James Kneale

@jameskneale.bsky.social

2037 Followers 1540 Following

Cultural/historical geographer at ucl working on drink/temperance, insurance, literary geographies, sf/fantastic/horror, &c. He/him. Author of Temperance Lives: Life Assurance, Drink and Medicine in Britain, 1840-1918 (Bloomsbury 2026)

A map of pubs in the Fitzroy Square district, 1898, showing their location and counting entrances and also compartments within them. Source as previous map
A map of Soho, marking pubs (but not licensed restaurants or hotels) but also noting that there were 259 of them in an area only slightly larger than half a square mile. Lady Somerset, evidence presented to the Third report of the Royal Commission on Liquor Licensing Laws (1898). London: H.M. Stationery Office. Appendix IV.
An architectural drawing of a narrow Georgian townhouse with a bar on the ground floor. When I accessed this the reference was 'Designs for alterations to the premises of Thompson & Fearon, 94 Holborn Hill, London, creating a 'gin palace': several images. 1830. Papworth, John Buonarotti (1775-1847). RIBA Library Drawings Collection RIBA68590'
A news story, reading "EXCITING RESCUE OF A CAT IN NOTTINGHAM.--An amusing and exciting incident (except for the chief participator) occurred at the Corn Exchange between the hours of 10 and 11 a.m. en Saturday morning. Fate, in the shape of & black cat, three insurance gentlemen, and a long ladder, which was too short, was responsible for the little previously unrehearsed drama. It appears that the black cat by some means not yet known found itself on the narrow stone window ledge which runs along the front of the Corn Exchange, from whence its piteous appeals for help resounded for a radius of a hundred yards. Attracted by the cries a number of people several hundreds strong soon collected, and speculations as to the best means of rescue soon became rife. About this time a long ladder carried by two of the previously-mentioned gentlemen emerged from the Corn Exchange. This was quickly reared against the building. The third gentleman (who had been previously calling to the member of the feline race from an adjoining window, but whose seductive overtures had not been responded to) then made his appearance, and ascending the ladder discovered that the same was somewhat short. Not deterred on his errand of mercy in the slightest, however, he balanced himself on the top rung of the ladder, the crowd below in the meantime watching with bated breath while he seized the cat, placed it in a haven of safety on his shoulders, and bore it to terra firma, amidst the cheers of the assembled crowd.
Subtitles from Ruth Madeley's Who Do You Think You Are? episode, describing me as someone "who specialises in this type of financial history", which is fair enough
Ruth Madeley and I sitting at a table in the beautiful library of Charlton House, Greenwich. I'm involved in a nice bit of business with a document here as I reveal the latest twist in Ruth's Who Do You Think You Are? story
A French boat in Dingle harbour, heavy cloud above
A scene from Alien 3. Andrews (Brian Glover) makes an announcement
View from a second floor hotel window in Paris. An iron railing partially screens a view of a street corner below. Much of the picture is taken up by the branches of a street tree. Its branches meet those of the tree on the other side of the road
Joe Swash and historian Annemarie McAllister standing in front of a barrel organ of the kind Joe's ancestor would have played in Clerkenwell.
Text saying "Life after work - how to make the most of your retirement or semi retirement"
Photo of players and officials of Crystal Palace Football Club standing and sitting for an official portrait. It was originally shared on the Club's official pages at http://www.cpfc.co.uk/club/history/ where it was titled '1905-06 squad photograph' but is no longer available. Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20130606051751/http://www.cpfc.co.uk/club/history/ which was my source for it.
Jackie Chan's MIRACLES (aka MR CANTON AND LADY ROSE)
A view of a university campus, with grassy spaces that you could *totally* pitch a tent on
Three pictures showing a man turning over playing cards, one after another. The cards are black with white printed messages. The first shows a card that says "not yet". The second card also says "not yet". The third card says "RUN", in capitals.
Skeet from MP Antonia Bance. Picture of her holding half a pint of beer. The text reads "I don't normally drink a half but I was driving. Can't let St George's Day pass without going dowen the pub, Hope you've had a good one."
A 1950 passenger list from the Mauretania, showing the names of Roger Pippett and Winifred Pippett, who took six items of luggage and two typewriters with them from England to New York
A photo of a park with budding trees above a green lawn and a beautiful blue sky above
A pile of sheets of paper testing on a white bin bag on the street. The top sheet has 'FEAR' written on it in marker pen
Stop The Hate is a grassroots non-profit organisation founded in response to the repeated failures of the Metropolitan Police to address anti-Semitic incidents at Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (PSC) marches. Today, we are the largest Jewish-led direct action campaign group, with teams in London, Leeds, and Brighton, united in our mission to stand against hate and advocate for Israel. Our coalition brings together individuals from all backgrounds and faiths who are united against terror by the shared values of love, freedom, and democracy.
A photo of part of UCL Portico, showing four banners made with the new brand design. The text on the banner on the left reads 'Here, we make buildings more sustainable."
Two maps of part of the city of Peel, on the Isle of Man. Side by side, they show the same hall in the nineteenth (left) and twentieth (right) centuries, first as a 'Temperance Hall' and later as 'Salvation Army Hall'
A black UCL sign with white text on a white wall, reading "Quiet reading area Dancing and music not permitted"
A much younger me performing at Bright Club in 2011, wearing a dark shirt against a dark background so only my hands and face are visible. I am holding a microphone and gesturing, looking rather smug in the way some stand-up comedians do.
A free shot from BBC Local News Oxfordshire showing someone looking into a water-filled pothole. The headline reads: "Council hits back at Starmer in pothole row"
A black and white comic image, showing a huge Great White shark and a scuba diver. The diver is swimming into the shark's mouth. The diver is thinking "HOPE THIS IS THE WAY."
A shot from the film The Holdovers (2023). A middle-aged white man sits at a desk by a window. He is smoking a pipe and marking student essays. The caption reads "Hmm. [scoffs]"
A screen shot of a google search for the question "does AI hallucinate DOI information". Below it is an 'AI overview' that starts "Yes, AI commonly hallucinates (fabricates) Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs),"
A working man, carrying both 'increased taxation' and 'militarism' looks back at a woman carrying the banner of Socialism; ahead of him a top -hatted man carrying a bag of profits leads him on towards the will-o'-the-wisp of imperialism
Three colourful panels of painted sculptured plaster, mounted at the top of cinema escalators. The panels show Victorian ideas of medieval scenes, inspired by Tennyson's Idylls of the King.
A scene with two couples at a table in a beer garden with the landlord standing over them. From left to right the actors are Daphne Pollard, Oliver Hardy, Alan Hale as the innkeeper, Stan Laurel and Betty Brown. Daphne (Mrs Hardy) is ordering a ham sandwich, mustard on the side and a glass of beer.
A photo of the bar of a cosy pub, showing a small chalkboard sign reading "CHEESE + ONION HOMEMADE ROLLS WITH BEST BITTER CHUTNEY £2.50". In the foreground is a packet of Taytos, the Northern Ireland variety, smoky bacon flavour
The cover of Andrew Davison's book The Built Heritage of the Temperance Movement, showing a classical statue of a woman in a blue robe in a building niche - this is 'Temperance' at Kirkby Stephen
Two juvenile delinquent aliens: D.R. (right) and Quinch (left) from the comic 200AD, drawn by Alan Davis. D.R. is a bequiffed greaser alien with green skin and big ears; Quinch is a pink-ish alien with tusks
A slide entitled 'Researching alcohol and eugenics, temperance and medicine'. On the left is a copy of a page listing press clippings collected for Karl Pearson, responding to the publication of the 1910 study he wrote with Ethel Elderton on the effects of parental drinking on children. On the right, part of the frontispiece from the study, with some text explaining responses; and a snapshot of surgeon Victor Horsley's blue plaque from Gower street. Teetotaler Horsley presented a strong criticism of Elderton & Pearson's work
A photograph of a square, framed by tree branches, cafe tables in the foreground and a green lawn beyond them. Houses surround the square and above them a very clear blue sky
A screenshot of an 'AI overview' which reads "There seems to be a misunderstanding or conflation of names; there isn't a prominent Chinese painter named Hugh Prince, but there was an English artist, Hugh C. Prince (1927-2009), known for his landscapes and influences from Chinese art, who did paint scenes inspired by the Lake District, focusing on its natural beauty and light, reflecting the region's famous scenery. He was an English artist, not Chinese, and his work captured the essence of the Lake District's hills and waters, often using watercolor." There's also a tiny photo of one of the Lakes.
A lime with a tiny citrus spigot stuck in it, resting on a kitchen counter. The spigot is designed to look like a lime leaf. It was utterly useless.
A picture of Level 42's Mark King. MarkKing geddit
A pile of books: RAKESFALL, VAJRA CHANDRASEKERA CORPSEMOUTH, John Langan EXTREMOPHILE, Ian Green THE MINISTRY OF TIME, KALIANE BRADLEY MOVE UNDER GROUND, NICK MAMATAS 120 MURDERS, EDITED BY NICK MAMATAS THE LAST TO DROWN, LORRAINE WILSON IMARO, CHARLES R. SAUNDERS THE HOTEL, DAISY JOHNSON Tender, Lauren Du Plessis THE SALVAGE, ANBARA SALAM WEIRD HORROR FALL 2025 WEIRD HORROR SPRING 2025 STRANGE HOUSES, UKETSU
A ceramic Santa with dead black eyes and a mass of facial tentacles
Bob Peck with a teddy bear
A photo of a restaurant window in Asakusa, Tokyo, showing the food and drink on sale. The top shelf offers alcoholic drinks, including plastic mugs of plastic beer. The other shelves show bowls of noodles and other nice things
A photo of the Tokyo skyline, taken from a bridge over the Sumida River. The bridge is in the foreground and several corporate towers are in the background. Phillpe Starck's Asahi Beer Hall is a black building just off-centre. On top of the building is the infamous 'Golden Turd', which looks like a golden flame. Or a golden turd.
A black and white photograph of a coastal scene with clapboard houses and a jetty above a rocky shoreline. I took the original photo in Marblehead, Massachusetts, in 2008 and I have altered it to make it look old, because while Marblehead was probably Lovecraft's inspiration for 'Kingsport', when I visited it looked like a sunny, affluent village.
A Telegraph headline saying "Britain is afraid of intellectuals - just look at the Booker Prize panel", with a photo of Jarvis Cocker
Despite the magazine's frequent statements to the contrary, the designation is often regarded as an honor and spoken of as an award or prize, simply based on many previous selections of admirable people. However, Time points out that controversial figures such as Adolf Hitler (1938), Joseph Stalin (1939 and 1942), Nikita Khrushchev (1957), and Ayatollah Khomeini (1979) have also been granted the title for their impact on events. Nevertheless, as a result of the public backlash it received from the American audience for naming Khomeini Man of the Year in 1979, the magazine's editors have since shied away from using figures who are controversial in the United States, fearing reductions in sales or advertising revenue.
Six vinyl records: 7 inch singles by Husker Du, A Flock of Seagulls, Mike Flowers Pops, and Sea Power/the Wurzels, plus albums by the Fall and Fatima Mansions
The title screen of Mark Bould's inaugural lecture - a black slide with the title 'My favourite thing is monsters'
An academic looking at his laptop and realising he's breached GDPR rules, saying "I mailed it to completely the wrong person", oops
A pile of hardback copies of my book Temperance Lives: Life Assurance, Drink and Medicine in Britain, 1840-1918. The cover shows the second office of the UK Temperance & General Provident Institution at the City end of London Bridge, with the Thames behind it.
A page from from my book Temperance Lives, dominated by A. B. Hulme's portrait of Edward Vivan, showing him in later life, bald and bearded, sitting in a chair next to what look like red roses climbing up the doorway or arch behind him.
When we first opened our doors, we made a bold promise: education for everyone
A page from my book 'Temperance Lives'. The top half features a detail from a piece of headed notepaper from the Deansgate Hotel, dated July 1908, showing the 120-room hotel and boasting of its electric lights and elevator.
Cover of the collection The Irish Pub, showing a pub, with a figure in the doorway. The title of the book is where the pub sign would be
Various guides for the Ursula K. Le Guin exhibition 'The Word for World' at the Architectural Association