Louisa Maria Brooks

Louisa Maria Brooks was my Gran's (Dad's mum) mother. I found her on the 1891 Census aged 20 and living with her parents, two sisters and two of her three brothers. Her birthplace was given as Wales, and I had her age, so finding the registration of her birth should have been a piece of cake. But I could not find her listed.

However, I looked again on the 1901 Census, and there she was, living with her husband Charles Haywood Hoyland with two sons and two daughters including Gran aged 9. This time it gave her birthplace as Wales, Yorkshire. So I hunted on the Internet and found a Wales, eight miles from Rotherham. So two weeks ago I was back to the library, and this time I found her name with a birthplace of Rotherham. When the birth certificate arrived, it was the right one. It gave the registration sub-district as Beighton. This is not far from Wales.

What was more interesting was her actual birthplace being Treeton (four miles from Rotherham)and she was born on the 21st July 1870. Treeton (www.treetonweb.co.uk) only had 383 inhabitants in 1871 and this rose dramatically in 1875 when Rotherham Colliery sunk mineshafts and built 242 miner's cottages. The Brooks family had left by then, but interestingly, Louisa's father was a Colliery Agent at her birth. Maybe he was involved in the search for coal. He must have done quite well as by 1891, the family was living off Abbeydale Road South in the nice Sheffield suburb of Norton, not that far from Dore where I first went to school.

Slumdog Millionaire

I wasn't sure why a film set in India, part gameshow, part love story, had attracted such widespread acclaim. But when I went to see Slumdog Millioniare I found out why. Simply one of the most powerful and emotional films of the last decade. The story is of a boy growing up in the slums of Mumbai, and his relationship with his brother and a girl who shares their childhood and later, his dreams. It is this story that is so emotional, sad and funny in equal measure. The director, Danny Boyle, has created a dazzling action packed masterpiece, with the colours and sights of India as his palette.

The cinematography is a sight to behold, only surpassed by the fabulous soundtrack, possibly the best I have ever heard. I cannot wait to see the two nominated songs performed at the Oscars, and M.IA. joining A R Rahman (both of Tamil descent) on the podium for "O...Saya".
The director has crammed the film full of everything we westerners associate with India, almost too much. The odd references to Trainspotting are more subtle, remember the worst toilet in Scotland? That's nothing!

Oakley Wood and Hatton Locks

Saturday was the 30th anniversary of when Mum died. John was away for the weekend, but I met Paul at Oakley Wood Crematorium at 11.30. We walked for an hour around the paths set in very nice woodland, very quiet on a Saturday - no funerals taking place. We stopped to chat at various points and laid some flowers under the trees.

Then it was off for lunch. Paul had suggested a pub called the Waterman outside Warwick and near a canal. It was glorious weather, chilly but sunny and blue skies, so after lunch we walked from the pub to a flight of locks on the canal. Hatton Locks are an attractive tourist spot with good walks along the towpath. I think that Mum and Dad must have visited here when they lived in Kenilworth.

Australia, The Spirit and The Reader

I'm not keen on narrators in movies, and especially not a child. So Australia was off to a disappointing start. Now, how to show off the Northern Territory to best effect. Let's have a cattle drive. The answer should have been no. So, lets have the main characters as opposite as they can be. No, they will be caricatures, and they were. How about an underlying theme from the "Wizard of Ozz"? No, that will be just too hammy. We have to have a clever solution to the sequence where Drover stops the villains cattle being loaded first. Did I miss something? Lets make the movie as long as we can, just like Gone With The Wind. It was far too long. The film was not all bad, just a big missed opportunity. The cinematography was great, the scenery wonderful. The secondary characters were pretty good, shame that Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman had characters that were such a cliche. And some of the action sequences were well choreographed. Come on Bazz, you can do so much better.

The less I say about The Spirit the better. I should have known from the reviews that the whole film would be an embarrassment. It is mainly due to such a wooden lead as Gabriel Macht. His constant monotone narration makes you cringe. The story is pathetic and the writing is a disaster.

Thank goodness for films like The Reader. Stephen Daldry has added another fantastic piece of work to his previous successes Billy Elliot and The Hours. No wonder that producers Anthony Mingella and Sidney Pollack wanted to make a movie from the book by Bernhard Schlink. It is a great story. David Hare does it wonderful justice in his screenplay. Kate Winslet deserves her Golden Globe and should get the Oscar. The last half hour is particularly moving, but the whole film is made with such loving care. Mark Kermode (BBC film critic) said it was not cinematic? I don't understand, maybe he likes a bit more action. But I do like a good drama, especially when it's this good. The best film I have seen for ages.

Dave Dee Obituary

My posting of 1st October 2007 included a note about a song called Hold Tight by Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich, that appeared in the film Death Proof. Dave Dee died on the 9th January, and today's Times has an obituary. It includes the following revelation:
"For the (last) three decades he was actively involved in fundraising and increasing the profile of the charity (Nordoff Robbins Music Therapy), including the the establishment of a division based in Manchester where he lived for ten years. It was through his charitable work that befriended the movie director Quentin Tarantino who was to include Hold Tight in the soundtrack of his 2007 film Death Proof."
Now we know why an obscure (but excellent) 1966 single that reached number four in the UK charts arrived in an American cult grindhouse movie.

Family History Correspondents

I don't receive many comments on my blog. But I was delighted when a letter arrived in December from a Chris Rathbone, with details of the families of our two common ancestors. The first is my great great great grandfather Sidney Roberts. I am descended from his eldest son, John Shearwood Roberts, and Chris from John's brother Augustus Morton Roberts. The brothers married two sisters, John to Ellen Littlewood and Augustus to her sister Sophia Arrabella. So Chris and I share another ancestor in the father of these sisters, John William Littlewood.

Chris also put me in touch with one of his correspondents, Nigel Buchanan, who is an even closer relative in that his mother (Ada Ellen Matilda Roberts) was the sister of my great grandfather, Vincent Littlewood Roberts. So the three of us have been swapping information and exchanged many emails and letters. One of the most interesting items has been an obituary of my grandfather, Stanley Boyd Roberts, of whom I knew (or remembered) only little.

All the information from Chris and Nigel has been absolutely brilliant. It will take me some time to digest it all, and even more time to put it on the Family Historian programme.