About Brum

Only in Birmingham… Just in case you weren’t sure of the location of the last public hanging in Brum (apparently it was mistakenly thought to have taken place somewhere else for all these years), it’s now been comemorated with a plaque:

The site of the last public hanging in Birmingham is being marked with a plaque, after the spot was wrongly identified for a number of years.

Philip Matsell was hanged for shooting and wounding, in front of a crowd of 40,000 in August 1806 on the corner of Great Charles Street and Snow Hill.  An historian’s research proved it was not in Ludgate Hill as earlier thought. Public executions in London took place in Ludgate Hill which may account for the mix-up.

The new plaque, known as a History Plate, is being unveiled by Birmingham’s Civic Society. Conceding it was a “gruesome” act to commemorate, a spokesman said Birmingham stopped its public hangings many years before other cities. Mr Matsell was executed for the murder of a “peace officer” – an early form of police officer.

The unveiling will be at the West Midlands Police Museum in Sparkhill, Birmingham, with the plaque being put up under the Great Charles Street railway bridge later.

Erm… Well, I’m sure that’ll be hotly attended – still, might as well go take a look at it. You can’t deny that it’s certainly an evocative thing to comemorate, if nothing else! I’ll always look at Snow Hill in a slightly different light now…

“Reinvigorating Longbridge’s industrial heritage while also attracting new hi-tech investors and companies will also play an important role in cementing the area’s status as the real engine room for a prosperous and ever-growing Midlands economy, able to compete on an international stage.”– Mike Whitby, Birmingham City Council leader

A smattering of pre-new-year goods news, I suppose… From BBC News, this morning:

Up to 10,000 jobs could be created and 1,400 homes and a shopping centre built to renovate part of Birmingham affected when a car plant closed down. About 6,000 workers lost their jobs in Longbridge when MG Rover collapsed in April 2005. Now a total of £500m could be spent if the 15-year plan goes ahead.

Government ministers have already outlined plans for a £20m innovation centre in the area which will make up part of that redevelopment. The plans are being developed by the Birmingham City, Worcestershire County and Bromsgrove Councils. Council leaders said they hoped the 15-year transformation of the area would encourage more people back to Longbridge.

Under the plans Longbridge railway station would also be revamped and Bournville College would also be relocated to the area.

£500 million? That’s not petty cash. I wonder where they’re going to get it from… Higher taxes? Or, perhaps they’ll get lucky with some ERDF/EUSF funding? One hopes for the latter but I think it’d be ill-advised to expect anything but the former. I definitely know that the only thing I’ve seen in the way of progress since Nanjing bought Longbridge is a near-total asset strip of the property, combined with a bit of bulldozing and, earlier this year, a VIP tour for some of the Nanjing execs around Birmingham centre (culminating in a ceremony attended by the Chinese, Council members and a the Press), so not much in the way of positive improvement has happened yet. I don’t even think any car production has been restarted there yet, which was their aim, wasn’t it?

 Or maybe I’m getting ahead of myself. Anyway, my favourite bit from the article:

‘Determined to succeed’
A museum called the Austin Heritage Centre has also been proposed, which would celebrate the area’s history in car-making.

Woohoo! That’ll get the tourists rolling in!

Yes, Gigbeth begins tomorrow, and I’ll be there (helping represent Revolver Records, who are also one of the event’s sponsors) – I won’t be hard to spot, I’ll be the one who looks like he’s the odd one out and running round with a camera! See you there.

You may have traveled to this corner of the Web expecting to see my scribblings about the new UCE logo and how I was concurring with what many other people had already roundly described as a big waste of money and a poorly-implemented rebranding. You’ve just got the short version, but if you’re looking for the long version – sorry, you’ll be disappointed – I was strongly advised to remove this from my site (more on this later). So, this post has automagically gone into hiding for the time being, as some people in high places feel it may be sufficient cause for me to receive an official telling off or maybe even removal from my course. I’m opinionated, but I’m not an idiot, so this post will most likely stay in hiding until UCE have stamped my degree.

(And you can count on the fact that I’m quite surprised about this happening now of all times, and I won’t be letting this lie when I have a proper chance to sit back and consider all of this and argue properly in my defence, but now is not the time.)

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The Grauniad put out an insert with today’s paper, in association with the EC and Advantage West Midlands, focusing on the range of innovation, development (and redevelopment) and diversity within and around Brum and the rest of the County. It’s a very interesting read, and doesn’t smack of “look at our area, come and invest now please, aren’t we great” so go and pick a copy up!

 It has some interesting factoids in it too – like, for instance did you know that the first steam engine was perfected in the area of Birmingham which is now called Handsworth? And, did you also know that Birmingham is set to become the first majority ethnic community in 15 years’ time (due to the relative population growth of non-native communities versus incumbent British citizens?)

Nope, I didn’t know that either. Go buy it and read it for yourself, it’s a worthwhile read for anybody interested in our fair city.

This made the news sites a while back now, but I’ve had it in one of my Opera tabs for a long time and never bothered to note it down on here. It seemed appropriate that I reference it, even though others have done so long before myself.

It’s a music video made as a promotional tool for the council and as such works quite well – it’s got some great montages of the sights in and around Brum, and the song’s pretty good to boot. The BBC site’s got it available for streaming on their Birmingham LocalTV subsite (and the accompany article, with a link to the video, can be found here).

Something I hadn’t noticed until I just had the video playing in the background – so I could only hear the sound – was that after the song finishes, and the credits roll, there’s a bloke heard speak very quietly in the background of the audio. I don’t think (well, I hope not!) that this was intended, but I don’t have a copy of the video on DVD so I can’t verify against the original version, so either the BBC kit had a dry wire or ground loop somewhere in the signal path, or the video was VERY poorly mastered!

What he says is quite amusing, too… If you’ve got very good ears, or you just turn the volume all the way up (the scientific method), this is what you’ll hear:

<guitar fades out>

“And join me to meet the mushroom picker who doesn’t mind working in the dark, and having compost dumped on his head… Join me to meet the mushroom picker who doesn’t mind working in the dark, and having compost dumped on his head… That’s right, join me at Warwick University where we meet a mushroom picker who doesn’t mind working in the dark, and having compost dump-”

Make what you will of that, but either which way, it’s an amusing easter egg! I’m feeling generous, so I clipped the audio and attached it as an MP3 for your enjoyment, though you can just watch the video in its entirety on the BBC web site if you think I’m having you on. Take a listen: Warwick University Mushroom Pickers?

An odd couple of bedfellows, but both quite significant events that took place last weekend – Birmingham hosted the Gay Pride weekend, seeing hundreds and thousands of people converge on the second city for a weekend of festivities, celebration, drinking and general madness… My lesbian housemate certainly seemed to enjoy herself, though she’s not shown me some of the snaps from her weekend exploits yet!

Unfortunately, as is customary with any big outdoor event, it rained all weekend. Oops. However, it doesn’t seem to have dampened peoples’ spirits, as is evidenced by taking a look at the photos from the weekend on the BBC Birmingham pages.

Last weekend also marked the start of Tolkien Weekend 2007 – something I’m far more interested in What’s not so well-known is that J.R.R. Tolkien (more info on the BCC pages) drew a lot of inspiration from the scenery in and around Birmingham when he was writing his Lord Of The Rings saga (as he lived in Birmingham at the turn of the century), and a lot of that which he drew his inspiration from is still around for all to see today. Buildings like Perrott’s Folly (just down the road from me in Edgbaston, and across the way from the Ivy Bush, the pub where Tolkien used to drink) serve as a mysterious reminder to those who are fans of his work as to how he even partly envisioned his amazing universe in the first place. The Folly gave Tolkien the spark for his idea of the Two Towers of Mordor- the Folly was built in line with the old water tower, and when you view them from a distance the similarity is striking.

Other landmarks include Sarehole Mill and Moseley Bog, the blueprint for Fangorn and the Old Forest, as well as various places in and around the Midlands where Tolkien grew up. Tolkien didn’t just derive inspiration from Birmingham however, and there are many guides (including this one by Simon Rose) detailing in much greater depth many of the other buildings and locations whose influence can be seen in his later writings.

Photos from the 2007 Tolkien Weekend are available here, here and here.

In other good news, Longbridge will be officially back in action from today – the 29th of May – after it was announced that Nanjing Automobile are not only making Longbridge their EU headquarters, they are reopening the factory for production and using the factory as an R&D facility for new development. Since buying the company in 2005, Nanjing has invested many millions of pounds into the facilities and have long said they have wanted to resume production at the facility. They’ve also premiered several new models of MG vehicles based on old Rover designs at this year’s Shanghai Automobile Show, and now seem set to scale up production of new vehicles. (More info here, here and here.)
Credit for all photos: BBC News Online

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I look forward to seeing you back soon