80 years ago local teacher Stanley Reed became the UK's first teacher of Film Studies as a curriculum subject, introduced in a West Ham technical school. He later became Director of the BFI. A group of us are marking this with a project involving local schools in film-making using Stanley's methods

80 years ago local teacher Stanley Reed became the UK's first teacher of Film Studies as a curriculum subject, introduced in a West Ham technical school. He later became Director of the BFI. A group of us are marking this with a project involving local schools in film-making using Stanley's methods

This man - who changed our mental picture of London's geography - was born 123 years ago today. His plaque in Leytonstone is one of only four to use a special font (the Johnston typeface, used across London's transport network)

'Pink Fiat', Bethnal Green Road (2024) by Doreen Fletcher doreenfletcherartist.com 👤: @doreenfletcher.bsky.social

Epping Forest fuelled the bread ovens and thus the stomachs of London, and has long hidden its secrets and its dead: A pleasure to talk about pollard symbolism, class & May Day rowdyism muddying simplistic Nature Cures for Radio 4's Open Country, listen here: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

'Changing the Face of the Forest' by @flatshistory.bsky.social, Peter Williams & Andrew Cole, featured by @wanstead.bsky.social. Available in our Searchroom, with thanks to Leyton & Leytonstone Historical Society for their gift of this recent publication. wansteadvillagedirectory.com/2025/02/15/f...

The Wren practical work team - most of it, at least - after a hot session on Wanstead Flats managing our important area of heather. @wrenwildlife.bsky.social

Save our Skylarks fence renewal on Wanstead Flats 📅 27 February 2025 📍Meet 10 am Centre Road Car Park Help renew the Skylark fencing and signs in preparation for the breeding season. Information will be available for #WansteadFlats locals and visitors. www.facebook.com/events/12816...

Thank you all! Exciting times 🌼

Meanwhile the 52% of Newham households with no car get 🚡 a cable car that costs £7/journey 🛗 foot tunnels with unreliable lifts 🚌 buses that don't run overnight 🚴‍♂️ a silly "cycle bus" finishing at 9pm & dumping you in a concrete jungle 😶‍🌫️ decades of pollution in the air we breathe #SilvertownTunnel

The Wren Winter Newsletter has arrived! Look out for the Otter seen locally and a Nightjar - and much else besides in this bumper edition. wrengroup.org.uk/wp-content/u... Happy New Year! Wishing all our members, volunteers, supporters and partners a wonderful 2025.

View from Whipps Cross towards Snaresbrook Road. Waltham Forest in Winter. 📷 Early 20th cent image from VHM photo collection, available in our Searchroom. #leytonstone #walthamforest

Hundreds of unemployed workers, mainly from West Ham, helped create much of the landscape of southern Epping Forest that we know today. Pictured here - Arthur Hart, foreman of the works (the rotund gent on the left) & workers in Wanstead Park

New post (1): @flatshistory.bsky.social continues his series on pre-industrial local agriculture, examining how two East Ham farms became the foundation of large-scale Crosse and Blackwell onion pickling production in the late 1880's: www.E7-NowandThen.org

New post (2): @flatshistory.bsky.social examines women-led strikes at the birth of New Unionism (c1889) in East Ham (Crosse and Blackwell and Gutta Percha) - assisted by Eleanor Marx: www.E7-NowandThen.org

#otd Theatre Royal Stratford East was opened 140 years ago by actor-manager Charles Dillon. He was related to the Fredericks family whose portable theatre or "fit-up" was regularly at Wanstead Flats fairs in the early 1880s. The Flats played a key role in the pre-history of the Theatre Royal.

2 majestic oaks in the SSSI #WansteadFlats #eppingforestwinter24 #trees @wrenwildlife.bsky.social @benjaminmurphyuk.bsky.social

Just arrived, great new pamphlet.

Out now! The story of how over 100 years ago unemployed workers made the landscape of the southern area of Epping Forest that we know today. Lavishly illustrated & only £6. Perfect Xmas gift for lovers of epping forest. Available from @newhambookshop.bsky.social & www.facebook.com/Number8Fores...

The Wren scything team out on Wanstead Flats this morning, helping to conserve Yellow Meadow Ant hills and conserve Skylark habitat. #grasslandhabitats

How a query over a supposed "Chinese" grave in an East Ham cemetery became a journey into a little-known aspect of local history: the presence of seamen from Japan in Newham 120 years ago - & how a Scottish missionary looking after their welfare became known as "the mother of the Japanese navy".

It’s a source of great joy to the Wren Wildlife & Conservation Group that we have otters in our urban recording area. Well done to @thecowboybirder.bsky.social for capturing such a great photo! #nature #wildlife

Come and support your local bookshop on Monday 2 December 3-8pm

Good decision. Another excellent performance vs Man City. Get him on the coaching staff!

Here's my recommendation... @newhambookshop.bsky.social

www.E7-NowandThen.org is the Forest Gate local history blog. It has been running for over 11 years, features more than 270 articles and has had 2 million hits - currently running at more than 1,000 a day. It is easy to search, with articles featuring local: politics, music, personalities, sport m/f

ww.E7-NowandThen.org also features local: streets and estates, religions and their buildings, education, housing, industry, cinemas and pubs, Wanstead Flats, war at home & abroad, transport, charities, witchcraft, murders and frausters, monuments and migrant communities and farms! Pop over and look!

🦉 Wren Group New Year Social and Mini-Quiz 🦉 📅 Sat 18 Jan 2025 19:00 - 21:30 A lively social evening with other Wren Group members, a short quiz and a raffle. Please bring your own drink and a dish to share. Free tickets can be booked at: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/wren-group...

#otd 150 years ago Judge George Jessel ruled #EppingForest landowners' enclosures illegal, opening way to 1878 Epping Forest Act, the first in UK giving public right to roam over "private" land. Jessel: "they have taken other people's property [commoners rights] & appropriated it to their own use"

The range of colours you can get from four blocks of lino never fails to amaze me! #blockprint #londonprint #Londonart #printmaker #originalprints

Just for starters - Wanstead Flats isn't a housing estate (but nearly has been in the past). Its the southern border of #EppingForest, a unique 12 mile-long woodland in north-east London. The Flats is a much loved open space used by east London's amazing diversity of communities. Come & see it!