100 Years of Cox

Send us Fan Mail Peter Pan, or the boy who wouldn't grow up - a long running, immensely popular play by JM Barrie, was at The Duke of York's Theatre. Avice has been to see it, again, and loved it. It is January 1908 and Frances reads letters from Edmund, Avice, Enid, Bernard and Cuthbert. The discussion on nightshirts versus pyjamas continues; Edmund has a new job – curate in charge of S...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads from the Machell Cox Family Budget - a stream of letters collectively written by ten adult siblings from a middle class Edwardian family. They started writing in 1906 and continued, non-stop, for the rest of their lives. There are eighty years worth of letters, safely preserved in the Bodleian Library in Oxford, which is where Frances discovered them. The letters wer...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads from the Machell Cox Family Budget - a stream of letters collectively written by ten adult siblings from a middle class Edwardian family. The siblings started writing to each other in 1906 and continued, non-stop, for the rest of their lives. There are eighty years worth of letters, safely preserved in the Bodleian Library in Oxford, which is where Frances discovered...

Send us Fan Mail Today Frances reads from the 1907 Christmas Budget - a special edition, written by the seven "home siblings" (Enid, Edmund, Arthur, Bernard, Cuthbert, Avice & Vera), along with contributions from their parents (Rev Dr John Charles Cox and Mrs Marian Cox.)  The poems, limericks and stories in the Christmas Budget were all written by the Machell Cox family. The Budget...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads letters from  Bernard, Cuthbert, Arthur and Vera from December 1907. Bernard writes in his letter: “ The great question of nightshirt versus pyjamas, which is now nightly before me.” Bernard also writes about Rev Dr Cox shouting at carol singers and chasing them out of the garden. Really. A Church of England vicar who detested carol singers. Cuthbert has had 17 teeth...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads letters from Edmund, Avice and Enid, written in November 1907.  The siblings are planning a special Christmas edition of the Budget, and are all busy writing items for it, including limericks, which were wildly popular in the early 1900s .  Edmund has a headache, and his letter is late, again. Although he has made a better effort this time. Well done Edmund. Send you...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads Neville's second letter, from October 1907, describing his travels through Switzerland, as well as Lake Como, Milan, Venice, Rome, Naples and Pompeii in Italy.  It rains all the time, some towns are decidedly smelly and Neville tells us about his train journeys and how much his hotels cost. Neville went on two Thomas Cook tours, in Venice and Pompeii, giving a f...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads Neville's long letter, written in October 1907, as Neville (sibling No.4) went travelling through Europe, after farewelling his family at Longton Avenue in Sydenham. He travels through Belgium, Germany, Switzerland and Italy on his way to Naples, where he boards his ship to travel back to Africa. Neville wrote this letter on Wednesday 23rd October 1907, from the...

Send us Fan Mail It is October 1907 - Frances reads letters from Bernard, Cuthbert, Arthur and Vera. Avice has joined a mixed hockey team, "and one man said DAMN , just like that ". Avice is shocked that a man would use such words with a lady present. Goldbeater's skin was the peculiar fabric used to construct airships - Bernard describes an airship landing at Crystal Palace in Sout...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads four Budget letters from September 1907 - news from Vera, Edmund, Avice and Enid. Vera is at home with the parents at St Alban's, 13 Longton Avenue, Sydenham in South London,  Edmund is back in his parish in Clay Cross in Derbyshire;  Avice is still working as Arthur’s housekeeper at Garfield House School in Devonport, Plymouth and has been drawing illustrations...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads extracts from Budget letters from 1907-1910, where the siblings describe their many bicycling expeditions. The siblings discuss the 1907 Bicycling Tour and their favourite bits; Edmund is sorry that he didn't snapshot a spill;  Vera and Bernard shock people by cycling on a Sunday;  Cuthbert punctures, a lot, in Branscombe, Devon;  Enid and Cyril cycle to Enville...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads Neville's letter, written for the Machell Cox family Budget; a second instalment, continuing the description of the Bicycling Tour of 1907. Edmund, Neville, Bernard, Cuthbert, Avice and Vera are cycling 186 miles/300km around  England and Neville's letter includes a variety of rich detail.  They have leather Gladstone bags, which travelled by train in the G...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads Neville's letter, all about bicycles, describing a family bicycling tour in 1907. Four brothers and two sisters set off from Studland for an 8 day cycling tour.  Edmund, Neville, Bernard, Cuthbert, Avice and Vera.  They cycle 186 miles (300km) around England, visiting Stonehenge, castles and churches.  If you are interested in following Arthur’s lead, you may li...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads 7 letters from the Machell Cox family Budget, from August 1907. " Dear Budgeteers " was the title Aldwyn used for his letters to his siblings.  Cuthbert describes a four day march from Berkhamsted to Aldershot with the schoolboys from the Officer Training Corps, including fascinating details about camp activities. Arthur describes the month-long extended fa...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads 4 letters from the Machell Cox family Budget, from July 1907.  Everyone is pleased that Neville is home on leave, and there are many descriptions of what they all did.   Avice draws several pen and ink sketches to illustrate her letter;  Mother and Neville spend 9 days in Liverpool with Enid's family, including plenty of cycling and bridge;   Bernard describes a...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads 6 letters from the Machell Cox family Budget, starting in June 1907.  "Vacabed" is the affectionate name Edmund uses when writing to his family - he is writing to Vera, Arthur, Cuthbert, Avice, Bernard, Enid and Dorothy (he doesn't include the foreign brothers). Bernard is proposing a fictional pageant;  Cuthbert finishes his account of his walking hol...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads a letter written by Revd. Edmund Machell Cox, (sibling No.2),  written in 1916. Edmund’s church, in Hallam Fields in Derbyshire, was next to the Stanton Ironworks, which was a target for WW1 German bombs. His letter is a detailed account of the night when a Zeppelin dropped 23 bombs on their little community. One of the bombs landed on St Bartholomew’s Church, where...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads a letter by Rev. Dr Cox, written in 1907. He dictated it to his son Bernard, who scribbled it all down, declaring himself to be exhausted once he had finished.  Dr Cox wrote an account: " .... of the various places that I frequent for the purpose of satisfying an innocent appetite". What delightful language our ancestors used. 'London Lunches and Town...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads two letters, written by Minnie and her daughter Vera. Minnie Cox, mother of the ten siblings, is now 67 years old; the year is 1907.  She writes a letter to her ten children called - The lost art of letter-writing – encouraging them to continue writing letters to each other.  And a letter by Vera, the youngest of the ten siblings. She and Bernard have been to the Sta...

Send us Fan Mail Frances reads two letters from the 1800s, written by women from the Machell Cox family. London in 1827 – by Matilda Machell; she was the grandmother of the ten siblings who wrote the Budget; Matilda was from a wealthy old family - the Machells of Crackenthorpe, in Cumbria - she was in London for the season, with her chaperone and her letter describes life in London and the people...

Send us Fan Mail Frances Thompson reads 9 letters, written from March to May in 1907. 9 letters from 9 siblings. Bernard is in Sydenham;  Cuthbert is on holiday in the Lake District;  Arthur is on holiday at Terrington, near York;  Neville is in South Africa;  Vera and Avice are both in Plymouth;  Edmund is in Derbyshire;  Enid is on holiday in France;  Aldwyn is in Malawi.  Wilfred (who is in Can...

Send us Fan Mail Frances Thompson reads 8 letters, starting in January 1907.  Cuthbert has been enjoying the theatre in London, watching Gilbert and Sullivan at the Savoy. Vera starts work as a temporary housekeeper at Garfield House, Arthur’s prep school in Plymouth (before Avice arrives to take up the post). Edmund has ordered a brand new bicycle with 3 gears, wow;  and he is playing a lot of Wh...

Send us Fan Mail Frances Thompson reads 7 letters, starting in November 1906.  Berkhamsted School has chickenpox, influenza and whooping cough, and Garfield House School closes early for Christmas, due to an outbreak of measles. We get hockey news from Vera, and the siblings discuss the correct literary use of the exclamation mark.  We also hear how The Reverend Dr Cox detests carol singers and de...

Send us Fan Mail Frances Thompson reads 8 letters, starting in October 1906. The siblings begin discussing the Times Book War, which was a heated discussion about the price of books between the Times newspaper, the publishers and the authors.  Arthur is having a bath installed at Garfield House School – a real bath with plumbing.  Vera is playing hockey for Kent (and it won’t be long before she ge...

Send us Fan Mail Frances Thompson tells the story of ten siblings from the Machell Cox family, through the letters they wrote to each other. This is the first episode which sets out the background of the story which Frances tells through the podcast. This is not fiction, but real life social history. The siblings were born in England between 1868 and 1884; seven of them lived in England and three...