Comments by "Derek Mills" (@derekmills1080) on "Britain was the World's Powerhouse u0026 Most Modern Nation. What Went Wrong? Prof. Jeremy Black" video.

  1. History is my main passion (I’m a retired physicist) and I pursued a research degree some 30 years ago. I have several volumes of Jeremy Black’s on my shelves. He has had a prodigious output of books, many related to the 18th century (his ‘George III: America’s Last King; 2008; throws new light on our pre and post Revolutionary relationship with America). As one may deduce from the discussion with Peter, Jeremy Black’s knowledge is also prodigious and I look at my studies as a mere speck of sand in comparison. His general view, mostly, about the need to modify the teaching of history in schools cannot be argued against. I must confess that during my time at Public School, I chose the ‘science option’ towards ‘O’ levels (many, many years ago) finding, in particular, the full details of names and events related to the French Revolution tooth-achingly boring. It was only years later that I met my old history master and his total despair at my childhood attempts to acquire some historical knowledge, changed to joy at my (unexpected) pursuit of history; we became good friends. Here I am waffling away; Jeremy Black referred to the ‘ignorance’ of history by many, it really depresses me at times. My home town of Bolton became one of the biggest cotton manufacturing towns in the world (don’t believe me, look up ‘Swan Lane Mill’ on Google, a listed structure, that in is heyday was the biggest spinning mill in the world), with every kind of associated manufacture and engineering of all kinds. Hick Hargreaves Engineers (of Bolton) were friendly with and joined forces with Sebastian Ziani de Ferranti to construct the world’s first ‘modern’ style of power station at Deptford.* Bolton’s massive industrialisation carried through after the war into my childhood and now there’s nothing much left. How utterly depressing that children now know NOTHING WHATSOEVER about our past and are being taught by (in my humble opinion) ‘history teachers’ who know NOTHING WHATSOEVER either. * A part of the structure of this revolutionary style of power station - ac production, step up transformers, high voltage transmission, step down transformers to consumers, etc. - is outside the Science and Industry Museum in Manchester, although I seem to recollect that the attached plaque is incorrect. 👍🇬🇧👍🇮🇱👍🇬🇧👍🇮🇱👍🇬🇧👍
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