Going round in circles

Hopefully when using a map to navigate, you don’t end up going round in circles.

This unusual map, however, goes round in one big circle, showing the area 25 miles around London.

It is currently on display in the ERO Searchroom alongside the oldest map of Essex and these miniature maps of Essex that we have recently written about to celebrate the launch of a new book on the historic maps of our county. Printed Maps of Essex from 1576 is being launched on Saturday 21 May 2016 at Saffron Walden – you can find all the details of the event below.

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The map dates from 1819, and includes a portion of Essex which begins with Sheering in the north-west of the county, before the circular edge sweeps down past the Rodings and Willingale, down to Ingatestone, Billericay and Laindon, before finally passing Vange and Stanford-le-Hope and then reaching the Thames.

The map shows main roads and some secondary roads, parks and most villages. It also defines the extent of the ‘Penny Post’ by a faint dotted line. In Essex the Penny Post line is drawn through Chingford and Woodford, not quite reaching Romford.

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The map was made at a time when the county of Essex was much bigger than it is today, extending as far as the River Lea and including areas such as Stratford, West Ham, Walthamstow and Barking and Dagenham.

If you’re a fan of maps, join us for the launch of Printed Maps of Essex on Saturday 21 May 2016, which will include a talk from the author, map expert Peter Walker, and a display of maps included in the book.

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Book launch: Printed Maps of Essex from 1576

Human beings have a long history of making maps to visualise and understand the world around them. Our ancient county is represented in many maps from the sixteenth century onwards, both printed and manuscript, a large number of which can be found today at the Essex Record Office. This new well-illustrated volume by map expert Peter Walker, Printed Maps of Essex from 1576, comprehensively lists and evaluates the ERO’s printed map collection and will be an invaluable guide to all those interested in Essex history. Join us to launch the book with a talk from Peter on the maps and the people who made them, and a display of some of the maps themselves. Copies of the book will be available to purchase on the day at a discounted price.

Printed Maps of Essex from 1576 is being published by the Friends of Historic Essex, the charity which supports the Essex Record Office.

Saturday 21 May, 11.00am-2.00pm (talk at 11.30am, display and book sale the rest of the time)

Saffron Walden Town Hall, Market Street, Saffron Walden, CB10 1HZ

Free, no need to book

A day in the life of Chelmsford Library: 5 April 2016

Sarah-Joy Maddeaux, You Are Hear Project Officer

What does a library sound like in 2016? A zoo, apparently.

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Stereotypically, libraries are quiet places, where everyone must speak in hushed tones. They are places for reading and studying, solitary activities that create minimal noise and require a calm, peaceful environment. But is that still what is required of a twenty-first-century public library in the middle of a busy city?

Unfortunately the Essex Sound and Video Archive does not have many recordings of what libraries sounded like in the past. To rectify this for future generations, I spent a day in Chelmsford Library, capturing the different soundscapes over the course of the nine and a half hours when it was open to the public. All the recordings were made on Tuesday, 5 April 2016: a beautiful sunny day during the school Easter holidays. I was using only a handheld Zoom H1 digital recorder (recorded as wav files and later converted to mp3s).

I arrived at the Library shortly before it opened at 9:00 am. I expected to be the first one at the door. I expected to have plenty of time to establish myself in the best location before the general public started to trickle in and create noise. But there were already people waiting at the door to get in, mostly students intent on studying for looming exams. From the start of the day to the very end, I was never the sole member of the public inside.

By the time I had set up my equipment and started to record about half an hour later, the Library was already a busy hive of activity. Among other things, a member of staff agrees to put up a community notice: the Library serves as an information point about local activities.

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At first, I sat on a chair placed halfway between the front doors and the issue desk, opposite the self-issue machines. Periodically you can hear people using the machines, returning books into the bins provided. But you can also hear the ding of staff issuing books at the desk, followed by the more traditional stamp as they put the due date in the book: here they are not insistent on people using the self-issue machines.

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In the early afternoon, I worked upstairs. It being exam season, these study desks were almost all occupied. Though some of the noise travelled up, and a siren infiltrated the windows from outside, this area provided something of the peace and quiet traditionally associated with libraries, allowing people to focus on their work.

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Later in the day, I worked by the public access computers. This area was even quieter: perhaps because it was later in the day and there were fewer people in the library, or perhaps because it was shielded from the general activity in the open area. Surprisingly, there were few technological noises, such as dings and beeps of error messages. There was only an occasional burst of typing: perhaps less than there would have been thirty years ago, when operating systems relied more on keyboards than mice? There is also the unmistakeable, clean sound of someone opening a fizzy drink: the library has an amenable policy of allowing people to drink inside, even by the computers: something my mother never allowed her IT students to do (nor her children at home).

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Different activities took place over the course of the day. A read-aloud book group meets once a month to enjoy reading together, as well as discussing the text. They are currently working their way through Simon Armitage’s Walking Away, and, after reading for a time, they broke into a discussion of Armitage’s prose versus his poetry.

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The Library’s sensory wall was also open in the morning, in the children’s section. This is actually a corner: two walls full of gadgets that produce different sounds and lights, touchy-feely parts with different textures, mirrors, and play-things. It was fun watching the children interact with each other and the wall.

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Elsewhere in the children’s section, the Library proved that it is still about reading. Listen out for the sound of a woman reading a book aloud to a captive audience.

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The Library provided so much enjoyment that for one boy it was a devastating blow when he was told that the back end of the children’s section had to be closed off for a private booking.

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The different soundscapes of all these different activities come together into one great crescendo of noise when you stand on the stairs. Children, adults, machines working and playing – mixed with the conversations you can hear from County Hall offices that adjoin the Library – create a busy atmosphere. There are no librarians demanding quiet here.

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The 1850 Public Libraries Act was the first piece of legislation granting town councils the right to use money raised through rates on the establishment and running of a public library facility. There were restrictions: it only applied to boroughs with a population of over 10,000, and they could only spend a set proportion of the rates on libraries (the legislation was extended to smaller towns and even parishes by the 1855 Public Libraries Act). Significantly, any such library would have to operate on the basis of free admission.

The use of library spaces has undeniably changed in the last 150 years, with a resulting impact on the sounds you hear inside. There is less whispering and rustling of pages. Libraries now offer more than books and study spaces: from public computers (increasingly important to combat digital exclusion) to social groups; meeting spaces to play rooms. We can speculate about how libraries will change in future, and how this will affect the soundscapes. Nevertheless, the service they provide remains true to the original purpose of the act: providing facilities ‘for the Instruction and Recreation of the People’.

The soundscape at Chelmsford Library did get gradually quieter over the course of the day. By the time I returned to the stairs at around 6:15 pm, the children had gone home, the students had packed up for the day, and the few people remaining were quickly checking out books and printing off documents before the Library shut. Staff went through the closing-up routine on computers and machines. It was noticeably quieter. That stereotypical hush had finally descended on the Library, but creating an aura of settling down to sleep and preparing for another busy day the next day.

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Perhaps this one last clip is sufficient to demonstrate the valuable role that public libraries continue to play.

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I echo this customer’s thanks: I am very grateful to the staff at the library for facilitating my recording visit.

Does your local library sound different? What about your college or university library, or an institutional or workplace library? We want to add the soundscapes you experience to our audio map of Essex Sounds, created as part of the Heritage Lottery Funded You Are Hear project. You can find instructions on our ‘contribute’ page, or get in touch to ask for more information.

You can listen to all of these clips, finishing with a more extended version of the recordings, on our Soundcloud channel here.

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Miniature maps

When we recently talked about our oldest map of Essex (from 1576) we mentioned how used to we are today to having maps on our phones in our pockets.

Today we are continuing the pocket-sized theme, nineteenth-century style. These miniature maps are amongst those included in a new book, Printed Maps of Essex from 1576, which we are launching on 21 May 2016.

These very small maps were not intended to help people find their way, but rather as illustrations. They are an example of the engraver’s art in making detailed engravings at such a small scale.

These maps are currently part of a small display in the ERO Searchroom, so do have a look next time you visit.

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Printed map of Essex by William Green, 1804 (MAP/CM/55/1)

This map is drawn with West to the top of the page, so that it fits well onto the paper. Only after the publication of Ordnance Survey maps from 1805 did it become the convention to put North at the top of the page. It shows only main roads, four parks, towns and a few villages. The map was published in Green’s book The Picture of England Illustrated with correct colour’d Maps of the several Counties, 1804.

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A Map of the County of Essex by George Wise, 1807 (MAP/CM/59/1)

This tiny circular map shows towns and connecting roads, with distances. The Wise family were potters in Kent, and this map was possibly made as an amusement for their clients.

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Printed map of Essex by Robert Miller, 1810 (MAP/CM/60/1)

This map of Essex is Plate 7 from Miller’s New Miniature Atlas of 1810, a small-scale atlas at a low price. It was also used in a children’s atlas, Reuben Ramble’s Travels through the Counties of England.

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Printed map of Essex and Kent by A M Perrot, 1823 (MAP/CM/69/1)

This miniature map includes 10 Essex towns, plus major rivers but no roads. The map itself is almost swamped by the decorative border featuring wheat, foliage, fish, waterfall, cannon, a telescope, and other objects. It is from a French guide to England of 1823.

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If you’re a map fan, do join us for the launch of Printed Maps of Essex from 1576 in Saffron Walden on Saturday 21 May 2016 – you can find all the details of the event here.

‘Tipling’, ‘idle life’ and ‘common badgers’

Katharine Schofield and Hannah Salisbury

This year, for the first time, we are running a workshop on our Quarter Sessions records. These records provide fascinating glimpses into hundreds of years of the past, and we are fortunate in Essex that our Quarter Sessions records are among the earliest and most complete in the country, dating back to 1555. So much of human life is to be found within these rolls and bundles of documents, and they can provide much of great value for social historians and potentially for genealogists.

Quarter Sessions records come in all shapes and sizes

Quarter Sessions records come in all shapes and sizes

Later records were bound in volumes rather than stitched into rolls

Later records were bound in volumes rather than stitched into rolls

The roots of the Quarter Sessions can be traced to 1361 when the office of justice of the peace was created to maintain local law and order. By the end of the 14th century they had started to meet quarterly to dispense justice, and these meetings became known as the Quarter Sessions. In addition to their legal duties, the justices soon began to acquire responsibility for other aspects of local life, becoming a centre of local government, until the establishment of the County Council in 1889.

The records created by the Quarter Sessions encompass a huge range of topics, from the licensing of alehouses and printing presses, the maintenance of roads and bridges, the planning of railways and canals, to the prosecution of crime and the running of gaols and houses of correction. (We have mentioned before the Quarter Sessions records which record all public officers.)

Delving in to these records, you might come across the likes of Henry Adcock (alias Cole) of Birdbrook, who was indicted in 1584 for keeping ‘a common house of tipling’, and for allowing Robert Brown, William Butcher, Henry Hempsted and others ‘of evil conversation and idle life’ to play unlawful games, namely ‘cards, tables and quoits’ (Q/SR 90/43). Alehouse keepers were required to take out a bond (called a recognizance) to guarantee good behaviour in their alehouse. To operate without a licence, or break the terms of the licence, left you open to prosecution.

Likewise, the Quarter Sessions tried to keep order amongst food dealers, such as badgers, laders, kidders, carriers of corn, fish, butter or cheese, and cattle drovers. Badgers, kidders and laders were dealers in food which was purchased in one place and carried for sale to another. Like alehouse keepers, these people were required to have licences from the Quarter Sessions, and could be prosecuted if they did not. At the Epiphany 1686 Sessions John Chalke of Leaden Roding and John Green of Moulsham, were indicted ‘both for Common badgers’ (Q/SR 449/46).

Part of the intention was to prevent food dealers from ‘engrossing’ (buying standing crops),forestalling(buying goods on the way to market) orregrating’ (buying at market for resale). The Sessions Rolls include many prosecutions for these crimes. The presentments made by the jury for the Hinckford Hundred at the Michaelmas 1588 Sessions included Richard Walford of Castle Hedingham who ‘doe forestall and buy hogges and sell the bacon at an excessive pryce contrary to the lawe’ (Q/SR 106/33).

On a journey into these records you might also find traces of those who were registered to vote or obliged to pay certain taxes. Under the Game Duty Act, from 1784 ‘every person qualified in respect of property to kill game’ had to register their name and abode (Q/RTg 1-4). Likewise, from 1795 persons using hairpowder were obliged to take out an annual certificate with a stamp duty of 1 guinea (Q/RTp 1-3).

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Register of those who were licensed to use hair powder in the 1790s

To discover more of these stories for yourself and find out how you could use these records in your own research, come along to Discover: Quarter Sessions Records on Wednesday 11 May, 2.00pm-4.00pm. Tickets are £10 and places are limited, so please book in advance on 033301 32500.

Document of the Month, May 2016: Photograph of the Empire State Building, New York

Allyson Lewis, Archivist

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For our May Document of the Month, we have chosen to highlight a photograph from one of the many albums compiled by Colonel Francis Whitmore of Orsett Park.

Col Whitmore travelled extensively during 1930 and 1931. His travels took him around the world via Sri Lanka, Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, Vancouver and Winnipeg before arriving in April 1931 in New York.  He took this photograph of the Empire State Building, perhaps the first photograph taken by an Englishman of the newly completed building.

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Construction of the building began on 17 March 1930.  Many Mohawk Iron workers worked on the project which was completed 12 days ahead of schedule on 11 April 1931.    The structure stands 102 storeys high and is 381 m high to the top of the roof, but 443 m high if the radio antenna is included.

The building was opened on 1 May 1931 by President Herbert Hoover switching the lights on from Washington DC and the grandchildren of Governor A J Smith, president of Empire State Inc. the construction company for the project, cutting the ribbon in New York.

The construction of the building was part of the race to build the tallest building in New York.  The Chrysler Building and 40 Wall Street each held the title for less than a year as the completed Empire State building surpassed them all.

Col Whitmore was there to record the completion of what has become such an iconic landmark.