—a cunning man who had already sabotaged a police lineup—forced his accomplice to write the note and then take his own life. “I don’t honestly believe he was a bad man,” Murphy’s mother would later insist in a BBC documentary, Shankill Butchers , though at least one fellow loyalist described him as a “psychopath.” The youngest of three sons, of below average height, Murphy was an unlikely murder suspect. Blue-eyed, with curly, dark brown hair, his most striking features were a series of tattoos signifying his allegiance to the Ulyster loyalists, and a leather jacket and scarf. During his time in prison, he married and had one daughter with 19-year-old Margaret Gillispie. After his release, Murphy frequented pubs near Shankill Road, nursing what some would later describe as a pathological hatred of Catholics. According to him, on August 13, 1975 he had just left the Bayardo when the pub was rocked by a bomb planted by IRA members, killing five Protestants and injuring over 50. Shortly after this event, Murphy began gathering a gang of about 20 men who would come to be known as the Shankill Butchers. On November 25, 1975, the body of Frank Crossan, a North Belfast Catholic and father of two, was discovered in a back alley by an elderly woman. Whilst walking towards the city centre at shortly after midnight he had been pulled into a taxi by four of the butchers, including Murphy, who hit him over the head with a wheel brace. He was beaten and the shard of a glass bottle was shoved into his head. As the taxi approached the Shankill area, Crossan was dragged from the car and Murphy cut his throat with a knife. He was almost decapitated. Reflecting on the scene, one of the constabularies in charge of the investigation said, “Evil was the only word to describe it. Just evil.” A few nights later, a local man named Ted McQuaid and his wife Dierdre attended a party. At around 3:30am they were walking home along the Cliftonville Road when she noticed a black taxi slowly driving past on the opposite side of the road. It turned left and disappeared from view, then reappeared a moment later. Dierdre pointed out to her husband the strange nature of the taxi’s movements and they argued about it. However, even when it stopped a short distance in front of them, Ted remained unalarmed. Apparently annoyed by Dierdre’s warnings, he began walking several steps ahead of her. When the door of the car opened and a young man got out, Ted was standing in between him and his wife. The man stumbled towards them, swaying as if he was drunk. Dierdre said to Ted, “It’s okay, he’s drunk.” As she said this, the man reached into his left pocket and pulled out a small gun, firing four bullets at Ted in rapid succession. “He never looked at me,” Dierdre would later recall, “but kept shooting at Ted.” As the assailant returned to the taxi and sped away, Ted, who lay bleeding on the ground, urged his wife to run. Though seriously wounded, he was still breathing ten minutes later when picked up by an ambulance, but died on arrival at the Mater Hospital. The murderer, William Moore, later tried to distance himself from the killing of Ted McQuaid by insisting that he had urged Murphy not to murder a blind man who had been out walking his dog at around the time they first spotted Dierdre and Ted. Moore did not consider the blind man an “acceptable target,” while Murphy had no scruples about killing anyone so long as he could confirm they were Catholic. According to crime reporter Martin Dillon in his book The Shankill Butchers , Moore’s protestations against killing the blind man unconsciously echoed the feelings of many Irish on both sides of the conflict during the war years. In Northern Ireland at that time, as in so many other places, people condemned the atrocities being committed against their own side while turning a blind eye to the atrocities that their side was committing. Loyalty to the tribe kept them silent in the face of obvious injustice. At the same time, it seems clear that Moore was trying to rationalise his role in the murder of Ted McQuaid by conceding that while, yes, he had done some terrible things, he had also done some very good things like saving the life of the blind man. In emphasising this kind act, he may have convinced himself that what he did was normal and good. These flimsy self-rationalisations were rapidly turning the Shankill Butchers into the figures of legend that Colin Meloy would one day describe in song: They used to be just like me and you They used to be sweet little boys But something went horribly askew Now killing is their only source of joy Yet the killings took place against a backdrop of merciless barbarism in Northern Ireland that was slowly engulfing the rest of the United Kingdom. While extending the military campaign to England had been debated by the IRA’s ruling counsel for some time, at first they had refrained from targeting the British for fear of rendering themselves illegitimate. “Doves” argued against the use of force while hawks felt London should be bombed. In 1973 the doves were overruled and the IRA began a strategic series of bombings in London and other major cities. In the first London bombing in early 1973, 200 people were injured. In January 1974, a bomb exploded at Madame Tussauds, followed a few minutes later by another bomb in the Earls Court Exhibition Centre. In June, a bomb exploded in the Houses of Parliament, injuring eleven people. A month later, one person died when a bomb went off in the Tower of London. In November, a bomb was thrown through the window of the Kings Arm Pub in Woolwich, killing an off-duty soldier and civilian. Downing Street tried to appease the Republican terrorists by appearing to negotiate a ceasefire in which the British army would leave Northern Ireland. In reality this agreement was just a tactical maneuver: the government hoped to placate the IRA and end the bombings without any significant military disengagement. Though the ceasefire crippled and nearly destroyed the Republican army, the end result was more violence. Fearing that a secret deal was being made with the IRA, Loyalist (Protestant) paramilitaries launched a bloody onslaught against Catholics, hoping to lure the IRA into breaking the truce. Five Catholics were killed inside a pub and three members of a popular band were gunned down. The IRA retaliated by bombing a pub on the Shankill road and killing five Protestants. Journalist J. Bowyer Bell reflects on this tragic period in his exhaustive 800-page book, The Irish Troubles: A Generation of Violence, 1967-1992 : “Over the years I watched the bombs being made . . . and saw them go off . . . I watched the landscape change and watched even the indomitable Irish change. And I changed. Gradually, like everyone else, I was transmuted by the years on the edge of a war without victories, with only victims, a long, long war. There were so many funerals, so many betrayed, so many broken hearts. There were children I had seen in strollers grow up to carry .38 revolvers . . . And there were so many innocent dead, forgotten maimed, so many idealists corrupted and so much good gone wrong.” Viewed in this context, the massacres perpetrated by Murphy and his gang lose their mythical proportions. While nothing excuses the murder of 23 innocent people, still less the sadistic manner in which the murders were committed, the truth is that men were killing each other throughout Ireland and the Shankill Butchers distinguished themselves primarily by the cruel way they went about it. The IRA, writes Dillon, “refuse to accept that their actions . . . breed an atmosphere in which gangs such as the Shankill Butchers develop and thrive.” If we examine the Pyramid of Hate used by the Anti-Defamation League, we see that violence doesn’t consist of just the most vicious acts inflicted on others. Those acts are made possible at the most basic levels by name-calling, stereotyping, and insensitivity to the humanity of our enemies. Hatred is always rooted, first and foremost, in a lack of empathy. Dangerous groups that hope to inflict violence will begin by conditioning their members to view outsiders as inhuman. They paint their enemies as deviants, degenerates, and freaks who are corrupting the world with their presence and need to be eliminated. The truth is that there were good and bad people on both sides of the conflict, as there are in almost any conflict. But a community spiraling into violence will convince itself that it is pure and incorruptible, untainted by evil in motivation or execution, while its enemies seek only to destroy it. Studies have shown that the number one instigator of violent aggression in a group is a feeling of self-righteousness. Towards the end of the documentary Shankill Butchers , journalist Stephen Nolan interviews psychologist Geoffrie Beattie, who grew up in a Protestant enclave with Jim “The Bomber” Watt, who would later become a notorious member of the Butchers gang. “You’ve been there, in a gang,” says Nolan. “And then of course, as a psychologist you must have an understanding of the weaker members of a gang, and that leader having a massive impact.” “Well, some of the weaker members of the gang,” says Beattie, “are bound into the gang. I think partly through fear. And what kind of fear is it? Well, partly fear of rejection. Because you’re much more vulnerable when you’re on your own. Now you might be very uncomfortable with what you’re doing at times, but the trauma of being rejected by the group just might outdo it. So you stay part of it. You do whatever he asks.” Perhaps this is why, even after his imprisonment for firearms possession in 1977, Murphy’s gang continued to roam the back alleys of the night seeking bloodshed. Now led by Moore, the gang kidnapped and tortured Stephen McCann, a Queen’s University student, Joseph Morrissey, and Francis Cassidy, a dock worker. But they made their fatal mistake in the attempted killing of Gerald McLaverty, a young Belfast man whose family had recently left the city. Late on Tuesday, May 10, 1977, McLaverty was walking down the Cliffordville Road when the gang approached him, posing as policemen, and forced him into a waiting car. The victim was driven to a disused doctor’s surgery, where he was beaten with sticks, stabbed, and left for dead on a back entry. Unexpectedly, however, he survived until early morning, when a woman heard his cries for help and phoned the police. News of the assault was delivered to Detective Chief Inspector Jimmy Nesbitt, who had been tirelessly pursuing the Butchers since their inception. The survival of Gerald McLaverty proved to be the breakthrough moment in the case. Nesbitt had the recovering victim disguised as a police officer and driven around the Shankill area on May 18 in the hope that he might recognize his assailants. Within the next day each of the Butchers was hunted down and brought into custody. There followed a mass trial in which the murderers were collectively sentenced to over 2,000 years in prison. Ironically, the principal culprit was never charged in connection with the case. Lenny Murphy completed his sentence for firearms possession in July 1982 and was gunned down in November. He had just pulled up outside of his girlfriend’s house, where he was now hiding to evade police capture, when two IRA gunmen emerged from a black van and opened fire. Ironically, although Catholic nationalists claimed responsibility for the murder, they were given the details of Murphy’s location and movements by Protestant UVF members. He bled to death in the upper Shankill, just around the corner from where the gang had dumped the bodies of many of its victims. But in death, even Lenny Murphy attracted mourners. His Aunt Agnes wrote, “Nothing could be more beautiful than the memories we have of you; to us you were very special and God must have thought so too.” On November 20 the murderer’s coffin was paraded outside his mother’s home in Brookmont Street by leading members of the UVF. Six masked gunmen fired a volley of shots over the coffin, and the police were prevented from arresting them by a ring of black taxis which sealed off the street from the Shankill. As the procession moved slowly down Shankill Road, a lone piper played the hymn, “Abide with Me.” He was given a hero’s funeral, and his tombstone reads, “Here Lies a Soldier.” And, even after the signing of the Good Friday Peace Accords in 1998, some in the Shankill community continued to honour the butchers as fallen heroes. “Is that what people really thought about the Shankill Butchers?” asked the daughter of Joseph Morrissey when she became caught up in a vast funeral procession for a dead butcher. Trapped in her car by the mourners, unable to get away, she watched the coffin pass with tears in her eyes. “I can’t tell you how I felt, but for me, the message was: he was a hero. The man who cut my father to pieces and tortured him for three hours was a hero.” Today, not one of the Shankill Butchers is in prison.