Thwarted by my attempt today to get #ByTheSea (or at least the Thames estuary) by train failure, here’s something inland for #wildflowerhour Field Scabious (Knautia arvensis) amongst the grass at Walthamstow Marshes
Jon Agar
@jonagar.bsky.social
historian of modern science and technology
Clouded Yellow, yesterday at Walthamstow Wetlands Took lots of pics and finally caught one when it was opening wings
As a historian of Jodrell Bank, I agree! And the reason it is important is that it has been made to mean different things to different people at different times. Who's up for a mega thread on how and why? (I'm off for lunch now, but I'll do it after. I'll need the energy...)
John Grindrod@grindrod.bsky.social · last wk.Really one of the most important postwar sites in Britain
Among the new file releases in July 2026 at the National Archives: the Home Office extradition of some extraordinary figures, including Pinochet, great train robber Ronnie Biggs, holocaust denier David Irving and Alexander Litvinenko
Won the Pembury pub quiz in Hackney (yay!) Killer round link: Beatles albums (eg galoshes are made of? Rubber. Rubber Soul) Comes down to: what colour are Mr Blobby’s spots? (I’d you get it wrong you get ZERO points) What’s the right answer?
Next thing you know, someone will put together programmes that combine subjects such as philosophy, history and science and sociology of knowledge and call it, who knows, science and technology studies. It might even catch on... 3/3
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law. And that includes keeping the bloody Leylandii if you are Jimmy Page and your RAF Bomber Command war hero neighbour asks you to cut the trees down because they are blocking the light (important news clipping found in Number 10 file to Blair, 1999)
Last week I visited La Bouffia Bonneval, the cave in La Chapelle-aux-Saints where the first (nearly) complete Neanderthal skeleton was found in 1908, carefully buried …
“knew his anions” was right there seriously, though, as a historian of science and government, I’m looking forward to 2046 to find out from public records whether having (another) scientist as science minister made a difference
Roger Highfield@rogerhighfield.bsky.social · 2w agoSad news ... it was so nice to have a science minister who knew his onions
I don’t mind who wins this, but I would like to see what Spain can actually do if they fall behind
A wander through Broxbourne woods, from Wormley Wood to Hoddesdon Park Wood, hoping for a Purple Emperor. All very dry. Here’s Great Willowherb, Fleabane (with a solitary bee visitor) and one desiccated Broad-leaved Helleborine. The weather has clearly been good for germinating oaks #wildflowerhour
In East London, tagging gangs are organised around allegiances to academic publication repositories. Know your turf
My first encounter with Round-headed rampion (Phyteuma obiculare) on Castle Hill, county flower of Sussex #wildflowerhour
Universities as ‘one of the few sectors that combines local economies and global influence’ is pithy and right It’s also why Burnham and the Manchester model is just a glimmer of a hope that central government might at last pay attention and intervene to help HE to help everyone But…
Mark Doidge@markdoidge.bsky.social · last mo.When Nottingham, Exeter, and Glasgow are making cuts, the entire sector is dying. Well done to successive governments for killing one of the few sectors that combines local economies and global influence.
#reading Matthew Cobb, The Idea of the Brain John Crowley, Aegypt M John Harrison, Viriconium George Eliot, Middlemarch Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus John Heywood, In Search of Technological Excellence: Education and Engineering in Post-war Britain
In my department @stsucl.bsky.social our first year undergrads take a module called STS Perspectives on Big Problems. It’s in the first term so it’s the first course they do The problem is chosen each year, in consultation with students (so it reflects their concerns), keeping it fresh 1/3
My cunning plan was to spend the day in the National Archives, with its formidable AC, I mean primary sources. But the Overground is running a reduced service because of heat. Trains were already rammed, standing room only. Decided my basement work office is the least worst option
Family trip to Shoreham-by-Sea in June meant I could search for the famous rarities in time for #wildflowerhour First, up: Starry Clover (Trifolium stellatum). This took some finding amongst the large patches of Rough Clover. Nearly gave up. But found it! You can see how it got its name
There’s a spectacular thunderstorm across northern France and Belgium right now…
100 years ago this month, the extraordinary ‘Electrical Age for Women’ magazine was launched by the UK’s Electrical Association for Women. Here is a co-authored blogpost about it (see link below for a new analytical tool to help navigate the millions of words) ietarchivesblog.org/2026/06/08/l...
Looking back: the 1926 launch of The Electrical Age for Women
By Daniel Belteki, Graeme Gooday and Anne Locker Introduction What was so special about June 1926? It wasn’t just that Britain was emerging from the extraordinary near paralysis of a General Strike…
ietarchivesblog.org
Spent the day at Northfields Allotments, oldest in London (1832), for a botany field meeting. The allotment holders keep the objects they dig out of the ground. Quiz: from what year was the Golden Wonder new baked bean flavour crisp packet? (Clue on packet, answer in alt text)
We’re hiring! We are recruiting for a Lecturer in Philosophy of Science to join our Department from September 2026. For more info and to apply, please visit: bit.ly/3Q7do8w Closing date 21-Jun-2026. #WeAreSTS #Science #Philosophyofscience
Off to the cinema, so here’s a slightly early, not the most charismatic, tiny, flower for #wildflowerhour: Narrow-leaved Bittercress (Cardamine impatiens), our target species for Saturday’s BSBI/LNHS field meeting to Fryent Country Park in Barnet
