Drinking in Victorian and Edwardian Britain: Beyond the Spectre of the Drunkard

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Reading List 1. Thora Hands (2018), Drinking in Victorian and Edwardian Britain: Beyond the Spectre of the Drunkard Jennifer is a PhD candidate at Glasgow Caledonian University. She began her PhD in October 2016 on a studentship project exploring mental health in twentieth century Scotland. Her research compares the experiences of soldiers and civilians co-residing in Scottish district asylums, 1914-1934. She previously completed an MSc in Historical Studies with an emphasis on health histories at the University of Strathclyde. The publicity stunt paved the way for the famous Tennent’s Lager Lovelies of the following decades, a trend which would likely not fly in today's world. Glossy images of various women adorned the sides of Tennent’s cans, which unsurprisingly turned out to bring incredible success at the time.

Supervisors: Dr Liam Bell (Creative Writing, University of Stirling), Dr Laura Kelly (History of Medicine, University of Strathclyde) Jennifer Farquharson One keen collector interviewed by the Sunday Mail newspaper even described this rare tinnie as the “Ming vase of Tennent’s Lager Lovelies”. Recommendations for dishes like 'Betty recommends goulash' and 'Cynthia recommends spaghetti casserole' were not uncommon.

Independently identify historical questions that are not adequately answered in the historiography; or that are still part of unresolved historiographical controversy; or have been left unanswered altogether up to this point. Berridge V. 2013. Demons: Our Changing Attitudes to Alcohol, Tobacco and Drugs. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

The first Tennent’s cans were of a wholesome design, depicting romantic Scottish landscapes and English landmarks to strengthen the brand’s homegrown image. Venetia Stevenson, whose death aged 84 was announced on Tuesday, was one of the first women to appear on a beer can. Nicholls J. 2011 . The Politics of Alcohol: A History of the Drink Question in England: Manchester: Manchester University Press. This part considers the use of alcohol by the medical profession. In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, doctors began to debate the efficacy of alcohol as a therapeutic drug and the moral implications of prescribing alcohol to patients. Alcohol was still used to treat a wide range of psychological and physiological illnesses but debates existed over the issue of therapeutic nihilism – whether alcohol did more harm than good and while some doctors held faith in its therapeutic qualities, others disagreed. The chapter draws upon an analysis of hospital records which show that alcohol use gradually declined in the period leading up to the First World War when the financial and moral cost of alcohol began to impact upon its popularity as a prescribed medicine. She said: “The campaign helped reinforce sexual objectification that proliferated at the time – Benny Hill, Miss World, naked women in media and advertising. Putting those images on cans contributed to everyday sexism in the 1970s and 1980s.The lager lovelies live on in Scottish cultural memory, invoking reactions that range from disbelief to outrage," she stated.

Dr Hands explained that the cans were not without controversy, as feminists accused the firm of promoting the exploitation and sexual objectification of women. Mary has been a University of Strathclyde student since 2014, completing a bachelor’s degree in history in 2018 and a MSc in health history in 2019. She has been granted a Wellcome Trust Doctoral Studentship to research her project: Animals and Allergy in Historical Perspective: Test Subjects, Pets and Patients, 1900 – Present. This research will explore the use of animals as test subjects for early allergy experiments, animals as a potent source of allergy and the growing incidence of atopic diseases in animals. This project employs published and oral history sources as well as archival research in Monaco’s Oceanographic Museum, the National Academy of Medicine in Paris and the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology in Wisconsin. Her thesis aims to inform ongoing research into the epidemiology of allergy, our current understanding of atopic conditions and our evolving relationship with companion animals. Rachel Meach The use of alcohol in treating fevers and other illnesses was reported in medical journals. Aside from the financial implications of alcohol use, some doctors believed that it only held therapeutic value in certain cases and in particular stages of illness and disease. In an article in the British Medical Journal in 1880, Dr H. McNaughton a physician in The Fever Hospital Cork, provided evidence to support his claim that alcohol should be prescribed carefully in fever cases. 32 He kept records of his patients from January 1873 to June 1879, a period in which he treated 889 fever cases mainly typhus, typhoid and simple fever. On average 30% of patients were treated with alcohol during this period. 33 Most fever cases were treated using brandy, claret and wine. He provided a patient case study of a girl he described as being one of the worst cases of typhoid fever he had ever treated. In the early stages of her illness he prescribed no alcohol but instead treated her using milk, beef extract, foul-broth, digitalis, ipecacuanha (an expectorant sometimes used to treat dysentery), Dover’s Powders, quinine and opium. In the later stages of illness, he prescribed a mixture of brandy and milk every four hours and one ounce of claret every two hours. The girl recovered completely. 34 Rachel has trained with the Scottish Oral History Centre and is now conducting oral history interviews across Scotland and the United States. Colin Moore Mitchell T. 2004 . Intoxicated Identities: Alcohol Power in Mexican History and Culture: London: Routledge: p. 6.Think and work in an interdisciplinary manner, where necessary bringing in concepts and methodologies from outside Economic History and even from disciplines other than History. This Honours level option course examines the formative period of this important and controversial industry through a close engagement with a wide range of primary sources. The approach is interdisciplinary, bringing in knowledge and methodologies from across History and the other Social Sciences. No prior Economic History knowledge is necessary. The historian stated that she is still looking to interview more people about their experiences with the cans, she added: "I would like to talk to anyone who remembers the cans either from childhood, when they were growing up or if they were in the armed forces stationed abroad in the 1970s and 80s. Dr Hands added that the project is still ongoing, stating that she hopes to use her research to create a future book entitled "Canned: Feminism - Sexism and Tennent's Lager Lovelies". Around 100 members across four colleges have also walked out in a separate dispute over pay. Workers in Ayrshire College, Dumfries and Galloway College, and West College Scotland are striking on varying days this week (see notes to editor). New College Lanarkshire members took strike action on 7 and 11 September.