I am still working on editing the book about the life of a
Ramsgate milkman an interesting aspect being that like Cockburn in Cockburn’s
diary who worked in Ramsgate throughout WW1, see http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/catalogue/id73.htm
Charles Walford worked in Ramsgate throughout WW2.
I guess though the main thing for me is that I am interested
at the moment in the social history of the lives of ordinary working people.
This view of Ramsgate from the perspective of an ordinary working man turning
into a local businessman during the period from the 1920s to the 1960s is a
very interesting read to me.
The whole business of supplying a perishable product like milk
to towns over a period of hundreds of years interests me now, I guess I am
going to be reading though various books on farm and countryside history in the
bookshop.
Information on the internet is pretty vague but I am coming
to the conclusion that milk distribution has a history dating back at lest to
medieval times that is worth researching while gently stepping around the jokes
about milkmaids and milkmen.
Go back to say 1750, would the milkmaid from a farm on the
edge of Ramsgate carry milk into the town in buckets using a yoke to sell it or
would there have been a separate group of people employed delivering it?
I would guess that everyone knows that Wetherspoons, TDC and
Rank have agreed a lease whereby The Royal Victoria Pavillion becomes the largest
pub in England. Having disagreed with this one on the grounds that the last
vacant large publicly owned building in Ramsgate should have been turned into a
public venue and tourist attraction, now this has happened I will be supportive
of the development.
That said The Pav is a building I have worked in in the past
and it has a long history of being flooded during combinations of storms and
high tides. I haven’t checked this yet, but my understanding is that it one of
the few buildings on the foreshore in southeast England that doesn’t sit behind
an Environment Agency constructed and maintained sea defence.
One again my bookshop was much busier on Saturday than it
was last year or I expected and this may cause supply problems with some of the
local books I produce as we get closer to Christmas.
We have a new Broadstairs book http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/catalogue/in_search_of_the_broadstairs_shipbuilding_industry.htm
A new St Peters book http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/catalogue/st_peters_and_the_forgotten_ranelagh_pleasure_gardens.htm
The new Ramsgate one about the Ramsgate milkman due to be
published properly in around a weeks time.
We also have two new maps related to The Ramsgate Tunnels.
This is combined with already having about 160 other local
books in print.
This is essentially a craft/cottage industry inasmuch as all
of the printing binding and now guillotining is done here.
I would guess that there are few local people who wouldn’t
be pleased to receive a book about the local area for Christmas but there are
limitations to the amount of stock of each title I can hold and the speed at
which I can produce more, so please try to buy the one you want in good
time.
In terms of my general stock or around 30,000 new and
secondhand titles, well frankly I don’t think Christmas sales will make much of
a dent in it and you should find a reasonable range of books on most sujectes
wven if you leave your Christmas
In terms of what not to buy for people as presents on the
book front, speaking as someone who encounters a steady stream of people just
after Christmas trying to deal with unwanted book gifts. Avoid the big book of
anything, particularly if the pages inside look very much like websites. Books
about Thanet are a fairly good bet as we hardly ever encounter people trying to
sell them or exchange them. Books about the whole of Kent or the whole of the
UK are best avoided.
The books illustrating this post are the farm and
countryside craft, economy and social history section in my shop.
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