Noise?

The photos above show the Christmas preparations in Bexleyheath Broadway adjacent to the Clock Tower. Click on either photo to see a larger version. Over the past few days traders have been setting up stalls in sheds for the forthcoming Christmas market and funfair. Also the temporary job centre in what used to be the large Argos outlet is now a Christmas shop, which seems to be doing good business. It does seem to me that year on year the celebrations for Christmas get earlier and earlier; I saw Christmas cards in Erith Morrisons at the end of August which strikes me as being somewhat ridiculous. This year there are going to be a number of other Christmas markets in and around the borough, including one located in Erith. Details below.

Erith Festive Market and Christmas Fair

101 to 103 Erith High Street

Erith DA8 1RG

Date - Saturday 14 December 11 am to 4 pm

Admission - Free

Food and Drink Stalls

Festive Crafts and Gifts

Support Local Traders

Licensed Bar

Supporting the Mayors Charity Appeal - Counselling Matters Bexley.

Following from my article last week on conspiracy theorists and aircraft contrails - incorrectly termed "Chemtrails" by the conspiracists, I received an email from a regular reader who wrote:- "Contrails have been around for years.  We used to look out for them when I was a kid (I’m mid-70s now).  We didn’t have a lot, something to look out for – we looked up, not down.  The attachment (photo above) was taken in Erith in the early ‘40s (either by my dad or my aunt – returning home from working nights).  Just after reading your article I saw two while sitting at a bus stop – against a blue sky, one had a distinctive bend in it (no camera, unfortunately).  I assume that the conspiracy theorists don’t live anywhere near Crawley or Hounslow.  Similarly, they should have been around in the ‘50s – smog, now that was a killer; crossing Fraser Road when it was Frasers’ kicking out time.  I will always be grateful that I went to West Street School, ok not many people passed the 11+ but we were taught to use common sense!  Unfortunately, there are far too many who seem to believe one conspiracy after another (and I wouldn’t take anything on X as gospel, far from it).  I am very concerned that this is a developing trend (and not just here) and am pleased that, for me, the finish line is probably in sight.  It seems that anything they cannot understand is a probable conspiracy; I don’t understand how just about everything invented in the last half-century works, I accept that I am not a close relative of Einstein and get on with life". Comments to me at hugh.neal@gmail.com. 

This week marks the 40th anniversary of the UK launch of a computer which was widely expected to become extremely successful, but in reality the polar opposite happened. It is a computer that failed so massively, very few people in the UK will have heard of it, as it sank without trace. Ironically because of its’ lack of success, the machines are now desirable collectors’ items among old computer enthusiasts. The machine in question is the IBM PC Junior, otherwise known as the “Peanut”. It was designed to be a computer which was software compatible with the existing IBM PC, but with better graphics and sound, to appeal to the home user and video gamer. Back in the 80’s, IBM could do no wrong. They were massively respected and totally dominated the business and government computer market worldwide. There was a popular saying at the time “nobody gets fired for buying IBM”. Which was pretty much the case; IBM kit was very well made, came with excellent documentation, technical support and training - it was also very expensive. The original IBM PC (the 5150 model) was the first time IBM had designed and manufactured a computer from “off the shelf” standard components, something which would both make the PC the industry standard, and also in time mark the end of IBM as a major producer of desktop hardware, as other companies introduced cheaper and more capable “clone” computers. At the point where the PC Junior was introduced though, IBM was still king of the hill. The launch of a home computer built by the company was thought to be a guaranteed hit. The problems with the Junior were pretty much obvious from the outset. The Junior  came with a terrible, very poor quality  “chicklet” type keyboard, which was virtually impossible to touch – type on. The keyboard used a wireless infrared connection which was very unreliable – even if you could get some typing on the keys themselves, quite often the infrared link would break, and you would get half a sentence along, before you realised that the words had stopped appearing on screen. To add to this, the expansion slots and joystick ports were non – standard, making adding third party devices very difficult. If this was not bad enough, the PC Junior only came with 64K or 128K of RAM; this meant that most full IBM PC software (which could require up to 640K of RAM - the maximum amount of memory early PC's could utilise) would not run on the machine – the much vaunted software compatibility was not anywhere near as good as the marketing people said. The factors are small when compared to the main problem – the PC Junior was over twice the price of the Commodore 64 – which at the time was the most popular and successful home computer in the world, which had a plethora of third party software and hardware available for it, and it was over four times the price of a Sinclair ZX Spectrum - the UK’s most popular home computer at the time. The PC Junior was launched in the USA in February 1984 to poor reviews and public indifference. The UK launch was actually much later in November 1984. The IBM marketing people were largely perplexed; they were used to dealing with large corporations and businesses, not individual private consumers, and really did not understand this strange new market. The few people who did buy the PC Junior complained so vociferously  and so long about the awful infrared keyboard that IBM eventually decided to provide users with a full stroke professional keyboard as used on the Juniors’ big brother – the full PC, but this was too little, too late - and also wiped out the small profit margin that IBM had made on the computer, and the company pulled the plug on the whole PC Junior project within eighteen months. Ironically this also marked the slow decline in the full IBM PC. Because of the open design of the PC, other manufacturers realised that they could make computers which were software compatible with the IBM product, but which were considerably faster, cheaper and easier to upgrade. Dell, Compaq and HP along with many others started producing PC compatible clones, and very soon these became ubiquitous, not just in the office, but in the home as well. The PC took on an identity apart from IBM, and in 2004, IBM had sold their entire desktop and laptop manufacturing division to Chinese PC makers Lenovo.

Did you know that the Metropolitan Police Museum is located in Marlowe House in Station Road, Sidcup? The Met’s Police Museum holds an important collection of photographs, archives, books, equipment, uniforms and other artefacts, some of which date from the start of the service in 1829. The organisers make this accessible by curated displays, talks and a research room. The Police Museum relocated from West Brompton and opened in Sidcup in October 2022. Visits are by appointment only and photo ID is required. Appointments can be made for a gallery tour or for a research visit. The museum has a long and involved history. The first appeal for objects was put out by Chief Superintendent Arthur Rowlerson of E Division in 1949 to mark the bicentenary of the Metropolitan Police's forerunners the Bow Street Runners. The resulting collection was housed at Bow Street Police Station, but a curator was not appointed until 1967, the year which also saw the foundation of both a Historical Society and a Museums Advisory Board (initially solely covering the Police Museum, but later with a remit extended to the Crime Museum and other collections within the Met such as that of the Thames River Police at Wapping). The first curator Audrey Sams was an existing member of the Met's civil staff at Bow Street who had previously been a police officer. She organised loans to an exhibition at the Museum of London in 1979 to mark the Met's 150th anniversary and instigated research into a potential new site at an empty Met building in Wapping. In September 1981 Sams was succeeded as curator by Marcelle Marceau. Later that year the exhibition space at Bow Street closed and the collections store moved to a former Met clothing store on the third floor of a former piano factory (now known as Piano House) on Brighton Terrace in Brixton, moving to another store in Charlton in 1993. No new display space was found until July 2009, when a new gallery space and research room opened in an annexe to Empress State Building, an MPS office building in west London, headed by curator Maggie Bird and renamed the Metropolitan Police Heritage Centre. With the planned change of use of Empress State Building to a counter-terrorism hub, the gallery space at West Brompton closed in early 2020. The collection then moved to Marlowe House in Sidcup, where a new research room opened in October 2022 and a new gallery in spring 2023. If you would like to visit the museum, you have to book via Eventbrite by clicking here. Tours operate on Thursdays at 11:00 and 14:00, lasting approximately one hour. Although carefully chosen for display, the material contained in the Museum relates to the history of policing and crime from 1829 onwards and includes material not suitable for children. They therefore do not admit under-12s. The maximum number of visitors permitted per tour is 10, available on a first come, first served basis. 

Thanks to regular reader and occasional contributor Gary, an important landmark in electronic technology which  a turning point in technological history has just had its' seventieth birthday.  While in 1954 the world was still getting used to the bulky, furniture-like radios that dominated living rooms, a small company called Regency Electronics, in partnership with Texas Instruments, introduced something revolutionary: the Regency TR-1 transistor radio. This unassuming little device, roughly the size of a deck of cards, was the first commercially successful transistor radio.  It was a far cry from the large, vacuum tube / valve based radios of the time. The TR-1 was portable, ran on batteries, and could be carried in a pocket or purse. It was a marvel of miniaturisation and a glimpse into the future of electronics. One could say that it was the first step towards the Walkman and later the iPod. The TR-1's creation was driven by the invention of the transistor in 1947.  This tiny semiconductor device could amplify electronic signals and switch electronic power, replacing the much larger and less efficient vacuum tubes / valves. Texas Instruments, eager to find a commercial application for their transistors, partnered with Regency Electronics to create a portable radio. The result was a device that, while limited in performance compared to its vacuum tube / valve counterparts, captured the public's imagination.  Priced in the USA at $49.95 (a significant sum in 1954), the TR-1 was a novelty item that symbolised the future. It allowed people to listen to music and news on the go, at the beach, in the park, or even walking down the street. On 18 October 1954, Texas Instruments announced the first commercial transistorised radio. It would be available in select outlets in New York and Los Angeles beginning 1 November, with wider distribution once production ramped up. Due to the high price the radio was not a big seller in the UK, but soon after cheaper and more capable portable radios started being imported from Japan - in August 1955, a small Japanese company called Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Corp. released its first transistor radio, the TR-55. A few years later, the company changed its name to Sony and went on to dominate the world’s consumer radio market. The Regency TR-1's impact was profound. It ushered in the era of portable electronics, paving the way for the development of smaller, more efficient devices like, but not limited to :- Portable cassette players, Calculators, Mobile phones, Laptops, Tablets. The TR-1 also had a significant impact on the music industry.  Teenagers could now listen to their favourite artists wherever they went, contributing to the rise of rock and roll and the cultural shifts of the 1950s and 60s. Today, the Regency TR-1 is a highly sought-after collector's item.  Its iconic design and historical significance make it a valuable piece of technology history.  It serves as a reminder of the incredible pace of technological innovation and the power of miniaturization to transform our lives. 70 years on, the legacy of the Regency TR-1 lives on.  It's a testament to the ingenuity of its creators and a symbol of the transformative power of technology.  The next time you slip your smartphone into your pocket, remember the small, unassuming device that started it all – the Regency TR-1.

A reader who chooses to remain anonymous has contacted me with a real mystery, and an appeal for help. The reader writes:- "For some good few weeks now I've been hearing a high pitched noise in the Birchdene Drive area, of Thamesmead SE28. It sounds electrical, starts as high frequency then drops a tone. Goes off regularly throughout the day (and night) and lasts about about a minute. I posted in the Thamesmead Facebook group, and, apart from the alien theories, subliminal brainwashing, fox repellents, and suggestions of tinnitus, it seems that many have heard it and it drives them nuts as well. Someone also said he hears it from Upper Belvedere. Initially I was thinking it might be something local, or even city airport ,as my house is west facing,  but if people are hearing it in Upper Belvedere it could be coming from anywhere! This is a high frequency sound, two pitches, high first then lowers, and lasts about a minute. It could be close by or miles away, I just can't pinpoint it. Do you have any idea what it might be? It really is, at times, very intrusive. If I knew who to complain to I would". Can any reader help? If you can, then please contact me in complete confidence to hugh.neal@gmail.com.

Earlier in this Blog update I wrote about the Metropolitan Police Museum in Sidcup. Did you know that another historic Police collection is also located in Marlowe House? The Metropolitan Police Historic Vehicle Museum, which has a collection of vintage and classic Police cars and other vehicles, including an armoured Rover P6 3500 saloon, once used as the secure transportation for a number of senior politicians, including Margaret Thatcher. The end video this week shows the historic Rover P6 3500 along with its special quirks and features not found in the standard version of the vehicle. Comments and feedback to me at hugh.neal@gmail.com.