It has been said that young amateur scientists typically fall into one of four categories: those trying to make explosives, those with an interest in electronics, astronomers and those that like to take dead animals apart. I didn’t fit the classification so well, I had an active interest in all of those things. It was …
Author Archives: dtl
Wantz – again
Some further digging in the archives today has revealed some confusion as to the source of the Wantz Stream. One news paper clipping from 1951 gives the source as “just south of Hainault” later stating “Six hundred years ago it was called the Wythendenbroke. Later it was known as Wisdom River.” The book, The Dagenham …
A hobby under threat?
It seems that one of the big stories doing the rounds on the ‘blogs today is the dumbing down of childrens’ chemistry sets. When I was growing up as a kid, I remember begging for a chemistry set one Christmas, at the time the holy grail of chemistry sets was the Salters Science Chemistry Set …
The Eastbrook connection
As I mentioned in the last post, the Eastbrook family are belived to have taken their name from the East Brook (now Wantz stream). Digging in the archives at lunch tuned up a copy of the will of one Thomas Esbroke, head of the household, a farmer and churchwarden in Dagenham in the 1550s of …
The Wantz stream
To the East part of Dagenham is an area known as Eastbrook. The name coming from the Eastbrook family, who in turn probably took their name from the local stream, then called the east brook. The family were in Dagenham from the 1280s until the 17th century, however the name lives on. The stream on …