Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
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infrastructuregeek.bsky.social
Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
@infrastructuregeek.bsky.social
2.9K followers 5.6K following 13 posts
Associate Prof in Environmental History, Northumbria Uni. Co-editor, Environment and History. The environmental, social and cultural impact of British water and transport infrastructure, 1500-2000. Author of Tyne after Tyne and Sanitation in Urban Britain.
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Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
pszaboenviro.bsky.social
Where did ordinary building timber come from before 🚂 made transport cheap? In our new paper, we analyzed 1231 dendrodated constructions and coeval archival data to show that timber was most probably sourced locally. (But watch out for 🌲🌳 floating!) #envhist
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Local timber dominated pre-industrial construction: Insights from archival and dendrochronological data
In pre-modern Europe, timber was notoriously difficult and costly to transport on land, therefore it is usually assumed that ordinary buildings – exce…
www.sciencedirect.com
April 14, 2025 at 6:40 AM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
cduigan.bsky.social
The winding River #Wensum from Bishop Bridge #Norwich - "with an antique bridge communicating with a long and narrow suburb, flanked on either side by rich meadows of the brightest green..."
George Borrow, Lavengro (1851); author of Wild #Wales (1862).
#envhist #literature #England
View from bridge if River Wensum; blue sky reflected in water. Right bank with woody vegetation; left bank with grass and trees.
April 14, 2025 at 8:19 AM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
nichecanada.bsky.social
History of The Spiral Tunnels

"In this episode we explore the history of the Canadian Pacific Railways construction through the Kicking Horse Pass in the Rocky Mountains."

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wci2...

#cdnhist #bchist #envhist #envirotech
History of The Spiral Tunnels
YouTube video by History of British Columbia
www.youtube.com
April 14, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
whitehorsepress.bsky.social
We’ve added a blog post, being a recent ‘Snapshot’ from ‘Environment and History’; Dimitrios Bormpoudakis on ‘“The Light of Day Was Our Comrade”: Ecologies of Forced Displacement and the Challenge of Unfamiliar Environments’. whitehorsepress.blog/2025/04/02/t... @eandhwhp.bsky.social #envhist
‘THE LIGHT OF DAY WAS OUR COMRADE’: ECOLOGIES OF FORCED DISPLACEMENT AND THE CHALLENGE OF UNFAMILIAR ENVIRONMENTS
In this blog, originally published as an Environment and History ‘Snapshot’ in August 2024, Dimitrios Bormpoudakis uses the case of forced exile in Greek islands to illustrate how ecolo…
whitehorsepress.blog
April 2, 2025 at 10:28 AM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
eandhwhp.bsky.social
Environment and History 31.2 is available online now! This is a special issue entitled 'Sensing the World: Exploring Sensory Histories of the Environment,' edited by @gpetrick.bsky.social & @gfitz.bsky.social liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/toc/whpeh/31/2 #envhist @eseh.bsky.social
April 3, 2025 at 1:51 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
rwldproject.bsky.social
Currently taking a roundabout route home, involving passing through Havant.

Also reading some of the Portsmouth Area Railway Pasts project preliminary research - about #Havant railway staff, from members of the Havant Local History Group!

www.railwayaccidents.port.ac.uk/introducing-...
Introducing Portsmouth Area Railway Pasts - Railway Work, Life & Death
Introduction to a new piece of work, looking at historical railway staff accidents in the Portsmouth and Havant area.
www.railwayaccidents.port.ac.uk
November 27, 2024 at 1:40 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
hibbertsalex.bsky.social
If you're interested in early modern meteorology, barometers, naval battles or fish, then come along to my hybrid lecture (link in comments) @unibern.bsky.social !

📆 25/03 🕐 18:15 CET

@northernenvhistory.bsky.social @ihr.bsky.social @whitehorsepress.bsky.social @eseh.bsky.social
March 10, 2025 at 1:02 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
eandhwhp.bsky.social
We are still accepting submissions for Snapshots! Reach out to deputy editor Tyson Luneau (@tluneau.bsky.social / tyson.luneau@cortland.edu) with any questions or proposals!
eandhwhp.bsky.social Environment and History, White Horse Press @eandhwhp.bsky.social · Feb 11
Call for submissions!

Snapshots are short essays which focus on environmental challenges of the 21st century, looking to historical perspectives to inform a more sustainable world.

See the attached call & send a pitch to @tluneau.bsky.social, deputy editor (tyson.luneau@cortland.edu) #envhist
March 10, 2025 at 1:44 PM
infrastructuregeek.bsky.social
theconversation.com/x-has-been-u...
X has been used to represent love and kisses for centuries. But how did it start?
While the origins of the cross as a kiss are still debated, the answer likely lies in the letters of working-class lovers like these.
theconversation.com
February 13, 2025 at 9:54 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
eandhwhp.bsky.social
Call for submissions!

Snapshots are short essays which focus on environmental challenges of the 21st century, looking to historical perspectives to inform a more sustainable world.

See the attached call & send a pitch to @tluneau.bsky.social, deputy editor (tyson.luneau@cortland.edu) #envhist
February 11, 2025 at 5:43 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
whitehorsepress.bsky.social
Tyson's first activity will be to devise a new call for the journal's popular editor-reviewed short 'Snapshots' section – so please feel free to start hitting him with your ideas! Contact info here: www.whpress.co.uk/EH.html
February 4, 2025 at 6:19 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
whitehorsepress.bsky.social
A warm welcome to 'Environment & History's new Outreach Editor, Alex A. Hibberts. Alex (Uni. of London) is an environmental historian of the cultural history of environmental change, among other areas; and a great new addition to the team!
@eandhwhp.bsky.social @hibbertsalex.bsky.social #envhist
February 5, 2025 at 2:29 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
tluneau.bsky.social
I'm looking for scholarship on place-based methodology & the value of visiting and experiencing spaces/environments we write about. Any recommendations? Some of this is for a grant proposal but it's also a pedagogical idea I've been interested in recently 📗 #envhist #history #envhum
February 6, 2025 at 8:25 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
On this day, 10 Jan 1949, Manchester finally managed to abandon its first generation electric tramways - a process started over a decade earlier but delayed by war. The brochure commemorating the event. @showmeasign.online #transport #manchester

↘️ flic.kr/p/absDCF
Manchester was one of the first British cities to repudiate the first generation of tramways - the electrified system opened in 1901 (under municipal control) having started life as horse drawn tramways in 1877. By the late 1920s the city decided to replace the tram system with buses - and, although the Department felt put upon, trolleybuses. The trams would most likely have gone c1941/2 but for the outbreak of war - it took another decade to finally scrap the system. Now, of course, Manchester is in the vanguard of re-introducing electric traction to the UK in the form of Metrolink. The cover commemorating the end of the system on 10 January 1949 shows the whole gamut of varying forms of transportation that formed part of the history of the tram (including horse drawn ones) - the last illustration is of the last type of cars built for the city, known as Pilcher cars, many of which saw secondhand service in other towns after Manchester scrapped them. All text and illustrations are in white on a blue background and the city's coat of arms is also shown
January 10, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
handhyorkshire.bsky.social
Enlarge this image to really appreciate York's transport past. The city's railway station history started with a makeshift wooden station. The first permanent one, designed by George Townsend Andrews, opened in 1841 inside the City Walls on Toft Green. There area locomotives all over if you
York in 1858
January 15, 2025 at 5:53 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
slowberlin.bsky.social
One for the design nerds: John K Peck traces the history of Berlin's public transport map designs…

www.slowtravelberlin.com/mapping-berl...
January 15, 2025 at 6:54 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
rwldproject.bsky.social
COMING SOON!

The next @ihr.bsky.social Transport & Mobility History seminar:

Building a British Rail in Britain: Advocating For a Nationalised Industry 1960-90
Lewis Smith, Brunel University

13 Feb 2025, 17.30 UK, online

#Railway200

Booking free - all welcome:
https://buff.ly/4gT5fwT
Colour photograph of British Rail era electric slam door multiple unit stock in sidings in an urban environment, under a blue cloudy sky.
January 17, 2025 at 8:30 AM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
joebrownlondon.bsky.social
#OnThisDay 93 years ago, the first of Harry Beck's revolutionary and iconic pocket Tube diagrams were handed out at Baker Street. Rejected at first, a limited trial run of 500 were distributed in 1932 before full adoption in 1933. @ltmuseum collection https://buff.ly/3Pygr64
This is the first pocket edition of the diagrammatic style of Underground map designed by H C Beck. The main features of this diagram are the use of 45 degree angles and diamonds to illustrate interchange stations. All the lines are shown in their entirety except the District line which is only shown as far as Mile End, the rest of the stations eastbound are listed to Southend. The Piccadilly line extension from Enfield West to Cockfosters is shown as opening Midsummer 1933. The logo on this map is a red and black roundel with UndergrounD printed on the bar. The reverse of the map lists places of interest and theatres, with their closest Stations. Printed on paper.
January 20, 2025 at 5:00 AM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
wenyihuangtw.bsky.social
New book: Ranjan Chakrabarti 's Climate, Calamity and the Wild: An Environmental History of the Bengal Delta, C.1737-1947

reurl.cc/RLoNRg
#envhist
#climate
#disaster
February 5, 2025 at 3:02 AM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
nphellstrom.bsky.social
Come join the 2025 ESEH Summer School in Environmental History, to be held in and around Stockholm on the topic of Anthropocene Histories!

#sts #eseh #kth #anthropocene
ESEH Summer School - ESEH CONFERENCE 2025
ESEH Summer School 2025 - applications now open for the ESEH summer school at KTH Stockholm coinciding with the Climate Histories conference.
eseh2025.com
January 28, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
whitehorsepress.bsky.social
'Environment & History' has a new Deputy Editor (with Leona Watson now co-editing alongside David Moon). Tyson Luneau (SUNY Cortland) is an environmental historian of colonial North Africa, among other areas; a fantastic addition to the team! @eandhwhp.bsky.social @tluneau.bsky.social #envhist
February 4, 2025 at 6:19 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
moneschleper.bsky.social
Very happy to see this #specialissue on #oilhist and #envhist out in the world: stm.cairn.info/journal-of-e....
With great articles by @renaudbecot.bsky.social, Reynaldo de los Reyes Patiño, @mattinbiglari.bsky.social, Randal L. Hall, Jelena Stanković, @michielbron.bsky.social, and Robert Lifset.
Journal of Energy History 2024/1 (No 12)
Black and Green? Environmental Histories of the Oil Industry
stm.cairn.info
February 3, 2025 at 2:34 PM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
downham.bsky.social
#Sedburgh (Cumbria) means ‘flat hill’ in Old Norse. This 9th/10th century finger ring was found by a farmer digging a drainage ditch. It is a beautiful rare type made from gold hoops incised with grooves, triangles and lozenge shapes. #dales countryside #museum #medievalsky #cumbria #vikingsky
January 31, 2025 at 9:21 AM
Reposted by Dr Leona Watson (formerly Skelton)
richardiiisocca.bsky.social
The February Labour of the month in MSL/1910/2385; NAL:f2r (© Victoria and Albert Museum, London), a woman dries off a man sitting by the fire. She appears to have snow on her boots as well.
Painting in a medieval manuscript. A man sits on a stool with his hands raised towards a small fire in the fireplace. His boots are off and one foot also raised towards the fire. He is looking back as a woman places a towel on his back. There are bits of snow on the floor in front of him and behind her.
February 1, 2025 at 3:40 PM