History Today

B.J. Haimes describes how a British airship, the R34, raised the possibility of transatlantic travel by dirigible.

D.L.B. Hartley describes the background to a postwar transatlantic aviation competition, famously won by Alcock and Brown’s Vickers Vimy aeroplane.

Owain Edwards profiles one of the most eminent Italian composers and performers.

Chinese Emperors banned the importation of opium, writes M. Foster Farley, but it was smuggled into the country by East Indian traders and led to the Opium War of 1840.

William Cobbett, English political reformer, was himself was largely self-educated. Molly Townsend describes how he regarded contemporary schooling as ‘a melancholy thing to behold’.

‘The Acts of the Apostles’ was written in the first century A. D. and describes a vital thirty years in the expansion of Christianity. J.K. Elliott studies its production and influence.

Stephen Clissold describes how many Christian prisoners in sixteenth and seventeenth century North Africa embraced the Islamic faith, willingly serving their new masters.

C. Northcote Parkinson describes the life and times of Jeffery Hudson of Oakham, Rutlandshire, a remarkable member of Charles I's court who nonetheless measured under three feet tall.

Elka Schrijver documents the productions and popularity of these 18th-century engravings and prints.