Once Upon a Street E-Book

Isabelle King

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Seitenzahl: 133

Beschreibung

On every street there is a story. Roll up, roll up for a circus adventure in Edwardian Yarmouth, merry-go-race through King's Lynn history with fabulous fairground animals, get swept back in time with the marvellous mice of Wymondham, meet the magical medieval dragon of Norwich and the musical Owl of Holt, discover the magnificent street procession of a Tudor Queen and get ready to be bedazzled by the delightful dancer of a Georgian theatre. Inspired by collections at Norfolk Heritage Centre and the history of Norfolk streets, this book consists of imaginative short stories where love and friendship take centre stage.

Leseprobe

First published 2019

The History Press

The Mill, Brimscombe Port

Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 2QG

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

© Isabelle King, 2019

The right of Isabelle King to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the Publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 0 7509 9168 1

Typesetting and origination by The History Press

Printed in Great Britain

eBook converted by Geethik Technologies

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION AND THANK YOUS

1 TA-DA! THE DAZZLING DANCER OF THEATRE ROYAL

2 A BRUSH WITH SHOWBIZ FOR WILLAMINA WHISKERS OF WYMONDHAM

3 THE INGENIOUS INVENTOR OF DRAGON HALL

4 SNUFFY AND THE STOLEN CUP OF QUEEN ELIZABETH I

5 GALLOPERS GO! THE MERRY-GO-RACE OF KING’S LYNN

6 THE AMAZING IMAGINARY ALPHABET CIRCUS OF GREAT YARMOUTH

7 THE SPECTACULAR STAR OF NORWICH MARKET

8 OSCAR OWL’S SONG OF HOLT

9 THE RAZZLE-DAZZLE RAINBOW STORY DRESS

Isabelle King(Wolf Marloh Photography)

INTRODUCTIONAND THANK YOUS

Every street has a story. To discover that story, all you have to do is step back in time; just imagine, you pop to the shop or the park and on your way along the high street, everything changes. The shops and supermarkets vanish and in their place are market stalls and street vendors. There are no cars or buses; all around you people walk or ride horses, and you are swept up in the lively hustle and bustle of this busy day. As for that roundabout, it disappears and in its place stands an enormous stone arch decorated with Tudor roses. Through the arch, riding a horse, comes a queen wearing a magnificent dress with swirly gold patterns. You have travelled back to the time of Elizabethan history where a great royal procession happened on this street, the very same street where you go shopping! The street where you go for walks by the river was once a medieval port where you can see the boats whipping over the waves and smell the sea salt on the air, bitter as the stormy wind. The street you walk along to get to the theatre was once filled with the dainty footsteps of the elegant Georgian gentry, off to one of their dazzling parties: see that Georgian lady with her fancy dress and enormous wig, swirling up and up like a big whirl of ice cream. In Norfolk, the streets are rich with such stories; delve into the region’s history and you will be sure to discover something wondrous – a magical marketplace, a factory for fairground animals, a spectacular circus or a marvellous home for a mighty dragon.

Streets, much like stories, bring people together. Look at a map and the ways the streets connect communities; well, stories do that too. Much like a storyline, the roads of a street may weave and wind in different directions but they still connect people with each other. Now, there’s lots to learn when you step back in time – so many things are different – the places, the buildings, the people, their way of life … yikes, that’s rather a lot of information to take on board! If only there were some special place where historical information was collected together in a fun and interesting way. Ah yes, enter museums, heritage centres and libraries! Norfolk Heritage Centre, for example, was my main source of information for this book. Norfolk Heritage Centre is on the second floor of Norfolk and Norwich Millennium Library, and it houses many fascinating archives of books, maps and items relating to Norfolk history. It was very exciting to discover how much of that history is linked with the arts and popular entertainment, and so this book has a theatrical theme.

As people are at the heart of these stories, love and friendship take centre stage.

This is the third book I’ve written inspired by Norfolk history and it’s been the most incredible adventure. The Norfolk Story Book is inspired by objects at Norfolk Collections Centre, a museum on site at Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse – the book saw me researching mammoths, mustard, snapdragons, toffee and Christmas crackers!

Once Upon A Time in Norfolk is inspired by museums throughout Norfolk Museums Service, which saw me researching the Norman knights of Norwich Castle, the enchanting weavers of Strangers’ Hall, the adventurous Iceni of Roman Britain and many more. What really draws me to the history is the thought not just of the place but also of the people who lived there, not just the object but the person who used it. Sometimes, not much is known about the people. That’s where writers come in and we make up stories about what might have happened. With that in mind, it’s important to note that some things in this book are based on historical truth and some things are made up.

There are three parts to making this historical story. Part one, I decide what I’m going to write about. This involves looking through the archives at Norfolk Heritage Centre and choosing items, for example circus posters from the Victorian era, a map of Norwich from Elizabethan times and an article from a newspaper of the Georgian era. Part two, I root the story in history by doing research. Research is fantastically interesting and mainly involves asking questions to the helpful staff at Norfolk Heritage Centre and sticking my nose in history books for days on end. Part three, I make up the story! This involves imagining the characters and situations to make the story magical and exciting. It’s rather like putting the final layer on a cake – this is the fun, playful layer with all the fancy icing and sprinkles. Speaking of cakes, I particularly enjoyed researching the delicious treats of the Georgian era, plenty of cakes were sampled for serious research purposes. As the Georgians loved their fashion, I thought it would be a good idea to include fabulous footnotes with fabulous shoes. The fabulous footnotes accompany each story to highlight the historical places and objects that inspired me to write. And of course, it doesn’t have to end there for you; if you enjoy learning about local history and love to get creative, why not make up your own story about a street?

I believe we are all storytellers and there are many ways that you might like to tell your story: writing, drawing pictures, playing music, performing, acting, singing, dancing, designing costumes, the list could go on and on; different types of art and creativity are different types of storytelling. That’s why reading is so brilliant because it opens up whole worlds of imagination and, in turn, helps us to get ideas for all the fantastic things we are going to do in the future.

I would like to give special thanks to the wonderful staff at Norfolk Heritage Centre, and in particular a huge thank you to Chris Tracy and Rachel Ridealgh for being so kind, helpful and full of knowledge.

Many thanks to the amazing staff at Norfolk Museums Service for all your support. Abundant thanks to Dr John Davies for your support and infinite knowledge.

I would also like to thank the lovely staff at Norfolk and Norwich Millennium Library where I had the pleasure of being Writer in Residence for the duration of their British Library exhibition, ‘Quentin Blake: The Roald Dahl Centenary Portraits’. Thank you to The British Library for your support and kindness. Thank you to The Prince’s Trust for being amazing and believing in me. It’s been an honour to be a Young Ambassador for The Prince’s Trust.

Thank you to my wonderful publisher The History Press, it’s a real pleasure to write these books. Take a bow, illustrator John McKeever, I couldn’t be more delighted with seeing the characters come to life with such vibrant illustrations – you big legend.

Thank you lovely family, love you Mum and Dad. We’ve had some lovely days out seeing some of the sites in this book!

Finally, reader, I would like to thank you for reading this book. I hope you enjoy reading it – I wrote it for you! Now, the characters are waiting in the wings to perform for you. It’s time to raise the curtain. The stage is set: let’s get lost in some Norfolk magic.

1

TA-DA! THE DAZZLING DANCER OF THEATRE ROYAL

Excited audience, take to your seats

Tonight you are in for wonderful treats

Everyone claps as the curtain rises,

A spectacular show of wondrous surprises.

It’s him! Here he is with a rat-a-tat-ta-da!

The dazzling dancer of Theatre Royal – horah!

You’ll be happy you ventured to Theatre Street

to see this performer so quick on his feet

Soft as spun sugar, light as whipped cream

each twizzle, each twirl to behold is a dream

An elegant, exquisite, excellent prancer

Norwich’s very own mysterious masked dancer

Yes, he is disguised in theatrical mask

But who is he really? The audience ask

Who indeed? Let’s find out

because that’s what this story is all about

How a boy from nowhere became a star of the stage

Discover his journey with each turn of the page

The start of the tale is the end of this rhyme

And so it begins with once upon a time …

Once upon a time there lived a boy called Fred. Just Fred, nothing else. Just Fred nothing else lived in a time called the Georgian era when King George sat on the throne. There were four King Georges and Fred lived in the time of George III. Step back into this time and you would be sure to notice how fancy it was. The Georgians wore very fine and beautiful clothes, dresses of splendid silk and luxurious lace. Their heads were decorated with great big wigs which swirled up and up like enormous whirls of cream and as for their feet, fabulous shoes!

The Georgians loved a good party and really knew how to put on a feast with delicious teas, fruits, pastries, custards and cakes. These were not the sort of cakes you would just guzzle and chomp down in one go; oh no, these cakes were works of art to be admired, with neat layers of soft sponge and delicate drizzles of sugars and cherries, often called dainties and fancies – to be scoffed in a dainty, fancy way, if you please. Magnificent balls were all the fashion, a chance to dress up, eat, drink and dance to the pleasant sounds of harmonious harps, tooting flutes, flitting lutes and pretty pianos. Fine music, big wigs, marzipan and jelly galore, you could have all this and more, right outside your door, provided, that is, on one vital score, the good luck of which you had been born extremely … rich!

Being rich meant you were a member of the gentlefolk, or ‘gentry’, in the finest clothes you ever saw. And guess what? Fred was not. Rags and tatters, that’s what Fred wore. Now there are three things you need to know about Fred. The first, as we have discovered, is that he didn’t have much to call his own. Fred lived on the streets of Norwich with no home, no family and no one but himself to rely on. He had a handful of pennies to his name; one of the pennies had holes in it and might have been an old button for all Fred knew.

The second thing you need to know is that while Fred didn’t have a person to rely on he did have a pet, a tiny puppy called Pebbles. Pebbles was a mischievous little scrap of a scamp with a keen nose, alert eyes and a teeny, twitching tail. Fred had named him Pebbles because the way he constantly skipped up and down, ever so lightly, reminded him of pebbles as they skimmed across the water. Fred had found Pebbles on an evening swagger down by the River Wensum. Some old wooden boxes were piled up against a wall and one of them was rattling about. No sooner had Fred opened the box than out rolled a stray puppy, straight into his arms as though it had always belonged there. Considerate and sensitive of nature, Fred decided to take care of this tiny scruff of fluff. Besides, that pup had the sort of look that said if he didn’t cause trouble he would tumble into it one way or another and so, thought Fred, someone’s got to keep an eye on the little rascal.

The third thing you need to know about Fred is that he was a fantastic dancer. Delicate as sunlight filters through the trees, nimble as a robin goes bobbin’ on the breeze, Fred could dance you into a daydream. You see, Fred desperately needed a way to earn money and since he had rather a natural flair for being quick on his feet, he had decided he would do this by dancing. The idea was to impress passers-by with his dancing skills and hopefully they would throw a few coins his way. Now, to get people’s attention, he couldn’t just be good, he had to be amazing. And so Fred practised and practised and practised to the point that it would indeed, appear to a passer-by that the boy was so talented it couldn’t be natural and must be magic. Fred, however, would soon correct them. ‘Everyone has a gift, something special and unique about them, but a gift doesn’t just become the best it could be without any work. The secret to my skills isn’t magic. It’s practice!’ Fred would happily tell this to anyone who cared to watch.

The problem was that no one did care to watch. ‘Get out of the way, street boy!’ people yelled at him. ‘Move over, street boy, out of my way!’

‘No time for you, street boy, stop prancing about!’

It seemed to Fred that no matter how delightful his dancing, he could never get the audience he deserved. Until one morning, warm and sunny, Fred woke up with a funny feeling in his tummy: it felt like butterflies fluttering about as though something different that day would surely come about.

Pebbles bounded up to Fred with something in his mouth, which he presented at his feet with pride as though it were a trophy. It was a crumpled copy of The Norfolk Chronicle. Fred had been taught slowly how to read by a kind schoolmistress who helped street children. They had read little bits of The Norfolk Chronicle together every day and, much like his dancing, Fred found that the more he practised, the better he got. Not only that but he had got to know The Norfolk Chronicle very well, a useful paper which let you know about important things happening in the area. Pebbles always went to see if there was a spare copy he could pick up in the morning. The little pup placed his paw on an article and barked and wagged his tail until Fred looked at it. As Pebbles lifted his paw, Fred read words that sent tingles of excitement down his spine:

AT THE THEATRE-ROYAL

By His MAJESTY’S Servants

THIS prefent Evening, July 22, will

be presented a comedy, call’d

The BEGGAR’S OPERA

To which will be added,

WIT’S LAST STAKE

To begin at Half an Hour

after Six o’Clock.

Tickets to be had of Mr. Griffith,

at his Houfe opposite

St Stephen’s Church; of Mr Croufe,

and at Mr Sutton’s

Peruke-maker, in the Market-place;

and of Mr Smith

at his office at the Theatre.