X is for X26/27, XPS, and X-Rays

X26/X27

Based on Royal Way, on the Belton Road West industrial estate, the Paul S Winson family-owned coach company was created in 1980, and has been running bus services in the area for most of that time.

Winson’s X26 service is a popular Monday through Saturday service that connects Loughborough to three nearby villages which fall within the Borough of Charnwood, namely, Quorn, Mountsorrel and Rothley. These villages lie in the Soar Valley and are on the west side of the River Soar: villages on the other side of the river include Barrow-upon-Soar, Sileby and Cossington. In addition to the X26 service, Winson’s also operate the X27 service which runs Monday through Friday, during the Leicestershire school terms only, and is dedicated to delivering children to school.

XPS and X-rays

Loughborough University has researched and taught all types of engineering since its inception as a Technical Institute in 1909. Chemistry and physics also feature on the curriculum, and today, the Loughborough Materials Characterisation Centre (LMCC) uses X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), sometimes known as Electron Spectroscopy for Chemical Analysis (ESCA) to analyse the top 3-10 nanometres of a material. Using XPS it is possible to study thin films like those used to coat spectacles, corrosion like oxidation, and adhesion, as well as changes in the state and composition of a wide range of materials, from powders to solids, like metal, ceramics and manmade polymers.

X-rays were discovered in 1895, and Loughborough College used the new techniques, which by the end of the First World War could help inform about the condition of various materials. The principal of the college, Herbert Schofield, had the foresight to invest in X-ray equipment for the college in 1919, which was used to check welds and castings. These early machines lasted until the 1930s when they were replaced by new equipment. The university continues to benefit from all the latest in X-ray technology, like the XPS.

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This post is one in a series of posts for the ‘April A-Z Blogging Challenge’

 

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2024). X is for X26/27, XPS, and X-rays. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/04/x-if-for-x2627-xps-and-x-rays.html [Accessed 27 April 2024]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

site: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/ “Radmoor House”

NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne

W is for Walking

Back in 2015 I was on a mission to walk more, and I certainly managed to achieve that!! In the process, I discovered just how beautiful our area was and still is, and how lucky we are to have such a variety of countryside surrounding us. Also, of course, as an accredited Leicestershire Tour Guide, I lead groups on guided walks, so walking is fairly central to my life!

Wherever I walk to I usually have my trusty camera to hand, and often stop briefly to take a photo of something interesting – and often the same thing on more than one occasion as the seasons can have a dramatic effect on nature, and on the view! I now find that my pc file directory is full of folders called things like ‘Walk to Beaumanor and back’, or ‘Walk via Woodthorpe to GCR Quorn and back’. Of course, that doesn’t mean I can find the photo I want at the time I want it though!!

While I love walking in the countryside – to the Outwoods, or Beacon Hill – I also love walking along the canal – to Barrow, or to Hathern – and I also love walking the streets of Loughborough, seeing the changes to buildings happening, seeing interesting things I might not have noticed before. Oh, and I love bumping into friends and people when I’m out on a walk.

As for my guided walks, I have put a few of these on this blog – the Luddites and Lace Trail, the Zeppelin Trail, the Three Towers Trail, the Sculpture, Art, and Architecture Trail, and the Walking the Plaques Trail, although I admit at least one of these does need to be updated.

Some of my real life walks include a general walk around Loughborough town centre, an Art Deco walk, and a pubs walk, as well as bespoke walks covering something specific. In September for the Heritage Open Days I shall be leading an Art Deco walk, and a general walk for the Loughborough Library local Studies Volunteers, and two others from the group will be leading a Suffragette walk and a Zeppelin walk. Keep an eye on the HODs website for more details of these walks!

 ____________________________________

This post is one in a series of posts for the 'April A-Z Blogging Challenge'

____________________________________

Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2024). W is for Walking. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/04/back-in-2015-i-was-on-mission-to-walk.html [Accessed 26 April 2024]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

site: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/ “Radmoor House”

NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne

V is for Victorians and what they did for us

So, whatever did the Victorians do for us in Loughborough?

Queen Victoria reigned from 1837 until 1901, a period of 63 years, and a time which saw huge changes in the lives and fortunes of not only the well-to-do, but also the poor, across the country.

New research suggests that the industrial revolution was beginning to happen almost a hundred years earlier than was initially thought, so around 1650, but surely, until the nineteenth century, Loughborough was still essentially a farming and agricultural economy? True, we also had butchers, bakers, and tallow chandler makers, and a wide variety of other trades that were essential to life.

However, factory working began to be introduced, and industry began to come to Loughborough in the mid-late seventeen hundreds particularly. I’m thinking here of framework knitting factories, dyeworks like Atherstones, and other trades allied to the hosiery industry. In the early nineteenth century, we see lacemaking, more dyeworks (like Clarke’s, Calverts, Heafford, Hepworth, Rossell, and Toone), brickmakers like the Tuckers, and George Hodson, and the Taylors bellfounders all finding their way to Loughborough. Later in the century, these were joined by hosiers Morley, and Cartwright and Warner, dyers like Godkin & Sons, Claypoole, Diggle and Hardy, and more. And by now there were no less than eight needle-making factories in town, and Messengers were producing glasshouses and conservatories for places across the country. We also saw the rise of ironmakers like Edwin Cooke, and John Jones, and boiler makers like the Coltman family. Towards the end of Queen Victoria’s reign, we also saw the Falcon Works become The Brush, and Herbert Morris moved their factory to Loughborough, and the last new railway in the UK was opened.

So, the Victorian era gave us a lot of engineering and heavy industry in Loughborough, and many were family firms that grew, and remained in the same family for generations. Owners of the family business needed somewhere to live, as did the workers in those factories. Thus, the Victorian era saw a huge increase in the housing available in Loughborough, ranging from the large impressive, country-house-like properties, like Field House, the Grove and so on, to detached residences like those on Ashby Road, and semi-detached properties, for example on Forest Road. Housing for the Victorian workers came in the form of redbrick, terraced properties, like those on Station Street, Paget Street, Leopold Street, and Oxford Street, and on Ratcliffe Road, Queen’s Road, and so on. Houses for the group of people in between the wealthy owners and the workers are probably like those found on Storer Road, Herrick Road, Middleton Place, and similar areas. Many streets bear names that remind us of this Victorian era, from the obvious Victoria Street, Albert Street, and streets named after Victoria and Albert’s offspring. And many houses, and groups of houses include name stones that indicate a connection to the era.  

The Victorian era also gave us things designed to keep us healthy in both body and spirit. So, Queen’s Park was created, with the swimming baths in the park providing a cleaner environment than the baths on Moor Lane near the canal.

To be honest, there is a huge deal more we could say about what the Victorians did for us, but that’s enough for one blogpost! Besides, a very kind person has just given me a copy of BBC History Today which seems to include some interesting stories from Victorian times, and, as if that weren't enough, an article about Muncaster Castle - (Part 2 of Alan's story is also worth a read!)

 

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This blogpost is one in a series of posts in the ‘April A-Z Blogging Challenge’

____________________________________

Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2024). V is for Victorians and what they did for us. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/04/v-is-for-victorians-and-what-they-did.html [Accessed 25 April 2024]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

site: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/ “Radmoor House”

NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne

U is for Ursula

Looking back through the blog, I can see I’ve already written about Unity House and some of the people and things associated with it (like Gertrude Mary Hutton, Dr Corcoran, and the British Restaurant) many posts about the university, and some posts about Unitarians, which also made an appearance in one of my virtual walks. I also noticed that two of my guest bloggers have been named Ursula!!

Ursula Ackrill is a librarian at the University of Nottingham, working in the Manuscripts and Special Collections area, which is based on the Kings Meadow campus. Ursula’s guest post focused on John Cleveland, a Loughborough poet who was born in 1613. 

My own work with Ursula was on the Loughborough parish library, a collection of books used by the Reverend James Bickham, and left by him to the parish. This was an interesting project which led to me writing many blogposts about the Reverend Bickham, his home, and his library!!

Ursula has given talks on Reverend Bickham’s library, and on parish libraries in our areas, and is currently a committee member of the Loughborough Archaeological and Historical Society, and can sometimes be found down at the Old Rectory on a Saturday during the building’s open season. 

The guest post which Ursula Davis wrote for this blog, was back in the early days of the lockdown in 2020. Ursula was a student at Loughborough University at the time, so it was very interesting to read about what strategies she had for keeping well – both physically and mentally – during that unprecedented situation. Absolutely fascinating to see how the chance to slow down, to stay local really helped with an appreciation of all that Loughborough and its surroundings have to offer – like Burleigh Woods, the old railway lines, Charnwood Water, Queen’s Park and so much more!

____________________________________

This post is one in a series of posts for the ‘April A-Z Blogging Challenge’

____________________________________

Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2024). U is for Ursula. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2024/04/u-is-for-ursula.html  [Accessed 24 April 2024]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

site: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/ “Radmoor House”

NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne