History is made every day, but interpretation can only come with distance. So today we present the raw stuff of History – some primary sources, free of the intermediary hand.  

This spring has been the most severe and most backward known for a number of years. No grass; cattle dying for want of fodder….”

“arrived the Usk steamer from Bristol, having on Board the three Chartists (Frost, Jones and Williams) who were condemned to death for high treason after the late riots at Newport,"

Royal Cornwall Gazette, 19 February 1814 reported that a meeting was held on Friday 11^th February to look into the formation of a geological society for Cornwall.

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the public were invited to help scrape and paint the undersides of three old luggers or to set up their easels on the Quay and paint....

“Arrived the Welsh fleet; some having been nearly twelve weeks on the voyage. Coals advanced 2s. Per way; price now 46s.”

Conflict between the 'tradition­alists' and the 'modernists' at the St Ives Society of Artists in 1948 led to the resignation of 24 modernists and the following year they formed the Penwith Society

History, it is said, repeats itself. Be that as it may, today's proceedings were somewhat reminiscent of occurrences in the “Hungry Forties,” when St Just miners marched to Penzance.

Villagers have read the reviews, and are hoping that Chang, the Chinese giant, will be there, and Captain Kidd. They want to hear the patter of Mr Lobb, the “capital” showman, as he introduces the Chamber of Horrors

On 5 February 1818, 79 years after William Borlase wrote to George Allanson bemoaning the lack of libraries and centres of learning in Cornwall, the Cornwall Literary and Philosophical Institution was founded in Truro.