History@Portsmouth

University of Portsmouth's History Blog

Tag Archives | twentieth century

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International Women’s Day 2021: Katherine Johnson: Mathematician at NASA

By on March 8, 2021 in Public History

To celebrate International Women’s Day, we are delighted that UoP history graduate Ian Atkins has written this profile of pioneering NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson. For International Women’s Day I have chosen to write about Katherine Johnson, NASA mathematician, most famous for her work in calculation of the trajectory for manned space orbits, and subsequent lunar expeditions.[1] Johnson was born in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia on the 26th August 1918. She was the youngest of four children, her mother a teacher and her father an all-purpose odd job man.[2] Katherine had always excelled at maths and was ahead of her class from an early age. Margot Lee Shetterly indicates that […]

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The hidden heritage of a naval town: women’s community activism in Portsmouth since 1960

By on February 23, 2021 in Public History, Research in Focus, Uncategorized

As a naval town, Portsmouth’s history has tended to have a masculine focus.  But many Portsmouth women have actively campaigned for women’s rights and set up practical initiatives in the Portsmouth area to improve the lives of women. A Heritage Lottery Fund grant enabled the setting up of a project to interview these women and capture their stories.  UoP history reader Sue Bruley was one of the project leaders.  Project co-lead Laurel Forster, Reader in Cultural history in the UoP School of Film, Media & Communication explains more about the project and its outcomes. The main aim of this project was to document the activism of  women in the Portsmouth […]

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“There are no revolutions in well-governed countries” – British film and the Russian Revolution

By on February 1, 2021 in Learning in Focus, Research in Focus

In this blog, Rob James explores how the events of the 1917 Russian Revolution impacted British film production in the mid-twentieth century. Rob tells us that the chance of a film being made depicting those tumultuous events depended on how they were presented. If the film demonstrated any sympathy towards the revolutionaries, then a ban was inevitable. Rob’s research covers society’s leisure activities and how they were shaped and controlled from both within and outside the entertainment industry. His research feeds into a number of optional and specialist modules that he teaches in the second and third year. In the 1934 film Princess Charming, produced by Michael Balcon, one of […]

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Have yourself a (not quite so) very merry Christmas film

By on December 11, 2020 in Research in Focus

In this blog, UoP Senior Lecturer Rob James reflects on the changing popularity of the, now well-regarded, festive classic It’s a Wonderful Life. Rob tells us that the film’s success was not predetermined, and that it took a mixture of chance and luck, along with a well-told story of course, for the film to achieve its status as a seasonal favourite. Rob’s research covers society’s leisure activities and this feeds into a number of optional and specialist modules he teaches in the second and third year. In a recent poll featured in The Independent newspaper of the ‘Best Christmas Movies’, the 1946 Hollywood-produced film It’s a Wonderful Life came in […]

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The banality and brutality of war: Wilfred Owen’s letter to his mother, Susan Owen, February 1917

By on August 13, 2020 in Learning in Focus

In the second in our series on First World War sources, second-year UoP student Charlotte Lewis discusses what can be learned from a letter by famed WWI poet Wilfred Owen to his mother Susan. Whilst Wilfred Owen’s poetry is well known for describing the horrors of the First World War, his letters to his mother, Susan Owen, give the reader an insight into Owen’s personal experiences and reactions hiding behind his poetry. In light of this, this blog will focus on a letter written by Owen in February 1917 to his mother.[1] Through the analysis of this letter, this blog will try to convey not only its significant use in […]

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Normalising the brutality of the Somme: a soldier writes to his aunt, 13 October 1916

By on August 12, 2020 in Learning in Focus

In the first of a series on First World War sources, in this blog second year UoP student Oliver Rooney discusses the experiences of Charles Wyndham Wynne, expressed through his letter to his aunt Sophia Sarah Wynne on the 13th October 1916, several months before his death in June 1917, as well as the historiography surrounding the importance and limitations of First World War letters. [1] The atrocities of the First World War have been conveyed through personal letters between soldiers and their families. These personal sources provide historians with a first-hand understanding of the soldier’s experiences during wartime, and the emotions they conveyed and attempted to conceal from their […]

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