These days, we associate autograph books with celebrities. But they originated in 16th-century Germany, where university students used to collect signatures from their classmates, and functioned as an

Dear Simon, I was particularly interested in Sylvia Lee’s item on Cope’s Pools in Yesterday Remembered (Pools Party, December). I worked at the company’s offices in Edmonton, north London in 1966-67.

Letter of the week Keeping mum I ...

Leigh Lawson has embraced acting and poetry with the same determination that sustained Marie Lloyd, the music-hall queen whose memorabilia he collects, as Carla Passino discovers

In June 1993, two new children’s books made an appearance in bookshops throughout the country. The cover of the first, Terrible Tudors, featured a cartoon by illustrator Martin Brown, of a 16th centur

The article on the battle against U-boats in the Second World War in the November issue omitted perhaps the most important episode. That was the part played by the late Joe Baker-Cresswell of Bamburgh