theatre history | The British Newspaper Archive Blog

Blog

The Jazz Age Queen Who Made Britain Her Home

American-born jazz age superstar Adelaide Hall (1901-1993) was a Black music legend, who from 1938 onwards made Britain her home. She went on to have a long and successful career in the UK. In this very special blog, as part of Black History Month on The Archive, we will celebrate this jazz age queen who came to Britain and entertained thousands of people via her stage and radio performances, using newspapers taken from our Archive. A Star Is Born To

Continue Reading

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Exploring the ‘Dancing Anthropologist’ Katherine Dunham’s Visits to the UK

Born in 1909 in Chicago, ‘dancing anthropologist’ Katherine Dunham was known as the ‘matriarch and queen mother of Black dance.’ Her father was a descendant of enslaved West Africans and Madagascans, whilst her mother hailed from Canada. A multitalented artist, academic and activist, for many years Katherine Dunham ran the Katherine Dunham Dance Company, the only self-supporting African-American dance troupe in the mid-twentieth century. It was during this time that Dunham toured the United Kingdom, and in this special blog,

Continue Reading

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hot Off The Press – New Titles This Week

This week at The Archive we have added 99,778 brand new pages, with seven brand new special interest titles joining our collection over the past seven days, which provide an incredible snapshot of early twentieth century culture. From cars to yachts, from movies to the modern man, our new titles this week furnish an exciting panorama of what life was like over one hundred years ago. Meanwhile, we have extensive updates to some of our existing titles, with over 50,000 pages being added to

Continue Reading

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hot Off The Press – New Titles This Week

This week at The Archive we have been busier than usual, bringing you a glut of new and updated titles. In total, we have added an incredible 44 brand new titles to our collection, which may well be a record, with 149,250 brand new pages added in all. Register now and explore the Archive Our new titles cover a range of specialities, from religion to the railways, and a range of locations, from London to Liverpool. Meanwhile, we have also updated 29 of our existing

Continue Reading

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Anna May Wong and Her Surprising British Connection

Anna May Wong, born Wong Liu Tsong in Los Angeles in 1905 to second generation Chinese-American parents, is widely considered to be the first Chinese-American Hollywood star, and certainly the first Chinese-American actor to win international fame and attention. The Bystander | 27 May 1931 After gaining success in such films as The Toll of the Sea and The Thief of Baghdad in the 1920s, and fed up with the stereotyped roles she was given (the Coventry Evening Telegraph in 1961 remembers her as the ‘slinky

Continue Reading

Tags

, , , , , , , , , ,