February 15, 1909
Hermine Santrouschitz is born in Vienna (Austria).
End of the First World War.
Hermine comes to the Netherlands with a group of Austrian children for convalescence. She lives with a foster family in Leiden and is given the name Miep.
Miep moves to Amsterdam with her foster family.
Miep becomes a secretary with the Opekta company.
July 16, 1941
Miep marries Jan Gies.
Otto Frank asks Miep if she will help if he and his family go into hiding.
August 4, 1944
The people in hiding are arrested. Miep and Bep are not taken with them. They find Anne Frank’s diary in the secret annex.
Miep goes to the SD (Nazi security police) offices in Amsterdam to try to get the people in hiding released.
Otto Frank has survived the war and comes to live with Miep and Jan Gies. When they hear that Anne and Margot have died, Miep gives Anne’s diary to Otto Frank.
July 13, 1950
Miep and Jan Gies have a son, Paul. Miep stops working at Opekta.
Miep writes a book: ‘Memories of Anne Frank’.
January 26, 1993
Jan Gies dies.
February 15, 2009
Miep celebrates her 100th birthday.
January 11, 2010
Miep Gies dies at the age of 100.


“The ancients didn’t have obstetricians, and as a result, women because of modesty perished. For the Athenians forbade slaves and women to learn the art of medicine. A certain girl, Hagnodice, a virgin desired to learn medicine, and since she desired it, she cut her hair, and in male attire came to a certain Herophilus for training. When she had learned the art, and had heard that a woman was in labour, she came to her. And when the woman refused to trust herself to her, thinking that she was a man, she removed her garment to show that she was a woman, and in this way she treated women. When the doctors saw that they were not admitted to women, they began to accuse Hagnodice, saying that he was a seducer and corruptor of women, and that the women were pretending to be ill. The Areopagites, in session, started to condemn Hagnodice, but Hagnodice removed her garment for them and showed that she was a woman. Then the doctors began to accuse her more vigorously, and as a result the leading women came to the Court and said: “You are not husbands, but enemies, because you condemn her who discovered safety for us.” Then the Athenians amended the law, so that free-born women could learn the art of medicine.”
- Helen King. “Agnodice”. In Simon Hornblower & Antony Spawforth (eds). The Oxford Classical Dictionary. Oxford University Press, 1996.
- Gaius Julius Hyginus translated by Mary Grant. “Fabulae”. Theoi E-Texts. www.theoi.com/Text/HyginusFabulae5.html.
- “Gaius Julius Hyginus”. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyginus.
Herophilus (Greek: Ἡρόφιλος) (335-280 BCE) was born in Chalcedon (now Kadiköy, Turkey) and taught and practiced medicine in Alexandria. However Hagnodike is said to be in Athens, and Herophilus is not recorded as ever teaching in Athens.
Agnodice is the Latin form of the name; ‘Aγνοδίκη=Hagnodike the Greek.
The accusation that, while taken as male, Hagnodike was seducing and corrupting his female clients, resembles the Christian transvestite saint stories of some centuries later. The Christian saints are discussed in several books, but there is no one web page that summarizes them. I have featured very few of them on this site in that it is usually impossible to pin their story down to a specific time and place.
The tale of Hagnodike was used from the Renaissance onwards as a precedent justifying female medical workers.


Kings & Queens
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King Malcolm II of Scotland (1005 - 1034)
Books & Posters House of MacAlpin Family Tree English King or Queen at the Time |
Name: King Malcolm II of Scotland
Father: Kenneth II, King of Scotland
Mother: a Princess of Leinster
Relation to Elizabeth II: 28th great-grandfather
House of: MacAlpin
Born: c. 954
Ascended to the throne: March 25, 1005
Children: Daughters Bethoc (mother of Duncan I) and Donada
Died: November, 1034, from injuries at Glamis castle, Angus
Buried at: Isle of Iona
Succeeded by: his grandson Duncan I
Malcolm (Máel Coluim mac Cináeda) son of Kenneth II became king after his predecessor Kenneth II was killed in battle. Hid daughter Donada married Sigurd Norse king of Orkney who controlled Caithness, Sutherland and most of the Western Isles. The combined kingdom extended Scottish rule into Moray and previously Norse occupied lands.
Malcolm’s early raids into Northumbria in 1016 were defeated by Uhtred the Bold at Durham, however he defeated a force of English and Vikings at Carham, and extended Scottish rule into Lothian and Northumbrian lands down to Berwick. In 1032 King Cnut King of England secured the southern part of Northumbria for England settling the border between Scotland and northern England.
Malcolm had no son so he had the grandson of Kenneth III murdered to ensure that his daughter Bethroc’s son Duncan became heir to the throne. Malcolm died from battle injuries at Glamis Castle in 1034
Malcolm II defeats a force of English and Vikings at Carham, and extends Scottish rule into Lothian and Northumbria.
Britroyals Books and Kings & Queens Family Tree Poster


|Population||192,064 (2011 Census)|
|OS grid reference|
|• Charing Cross||9.4 mi (15.1 km) N|
|Ceremonial county||Greater London|
|Sovereign state||United Kingdom|
01689 (Addington and New Addington parts)
Croydon is a large town in south London, England. It is 9.4 miles (15.1 km) south of Charing Cross. The principal settlement in the London Borough of Croydon, it is one of the largest commercial districts in Greater London outside Central London, with an extensive shopping district and night-time economy. The entire town had a population of 192,064 as of 2011, whilst the wider borough had a population of 384,837.
Historically part of the hundred of Wallington in the county of Surrey, at the time of the Norman conquest of England Croydon had a church, a mill, and around 365 inhabitants, as recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086. Croydon expanded in the Middle Ages as a market town and a centre for charcoal production, leather tanning and brewing. The Surrey Iron Railway from Croydon to Wandsworth opened in 1803 and was the world's first public railway. Later 19th century railway building facilitated Croydon's growth as a commuter town for London. By the early 20th century, Croydon was an important industrial area, known for car manufacture, metal working and Croydon Airport. In the mid 20th century these sectors were replaced by retailing and the service economy, brought about by massive redevelopment which saw the rise of office blocks and the Whitgift Centre, the largest shopping centre in Greater London until 2008. Croydon was amalgamated into Greater London in 1965.
Croydon lies on a transport corridor between central London and the south coast of England, to the north of two high gaps in the North Downs, one taken by the A23 Brighton Road and the main railway line through Purley and Merstham and the other by the A22 from Purley to the M25 Godstone interchange. Road traffic is diverted away from a largely pedestrianised town centre, mostly consisting of North End. East Croydon is a major hub of the national railway transport system, with frequent fast services to central London, Brighton and the south coast. The town is also at the centre of the only tramway system in southern England.
As the vast majority of place names in the area are of Anglo-Saxon origin, the theory accepted by most philologists is that the name Croydon derives originally from the Anglo-Saxon croh, meaning "crocus", and denu, "valley", indicating that, like Saffron Walden in Essex, it was a centre for the cultivation of saffron. It has been argued that this cultivation is likely to have taken place in the Roman period, when the saffron crocus would have been grown to supply the London market, most probably for medicinal purposes, and particularly for the treatment of granulation of the eyelids.
There is also a plausible Brittonic origin for Croydon in the form "Crai-din" meaning "settlement near fresh water" (cf Creuddyn, Ceredigion), the name Crai (variously spelled) being found in Kent at various places even as late as the Domesday Book.
Alternative, although less probable, theories of the name's origin have been proposed. According to John Corbet Anderson: "The earliest mention of Croydon is in the joint will of Beorhtric and Aelfswth, dated about the year 962. In this Anglo-Saxon document the name is spelt [here he uses Old English characters] Crogdaene. Crog was, and still is, the Norse or Danish word for crooked, which is expressed in Anglo-Saxon by crumb, a totally different word. From the Danish came our crook and crooked. This term accurately describes the locality; it is a crooked or winding valley, in reference to the valley that runs in an oblique and serpentine course from Godstone to Croydon." Anderson challenged a claim, originally made by Andrew Coltee Ducarel, that the name came from the Old French for "chalk hill", because it was in use at least a century before the French language would have been commonly used following the Norman conquest. However, there was no long-term Danish occupation (see Danelaw) in Surrey, which was part of Wessex, and Danish-derived nomenclature is also highly unlikely. More recently, David Bird has speculated that the name might derive from a personal name, Crocus: he suggests a family connection with the documented Chrocus, king of the Alemanni, who allegedly played a part in the proclamation of Constantine as emperor at York in AD 306.
The town lies on the line of the Roman road from London to Portslade, and there is some archaeological evidence for small-scale Roman settlement in the area: there may have been a mansio (staging-post) here. Later, in the 5th to 7th centuries, a large pagan Saxon cemetery was situated on what is now Park Lane, although the extent of any associated settlement is unknown.
By the late Saxon period Croydon was the hub of an estate belonging to the Archbishops of Canterbury. The church and the archbishops' manor house occupied the area still known as "Old Town". The archbishops used the manor house as an occasional place of residence: as lords of the manor they dominated the life of the town well into the early modern period, and as local patrons they continue to have an influence. Croydon appears in Domesday Book (1086) as Croindene, held by Archbishop Lanfranc. Its Domesday assets included 16 hides and 1 virgate of land; a church; a mill worth 5s; 38 plough-teams; 8 acres (3.2 ha) of meadow; and woodland for 200 hogs. It had a recorded population of 73 households (representing roughly 365 individuals); and its value in terms of taxes rendered was £37 10s 0d.
The church had been established in the middle Saxon period, and was probably a minster church, a base for a group of clergy living a communal life. A charter issued by King Coenwulf of Mercia refers to a council that had taken place close to the monasterium (meaning minster) of Croydon. An Anglo-Saxon will made in about 960 is witnessed by Elfsies, priest of Croydon; and the church is also mentioned in Domesday Book. The will of John de Croydon, fishmonger, dated 6 December 1347, includes a bequest to "the church of S John de Croydon", the earliest clear record of its dedication. The church still bears the arms of Archbishop Courtenay and Archbishop Chichele, believed to have been its benefactors.
In 1276 Archbishop Robert Kilwardby acquired a charter for a weekly market, and this probably marks the foundation of Croydon as an urban centre. Croydon developed into one of the main market towns of north east Surrey. The market place was laid out on the higher ground to the east of the manor house in the triangle now bounded by High Street, Surrey Street and Crown Hill. By the 16th century the manor house had become a substantial palace, used as the main summer home of the archbishops and visited by monarchs and other dignitaries. However, the palace gradually became dilapidated and surrounded by slums and stagnant ponds, and in 1781 the archbishops sold it, and in its place purchased a new residence at nearby Addington. Nevertheless, many of the buildings of the original Croydon Palace survive, and are in use today as Old Palace School.
The Parish Church (now Croydon Minster) is a Perpendicular-style church, which was remodelled in 1849 but destroyed in a great fire in 1867, after which only the tower, south porch, and outer walls remained. A new church was designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott, one of the greatest architects of the Victorian age, and opened in 1870. His design loosely followed the previous layout, with knapped flint facing and many of the original features, including several important tombs. Croydon Parish Church is the burial place of six Archbishops of Canterbury: John Whitgift, Edmund Grindal, Gilbert Sheldon, William Wake, John Potter and Thomas Herring. Historically part of the Diocese of Canterbury, Croydon is now in the Diocese of Southwark. In addition to the suffragan Bishop of Croydon, the Vicar of Croydon is an important preferment.
Addington Palace is a Palladian-style mansion between Addington Village and Shirley, in the London Borough of Croydon. Six archbishops lived there between 1807 and 1898, when it was sold. Between 1953 and 1996 it was the home of the Royal School of Church Music. It is now a conference and banqueting venue.
Croydon was a leisure destination in the mid 19th century. In 1831, one of England's most prominent architects, Decimus Burton, designed a spa and pleasure gardens below Beulah Hill and off what is now Spa Hill in a bowl of land on the south-facing side of the hill around a spring of chalybeate water. Burton was responsible for the Beulah Spa Hotel (demolished around 1935) and the layout of the grounds. Its official title was The Royal Beulah Spa and Gardens. It became a popular society venue attracting crowds to its fêtes. One widely publicised event was a "Grand Scottish Fete" on 16 September 1834 "with a tightrope performance by Pablo Fanque, the black circus performer who would later dominate the Victorian circus and achieve immortality in The Beatles song, Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" The spa closed in 1856 soon after the opening nearby of the Crystal Palace which had been rebuilt on Sydenham Hill in 1854, following its success at the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park. It was destroyed in a spectacular fire in 1936.
Horse racing in the area took place occasionally, notably during visits of Queen Elizabeth I to the archbishop. Regular meetings became established first on a course at Park Hill in 1860 and from 1866 at Woodside, where particularly good prizes were offered for the races run under National Hunt rules. In that sphere its prestige was second only to Aintree, home of the Grand National. Increasing local opposition to the presence of allegedly unruly racegoers coupled with the need to obtain a licence from the local authority led to it being closed down in 1890.
The Elizabethan Whitgift Almshouses, the "Hospital of the Holy Trinity", in the centre of Croydon at the corner of North End and George Street, were erected by Archbishop John Whitgift. He petitioned for and received permission from Queen Elizabeth I to establish a hospital and school in Croydon for the "poor, needy and impotent people" from the parishes of Croydon and Lambeth. The foundation stone was laid in 1596 and the building was completed in 1599.
The premises included the Hospital or Almshouses, providing accommodation for between 28 and 40 people, and a nearby schoolhouse and schoolmaster's house. There was a Warden in charge of the well-being of the almoners. The building takes the form of a courtyard surrounded by the chambers of the almoners and various offices.
Threatened by various reconstruction plans and road-widening schemes, the Almshouses were saved in 1923 by intervention of the House of Lords. On 21 June 1983 Queen Elizabeth II visited the Almshouses and unveiled a plaque celebrating the recently completed reconstruction of the building. On 22 March each year the laying of the foundation stone is commemorated as Founder's Day.
The Grade II listed West Croydon Baptist Church was built in 1873 by J. Theodore Barker. It is a red brick building with stone dressings. Its three bays are divided by paired Doric pilasters supporting a triglyph frieze and panelled parapet.
Industrial Revolution and the railway
The development of Brighton as a fashionable resort in the 1780s increased Croydon's importance as a halt for stage coaches on the road south of London. At the beginning of the 19th century, Croydon became the terminus of two pioneering commercial transport links with London. The first, opened in 1803, was the horse-drawn Surrey Iron Railway from Wandsworth, which in 1805 was extended to Merstham, as the Croydon, Merstham and Godstone Railway. The second, opened in 1809, was the Croydon Canal, which branched off the Grand Surrey Canal at Deptford. The London and Croydon Railway (an atmospheric and steam-powered railway) opened between London Bridge and West Croydon in 1839, using much of the route of the canal (which had closed in 1836). Other connections to London and the south followed.
The arrival of the railways and other communications advances in the 19th century led to a 23-fold increase in Croydon's population between 1801 and 1901. This rapid expansion of the town led to considerable health problems, especially in the damp and overcrowded working class district of Old Town. In response to this, in 1849 Croydon became one of the first towns in the country to acquire a local board of health. The Board constructed public health infrastructure including a reservoir, water supply network, sewers, a pumping station and sewage disposal works.
The Surrey Street Pumping Station is Grade II listed; it was built in four phases. starting with the engine house in 1851, with a further engine house in 1862, a further extension in 1876–7 to house a compound horizontal engine and a further extension in 1912.
A growing town
In 1883 Croydon was incorporated as a borough. In 1889 it became a county borough, with a greater degree of autonomy. The new county borough council implemented the Croydon Improvement scheme in the early 1890s, which widened the High Street and cleared much of the "Middle Row" slum area. The remaining slums were cleared shortly after Second World War, with much of the population relocated to the isolated new settlement of New Addington. New stores opened and expanded in central Croydon, including Allders, Kennards and Grade II listed Grants, as well as the first Sainsbury's self-service shop in the country. There was a market on Surrey Street.
Croydon was the location of London's main airport until the Second World War. During the war, much of central Croydon was devastated by German V-1 flying bombs and V-2 rockets, and for many years the town bore the scars of the destruction. After the war, Heathrow Airport superseded Croydon Airport as London's main airport, and Croydon Airport quickly went into a decline, finally closing in 1959.
By the 1950s, with its continuing growth, the town was becoming congested, and the Council decided on another major redevelopment scheme. The Croydon Corporation Act was passed in 1956. This, coupled with national government incentives for office relocation out of Central London, led to the building of new offices and accompanying road schemes through the late 1950s and 1960s, and the town boomed as a business centre in the 1960s, with many multi-storey office blocks, an underpass, a flyover and multi-storey car parks. The redeveloped town centre has since been identified as an "edge city" – a significant urban and commercial centre in its own right, located on the outskirts of a larger metropolitan area (in this case, London).
In 1960 Croydon celebrated its millennium with a pageant held at Lloyd Park and an exhibition held at the old Croydon Aerodrome.
The growing town attracted many new buildings. The Fairfield Halls arts centre and event venue opened in 1962. Croydon developed as an important centre for shopping, with the construction of the Whitgift Centre in 1969. No. 1 Croydon (formerly the NLA Tower) designed by Richard Seifert & Partners was completed in 1970. The Warehouse Theatre opened in 1977.
The 1990s saw further changes intended to give the town a more attractive image. These included the closure of North End to vehicles in 1989 and the opening of the Croydon Clocktower arts centre in 1994. An early success of the centre was the "Picasso's Croydon Period" exhibition of March–May 1995.
The Croydon Tramlink began operation in May 2000 (see Transport section below).
The Prospect West office development was built in 1991 to 1992, and its remodelling planned in 2012 has now been completed. Renamed Interchange Croydon when it was reopened in 2014, the 180,000 square foot office development was the first new grade A office development of its size to open in Croydon for more than 20 years.
Another large shopping centre, Centrale, opened in 2004 opposite the Whitgift Centre, and adjoining the smaller Drummond Centre. House of Fraser and Debenhams are the anchor stores in the combined centre. In addition, there are plans for a large, new one billion pound shopping centre, in the form of a new Westfield shopping mall to add to the two which the company currently has in Greater London; Westfield plans to work jointly with Hammersons and to incorporate the best aspects of the two companies' designs. In November 2017, Croydon Council gave permission for the new Westfield shopping centre to be built and in January 2018, the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, approved the regeneration scheme. Work to demolish the existing Whitgift Centre will begin in 2018 and Westfield Croydon is currently expected to open by 2022. There are several other major plans for the town including the redevelopment of the Croydon Gateway site; and extensions of Tramlink to Purley Way, Streatham, Lewisham and Crystal Palace.
Croydon has many tall buildings such as the former Nestlé Tower (St George's House). The London Borough of Croydon's strategic planning committee in February 2013 gave the go-ahead to property fund manager Legal and General Property's plans to convert the empty 24-storey St George's House office building, occupied by Nestlé until September 2012, into 288 flats.
Several apartment developments, for instance Altitude 25 (completed 2010), have been built in recent years, and several more are being built or planned. The construction of Saffron Square, which includes a 43-storey tower, began on Wellesley Road in 2011 and was completed in 2016. Other developments with towers over 50 floors high have been given planning approval. These include the 54-storey "Menta Tower" in Cherry Orchard Road near East Croydon station, and a 55-storey tower at One Lansdowne Road, on which construction was set to begin in early 2013. The latter is set to be Britain's tallest block of flats, including office space, a four-star hotel and a health club.
In May 2012 it was announced that Croydon had been successful in its bid to become one of twelve "Portas Pilot" towns, and would receive a share of £1.2m funding to help rejuvenate its central shopping areas.
In November 2013, Central Croydon MP Gavin Barwell gave a presentation at a public meeting on the Croydon regeneration project, detailing various developments underway due to be completed in coming years.
On 26 November 2013, Croydon Council approved a redevelopment of the Town Centre by The Croydon Partnership, a joint venture by The Westfield Group and Hammerson. London Mayor Boris Johnson approved the plan the following day. The Croydon Advertiser listed the approval as an "Historic Night for Croydon".
At Ruskin Square, a Boxpark made of sea containers opened in 2016 as a temporary measure until new buildings are constructed for shops, offices and housing.  The London Evening Standard said that this and other developments were reviving the town which was in the process of gentrification.
Further developments are planned as part of the Croydon Vision 2020 plan, which was drawn up by the Borough after a 1999 study by town planning consultants EDAW. The plan includes new office blocks, apartment buildings, shopping centres and other developments, some of which have already been built. More than 2,000 new homes are planned.
Public transport is set to improve, with Tramlink getting more tracks, platforms and trams. The East Croydon train station is to have more tracks and ticket barriers, with nearby bus stops getting better lights and paving. However, a footbridge built at the station in 2013 had fewer openings than planned, leading it to be dubbed the "bridge to nowhere" by some locals. In West Croydon, track extensions in 2010 met the London Overground rail network.
Fairfield Halls is to become the linchpin of a cultural quarter encompassing nearby College Green. Plans include an art gallery, a new college, shops and offices, with a multi-storey car park set for demolition to make space for 218 homes. The John Laing Group is involved in the College Green development with the Croydon Council as part of a joint project called the Croydon Urban Regeneration Vehicle.
In 2007, events were held under the label of Croydon Exp07 to promote billions of pounds of promised projects, including swimming pools and a library. However, plans for a new shopping centre, to be called Park Place, had already been abandoned amid a scandal about cash for peerages. Also abandoned were plans for an arena near the East Croydon station, after a compulsory purchase order was rejected in 2008 at Cabinet level.
As of 2011, Croydon's annual retail turnover from comparison goods was £353 million, the 5th highest in Greater London behind the West End, Shepherd's Bush, Stratford and Kingston upon Thames. Croydon had as of 2012 320,991 square metres (3,455,120 sq ft) of total town centre floorspace, the 2nd highest in Greater London only behind the West End.
Apart from its very large central shopping district, Croydon has a number of smaller shopping areas, especially towards the southern end of the town in which are many restaurants. Two of Croydon's restaurants are listed in The Good Food Guide.
In a 2015 study by CACI, Croydon was ranked 12th in the "Hot 100 UK retail locations" with a score of 90%.
The Zotefoams company is headquartered in Croydon.
For centuries the area lay within the Wallington hundred, an ancient Anglo-Saxon administrative division of the county of Surrey. In the later Middle Ages – probably from the late 13th century onwards – residents of the town of Croydon, as defined by boundary markers known as the "four crosses", enjoyed a degree of self-government through a town court or portmote, and a form of free tenure of property. These privileges set the area of the town apart from its rural hinterland, where the more usual and more restrictive rules of manorial tenure applied. However, Croydon did not hold any kind of formal borough status.
In 1690, the leading inhabitants petitioned William III and Mary for Croydon to be incorporated as a borough. The application was initially approved, the King authorising the drafting of a charter, but the process was then abruptly halted, apparently through the intervention of Archbishop John Tillotson, who probably feared a threat to his own authority over the town. The application was revived the following year, when Queen Mary again authorised a charter, but once again it was abandoned. A second petition in 1707 was effectively ignored.
Croydon's growth in the 19th century brought the issue of incorporation back on to the political agenda, and in 1883 the ancient parish of Croydon, apart from its exclave of Croydon Crook or Selsdon, was created a municipal borough within Surrey. In 1889, because the population was high enough, it was made a county borough, exempt from county administration.
In 1965 (under the terms of the London Government Act 1963) the County Borough of Croydon was abolished and the area was transferred to Greater London and combined with the Coulsdon and Purley Urban District to form the London Borough of Croydon.
In recent decades, the borough has on several occasions sought city status. (This would be a purely honorific change of title, making no practical difference to the borough's governance.) A draft petition was submitted by the County Borough to the Home Office in 1951, a more formal petition in 1954, and two more applications in 1955 and 1958. When the London Borough was created in 1965, the Council endeavoured to have it styled a City, as was the City of Westminster. Further bids for city status were made in 1977, 1992, 2000, 2002, and 2012. All have failed. The borough's predominant argument has always been its size: in 2000 it pointed out that it was "the largest town which does not have the title of City in the whole of Western Europe". The grounds on which it has been turned down have invariably been that it is (as was stated in 1992) merely "part of the London conurbation, rather than a place with a character and identity of its own". Undeterred, council representatives have more than once described Croydon as "a city in all but name". In 2008, Boris Johnson, then Mayor of London, said he would support Croydon being awarded city status.
The London Borough of Croydon has a Labour-controlled council with 41 Labour councillors and 29 Conservative councillors elected on 3 May 2018.[Corrected Aug 2020]
Most of the town centre lies within the Addiscombe and Fairfield wards, which form part of the Croydon Central constituency. The rest of the town centre is in the Croham ward, which is part of the Croydon South constituency. These wards are all in the London Borough of Croydon, which is responsible for services along with other agencies such as education, refuse collection, road maintenance, local planning and social care. The Addiscombe ward is currently represented by Labour Councillors . The Fairfield and Croham wards have, by contrast, habitually elected Conservative members. The sitting Member of Parliament for Croydon Central is Sarah Jones, a member of the Labour Party. The sitting Member of Parliament for Croydon South is Chris Philp, a member of the Conservatives. The Member of Parliament for Croydon North is Steve Reed, for the Labour Party.
The nearest hospital is Croydon University Hospital (known from 1923 to 2010 as Mayday Hospital) in nearby Thornton Heath, which is part of Croydon Health Services NHS Trust. The London Ambulance Service provides the ambulance service.
Demography and population
The town of Croydon includes its neighbourhoods Addiscombe, Addington, Broad Green, Coombe, Forestdale, New Addington, Sanderstead, Selsdon, Shirley, and Waddon. The 13 electoral wards that make it up together counted a population of 192,064 in the 2011 census, forming the majority of the borough overall (pop. 384,837).
Croydon is ethnically diverse. Those who are from BAME minority background range from 19.5% in Sanderstead ward to 68.6% in Broad Green. West Thornton ward (part of Thornton Heath) is one of the most ethnically diverse areas of England.
Fairfield ward, which is the major ward covering the central town, was ethnically 40% White British, 16% Indian, and 10% Other White in the 2011 UK Census. Religiously, 46% was Christian, 21% irreligious, 13% Hindu and 8% Muslim. The most common household tenure type was either owned or privately rented. The median age was 33. In addition, the Broad Green ward was ethnically 23% White British, 13% Indian, 13% Other Asian, and 11% Black African. About 41% of household tenures were owned, while privately and socially rented each made up 29% each. The median age was 31. The Addiscombe ward was ethnically 45% White British and 10% Other White. Religiously, 52% of the population was Christian, 24% irreligious, 7% Muslim and 6% Hindu. 52% of house tenures were owned. There are 10 other wards that cover Croydon's neighbourhoods.
The median house price as of 2014 was £212,998 in Selhurst ward, one of London's lowest. The highest in the town was in Sanderstead ward, £392,500. The mean age in 2013 ranged from 32 years in Broad Green and Fieldway wards, to 43.2 years in Selsdon and Ballards ward.
|Ward||Detached||Semi-detached||Terraced||Flats and apartments|
|Selsdon and Ballards||24.4%||57.6%||11.7%||6.3%|
Croydon town centre is near the centre of the borough of Croydon, to the north of the North Downs and the Pilgrims' Way path. To the north of Croydon are typical London districts, whereas a short distance southeast (such as Coombe and Selsdon) is green, hilly and rural land. To the west are industrial areas, part of which are in the London Borough of Sutton. The southern suburbs are mainly affluent and also hilly.
The town centre is bordered by Waddon immediately southwest of central Croydon. To the west, inside the London Borough of Sutton lies Beddington. To the north are Broad Green, Thornton Heath and Selhurst. To the south lies South Croydon, and going further south are Purley and Sanderstead. To the east lie Addiscombe and Shirley.
Croydon High Street runs from South Croydon up to the point where it meets the street called North End. North End is the main shopping street, while Croydon High Street is the main restaurant quarter.
The High Street is also home to Wrencote House, a Grade II* listed building. Dating from the late 17th or early 18th centuries, and probably built as a merchant's house, it has a distinctive "H" plan form over its four floors (including basement and attic storey). External features include a rich red brick facade with black headers, and a heavily carved and enriched wooden eaves cornice.
Wellesley Road on the A212 road forms a north–south axis through the town centre. In line with London Plan policy, there have been a number of proposals to create greater integration between East Croydon station, which lies on one side of the A212, and the town centre of Croydon, which lies on the other side of it. Croydon Vision 2020 aims to tackle this though such solutions as making the road easier for pedestrians to cross by creating a centre island pathway.
Topographically, central Croydon generally lies between 50 metres (160 ft) (in the north) and 70 metres (230 ft) (in the south) above sea level. Elevation significantly climbs towards the east of the town - Coombe Park peaks at about 95 metres (312 ft) above sea level, whereas the Addington Hills, Coombe Wood and Addington Golf Course are as high as 145 metres (476 ft), with the southern end of New Addington having an elevation of over 160 metres (520 ft). To the south, Croham Hurst has a hill of 145 metres (476 ft), and the highest area of Croydon is the Sanderstead Plantation at 175 metres (574 ft). The lowest elevation is around Broad Green, about 35 metres (115 ft) above sea level.
The River Wandle is a tributary of the River Thames, flowing some 9 miles (14 km) to Wandsworth and Putney from its source in Croydon. It roughly forms the borough's western boundary with the London Borough of Sutton, and for part of its length also forms the boundary between the London Boroughs of Croydon and Lambeth. One of its tributaries rises in Selhurst.
There are several arts venues. Foremost is the Fairfield Halls, opened in 1962, which consists of a large concert hall frequently used for BBC recordings, the Ashcroft Theatre and the Arnhem Gallery. Fairfield is the home of the London Mozart Players. Many famous faces have appeared at the Fairfield Halls, including The Beatles, Bucks Fizz, Omid Djalili, Robert Cray, JLS, Chuck Berry, BB King, Don McLean, The Monkees, Johnny Cash, Dionne Warwick, Gladys Knight, Morecambe and Wise, Tom Jones, The Stylistics, Status Quo, Level 42, A-HA, John Mayall, Jools Holland, Kenny Rogers, James Last, and Coolio. The main concert hall was used for the conference scene in the Ron Howard film The Da Vinci Code (2006). The Fairfield Halls reopened in 2019, following a programme of modernisation and refurbishment.
Croydon Clocktower, built by the London Borough of Croydon in the mid-1990s, houses a state-of-the-art library, a performance venue in the old reference library, the David Lean Cinema - which is a small, independent, art-house cinema and the Museum of Croydon, which details Croydon's history. The building links into Croydon Town Hall and some areas of the building, most notably the Braithwaite Hall, are part of the original town hall and library complex, built in 1892–1896 to a design by Charles Henman. A bronze statue of Queen Victoria was erected outside the buildings in 1903.
The Warehouse Theatre (which closed in 2012), was a studio theatre known for promoting new writing, comedy and youth theatre. It had to close because of the major Ruskin Square redevelopment, but will re-open in the future in a new larger theatre building within the new development.
The Pembroke Theatre had many productions with well-known actors before its closure in about 1962.
There are several local and small venues for comedy and community events dotted around Croydon and its districts. Croydon Youth Theatre Organisation celebrated its 40th birthday in 2005. There are several community arts groups, particularly in the large Asian community.
The Spread Eagle Theatre is a new 50-seat studio theatre. Opened in October 2013, it is situated in the town centre, 10 minutes' walk from East Croydon Station. The Spread Eagle works closely with its sister venue, the Old Joint Stock Theatre in Birmingham. Both venues champion 'big plays for small spaces' with an emphasis on new writing, supporting emerging artists and theatre companies.
A calendar titled "Rare Roundabouts of Croydon", with a picture of a different Croydon roundabout each month, has enjoyed some success.
Croydon is the setting of two poems by British Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman, "Croydon" and "Love in a Valley".
The borough has been the residence of many renowned authors and novelists, including Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who set up house in Norwood, D.H. Lawrence, and French novelist Émile Zola, who lived for a time in the Queen's Hotel, Upper Norwood. Cicely Mary Barker, author and illustrator of the Flower Fairies series of books, was born in Croydon.
Croydon is referred to in a rhyme dating back to the 18th century, revised in the Victorian era to:
The composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875–1912) lived at 30 Dagnall Park, Selhurst, until his death. He grew up in Croydon and sang in the church choir at St George's and taught at the Crystal Palace School of Music and many other schools of music. He died from pneumonia after collapsing at West Croydon station. There is an impressive grave with a touching poem at Bandon Hill Cemetery, and exhibits about him in the Museum of Croydon.
In addition to the Fairfield Halls, there have been several venues in Croydon that have hosted rock acts. Established in 1976, the Cartoon was a popular live music venue that closed in 2006. The Greyhound in Park Lane, played host to acts such as Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, the Who, David Bowie, Queen, Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Damned, the Boomtown Rats, A-ha in (1987) and others during the 1960s and '70s. The Greyhound also saw the debut of the Electric Light Orchestra in 1972.
The town centre was for 30 years home to Europe's largest second-hand record store, Beano's, offering rare vinyl, CDs and books. In November 2008, it was announced that Beano's would close. The premises, off Church Street near the Grant's cinema complex, became a "market place" with stalls for rent by small business and individuals. Croydon has a rock scene producing such local talent as Frankmusik and Noisettes.
Croydon has been at the centre of the development of the dubstep genre, a relatively recent musical development that traces its roots from Jamaican dub music, UK Garage and drum and bass. Artists such as Benga and Skream, who honed their production and DJing skills whilst working at the now defunct Big Apple Records on Surrey Street, along with Norwood's Digital Mystikz, DJ Chef, Timi Korus and Thornton Heath's Plastician, form the core roster of dubstep DJs and producers. Moreover, UK rappers and grime artists Stormzy, Krept and Konan, Nadia Rose and Section Boyz all hail from or can trace their roots to the London Borough of Croydon.
The band Saint Etienne formed in Croydon.
The oldest currently surviving shop in Croydon is 46 South End. Dating back to the 16th century, this Grade II listed building still retains all its original Tudor features. Records show that the premises has been a shop for at least 163 years, where street directories from 1851 give the names of E. C. Johnson & Thorpe. The building is currently in use as a music shop.
Croydon is home to the BRIT School for performing arts and technology, based in Selhurst, which has produced stars such as Adele, Jessie J, Amy Winehouse, Leona Lewis, Katie Melua, Katy B, Kate Nash, Imogen Heap, Rizzle Kicks, Dane Bowers and members of the Feeling & the Kooks. Independent of such institutions, Croydon is also the home of artists like Nosferatu D2, Magic Brother, Bad Sign, Cassettes and Grimecore band Caine.
Croydon plays host to the popular Channel 4 show Peep Show. The ITV police drama The Bill, although set in East London, was filmed in Croydon and many of the town centre locations were filmed around Surrey Street and St George's House (the Nestle building). Sun Hill Police Station is in nearby Mitcham. The opening credit sequence for the sitcom Terry and June featured the eponymous stars walking around the Whitgift Centre and the Fairfield Halls. In 2007, the music video for pop star Mika's single "Big Girl (You Are Beautiful)" was shot in various locations around the town, including High Street and Surrey Street Market. The Delta Point building, close to West Croydon station appeared in the film The Dark Knight Rises as Gotham General Hospital. The 2018 interactive film, Black Mirror: Bandersnatch featured several scenes shot in Croydon, such as St George's Walk and No.1 Croydon.
Croydon has its own fully independent television station: it does not receive any government or local authority grant or funding and is supported by donations, sponsorship and by commercial advertising. In 2012, Croydon Radio, an internet radio station, began in the area.
Sport and leisure
Parks and open spaces
Among several other parks and open spaces around Croydon, there is an area of landscaped green space in the town centre called Queens Gardens; it is adjacent to the town hall and Clocktower art centre.
Clubs and teams
The most prominent sports club in the borough is Crystal Palace Football Club, based in the north of the borough since 1918. Palace play at the purpose-built stadium of Selhurst Park, which the club moved to in 1924 from the Nest, its first Croydon-based stadium. The Nest had previously been the home of the defunct Croydon Common Football Club and sat next to Selhurst station. Palace won promotion to the Premier League (the top tier of football in England) at the end of the 2012–13 season. Croydon has a Non-League football club, Croydon F.C. who play at Croydon Sports Arena. Sunday League team Purley Saint Germain also play at Croydon Sports Arena.
Croydon Amphibians SC plays in Division 2 British Waterpolo League. In 2008, the team won the National League Division 3.
The borough also has a women's roller derby team called Croydon Roller Derby, which trains in Carshalton. The team was established in the early part of this decade and has played both national and international teams including Roller Derby Madrid, Stuttgart Valley Rollergirlz and Oxford Roller Derby. The sport is full-contact and played on quad skates with players skating round an elliptical track.
Croydon is served by East Croydon, South Croydon and West Croydon. East Croydon and South Croydon are served by Govia Thameslink Railway, operating under the Southern and Thameslink brands via the Brighton Main Line. West Croydon is served by London Overground and Southern services. The largest and busiest of the three stations is East Croydon, although West Croydon is located closer to Croydon's main shopping district.
The Tramlink tram system opened in 2000; Croydon is its hub. Its network consists of two main lines, from Elmers End or Beckenham to Wimbledon, and from New Addington to West Croydon, with all trams running via a loop in central Croydon. It is the only tram system in Greater London. It serves Mitcham, Woodside, Addiscombe and the Purley Way retail and industrial area.
The system was previously known as the "Croydon Tramlink", having been established under the Croydon Tramlink Act 1994.
A few miles to the south of Croydon is a small gap in the North Downs, a route for transport from London to the south coast. The London to Brighton road used to pass through the town on North End before the A23 Purley Way was built to the west. Transport for London operates many bus routes in and around Croydon. Most buses serve West Croydon bus station, next to the railway station and tram stop.
The horse-drawn Surrey Iron Railway was the world's first public railway. It was opened in 1803, had double track, was some 8.5 miles (13.7 km) long and ran from Wandsworth to Croydon, at what is now Reeves Corner. In 1805 it was extended to Merstham as the Croydon, Merstham, and Godstone Railway. The railway boom of the 1840s brought superior and faster steam lines and it closed in 1846. The route is followed in part by the modern Tramlink. The last remaining sections of rail can be seen behind railings in a corner of Rotary Field in Purley.
With the opening of the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway line to London Victoria in 1860 extra platforms were provided at East Croydon, which the LBSCR treated as a separate station named New Croydon. The South Eastern Railway (SER) was excluded from this station, which ran exclusively LBSCR services to London at fares cheaper than those the SER offered from the original station. In 1864, the LBSCR obtained authorisation to construct a ½-mile long branch line into the heart of the town centre near Katharine Street, where Croydon Central station was built. The line opened in 1868 but enjoyed little success and closed in 1871, only to reopen in 1886 under pressure from the Town Council before finally closing in 1890. The station was subsequently demolished and replaced by the Town Hall. In 1897–98, East Croydon and New Croydon were merged into a single station with three island platforms, which remain today, but the two stations kept separate booking accounts until 1924.
The Croydon Canal ran for 9.5 miles (15.3 km) from what is now West Croydon station. It travelled north largely along the course of the present railway line to New Cross Gate, where it joined the Grand Surrey Canal and went on into the River Thames. It opened in 1809 and had 28 locks. It had a strong competitor in the Surrey Iron Railway and was never a financial success. It sold out to the London & Croydon Railway in 1836. The lake at South Norwood is the former reservoir for the canal.
Croydon Airport on Purley Way was the main airport for London until it was superseded by Heathrow Airport and Gatwick Airport. It opened on 29 March 1920 by combining two smaller airfields used for defence in World War I. It developed into one of the great airports of the world during the 1920s and 1930s. It welcomed the world's pioneer aviators in its heyday. As aviation technology progressed and aircraft became larger and more numerous, it was recognised in 1952 that the airport would be too small to cope with increasing air traffic and its role was decreased.. The last scheduled flight departed on 30 September 1959. The air terminal, now known as Airport House adjoining Purley Way to the west of the town, has been restored and has a museum open one day a month. The name "Croydon Airport" is still used as a landmark and as a bus stop designation.
- Peggy Ashcroft (1907–1991), actress, was born in Croydon, lived in George Street as a child and attended Croydon High School; honoured in the name of the Ashcroft Theatre, part of the Fairfield Halls
- Jon Benjamin (1964–), Chief Executive of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, born and grew up in Croydon
- Raymond Chandler (1888–1959), American detective fiction writer, lived in Upper Norwood as a schoolboy
- Anne Clark (1960–), electronic music artist and poet, was born in Croydon
- Carlton Cole (1983–), English footballer, born in Croydon
- Roger Ward Crosskey (1930–2017), entomologist, born in Croydon
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930), Scottish-born fiction writer, lived at No. 12 Tennison Road, South Norwood and featured the area in some of his Sherlock Holmes detective stories
- Jane Drew (1911–1996), modernist architect, born in Thornton Heath and head girl at Croydon High School
- Havelock Ellis (1859–1939), sexologist, born in Croydon
- Paul Garelli (1924–2006), French Assyriologist, born in Croydon
- Ben Haenow (1985–), pop singer, winner of The X Factor (UK series 11), born in Croydon
- Roy Hodgson (1947–), Crystal Palace and former England manager, born and grew up in Croydon
- Tom Holland (1996–), actor in five Marvel Cinematic Universe films, educated at the BRIT School
- William Forster Lanchester, FRSE (1875–1953), zoologist, born and raised in Croydon
- Eden Kane (born Richard Graham Sarstedt) (1940–), singer and older brother of Peter and Robin Sarstedt
- Rachel Khoo (1980–), cook, editor-in-chief of online lifestyle magazine Khoollect, with her own BBC series
- George Knowland (1922–1945), Victoria Cross recipient, went to Elmwood Junior School
- D. H. Lawrence (1885–1930), novelist, lived at 12 Colworth Road, Addiscombe, 1908–1912 whilst a teacher at Davidson Road School
- David Lean (1908–1991), film director, born in Croydon
- Kirsty MacColl (1959–2000), singer and songwriter, born and grew up in Croydon
- David McAlmont (1967–), singer, songwriter, writer, historian; born at St Mary's Maternity Hospital, attended Broadmead Primary.
- Ralph McTell (1944–), musician, composer of "Streets of London", was brought up in Croydon
- Katie Melua (1984–), musician, singer and songwriter, attended the BRIT School
- Kate Moss (1974–), model, attended Riddlesdown High School
- Malcolm Muggeridge (1903–1990), author and media personality, the son of H. T. Muggeridge, a prominent Croydon Labour councillor, and taught at John Ruskin Central School in the 1920s
- Lucy Porter (1973–), comedian, born in Croydon
- Jason Puncheon (1986–), professional footballer playing in midfield for Pafos FC (Cyprus)
- Peter Sarstedt (1941–2017), singer, winner of Ivor Novello Award, lived in Croydon as a teenager
- Robin Sarstedt (1944–), singer and younger brother of Peter
- Captain Sensible (born Raymond Burns) (1954–), guitarist with The Damned, attended school in South Norwood
- Ashraf Sinclair (1979–2020), Malaysian actor, born in Croydon
- Emile Smith-Rowe (2000-), professional football player, born in Thornton Heath before relocating to North London
- Dan Stevens (1982–), actor, born in Croydon
- Stormzy (1993–) UK grime rapper, born in Croydon
- Aaron Wan-Bissaka (1997–), English footballer, born in Croydon
- Algy Ward (born Alaisdair Terry Mackie Ward) (1959–), bass guitarist and musician with The Saints, The Damned, and Tank, born in Croydon
- Amy Winehouse (1983–2011), singer, attended the BRIT School
- Edward Woodward (1930–2009), actor, born and for many years lived in Croydon
- Wilfried Zaha (1992–), professional football player, grew up in Thornton Heath and attended Selsdon High School
The town is home to Croydon College, with its main site on Park Lane and College Road near East Croydon station. It has over 13,000 students attending one of its three sub-colleges. The sub-colleges were created in 2007. The three sub-colleges are the Croydon Sixth Form College, Croydon Skills and Enterprise College and the Croydon Higher Education College. The Higher Education College offers university-level education in a range of subjects from Law through to Fine Art. Croydon Skills and Enterprise College delivers training and education opportunities.
The town has five fee-paying schools, three of which are part of the Whitgift Foundation. Two are boys' schools (though Trinity School has a co-educational sixth form): Whitgift School was situated near the Almshouses until 1931 when it moved to its current site in Haling Park in South Croydon, the Middle School (renamed Trinity School of John Whitgift in 1954) remained on the site until 1965 when it moved to Shirley Park. A direct grant grammar school until 1968, it is now a member of the Headmasters' Conference. Old Palace School, an independent girls' school situated in the old Summer Palace of the Archbishops of Canterbury, joined the Whitgift Foundation group of schools in 1993. Croham Hurst School, an independent girls' school in South Croydon, became part of Old Palace in 2007 and its old buildings are now used as the Old Palace junior school. The site of the old Whitgift grammar school is now the Whitgift shopping centre whose freehold is owned by the Whitgift Foundation.
Croydon is also home to three single-sex Catholic state schools. The formerly independent John Fisher School in Purley has not charged fees since the late 1970s, but during the 1990s was selective, choosing boys via exams, interviews, tests, previous school reports and written statements. The school ended its selection policy in 1999, and now accepts pupils under a points system, which favours those who have high mass attendance and whose families are most involved in the Catholic Church. Coloma Convent Girls' School is one of England's Catholic girls' schools: formerly a grammar school, it has now, like John Fisher, adopted points-based admission criteria. St. Joseph's College, on Beulah Hill in Upper Norwood, is a boys' school with a mixed sixth form.
Croydon High School for Girls is an independent girls' school in Selsdon, and a member of the Girls' Day School Trust. The Japanese Saturday School of London, a weekend Japanese programme, uses Croydon High School as its Croydon Campus (クロイドン校舎 Kuroidon Kōsha).
Royal Russell School is a co-educational independent boarding and day school in South Croydon and is a member of the Headmasters' Conference.
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- "Ward Profiles and Atlas – London Datastore". Retrieved 25 September 2020.
- "Neighbourhood statistics". Office for National Statistics.
- Census Information Scheme (2012). "2011 Census Ward Population Estimates". Greater London Authority. Retrieved 30 January 2013.
- Historic England. "Wrencote (Grade II*) (1079291)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 15 August 2017.
- "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 14 July 2014. Retrieved 6 July 2014.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
- Bridget Cherry and Nikolaus Pevsner, London 2: South. Buildings of England series. Penguin Books, 1983. ISBN 0-14-071047-7. Page 214.
- "Queen Victoria statue – Croydon". London Remembers.
- "Roundabout calendar is gift hit". BBC News.
- Truelove, Sam (10 September 2018). "The amazing new murals that are popping up all over Croydon". croydonadvertiser. Retrieved 25 September 2020.
- Truelove, Sam (1 November 2018). "Stunning mural painted on side of Hindu temple in Croydon". croydonadvertiser. Retrieved 25 September 2020.
- Noble, Will (14 April 2016). "11 Amazing Facts About Croydon Airport". Londonist.
- "Chapter XIV: Local Allusions to Women". sacred-texts.com. Retrieved 5 December 2013.
- Whalley, Kirsty (15 September 2010). "ELO man dies". Croydon Guardian. Newsquest Media Group. p. 15.
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- "Fan Releases Nosferatu D2"²s Album Again, Ignites Cult Following". Public Radio International.
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- Dwilson, Stephanie Dube (28 December 2018). "Where Was Black Mirror's Bandersnatch Filmed? [PHOTOS]". Archived from the original on 29 December 2018. Retrieved 20 June 2020.
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- "The British Water Polo League". bwpl.org.
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- West Croydon National Rail
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- "＜学校紹介＞" (Archive). The Japanese Saturday School of London. Retrieved on 5 April 2015. – See "９．校舎 "
- Daniel Lysons (1792), "Croydon", Environs of London, 1: County of Surrey, London: T. Cadell
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- Edward Walford (1883), "Croydon", Greater London, London: Cassell & Co., OCLC 3009761


What are green burials and why are they becoming so popular?
Green burials, also known as natural burials, are funerals that are designed to have a minimal environmental impact. These types of burials often involve using biodegradable materials, such as wooden caskets or shrouds, and avoiding the use of chemicals or embalming fluids. Green burials may also involve choosing a burial location that is natural and untreated, such as a meadow or a forest, rather than a traditional cemetery.
Green burials are becoming increasingly popular for a number of reasons:
Environmental concerns: Green burials are seen as a more environmentally friendly alternative to traditional burials, which can be resource-intensive and produce greenhouse gases through the use of embalming fluids and the production of concrete burial vaults.
Cost: Green burials are often less expensive than traditional burials, as they involve fewer materials and services.
Personal values: Some people choose green burials as a way to align their funeral practices with their personal values and beliefs about the environment and sustainability.
Simplicity: Green burials can be a more simple and natural way to honor the deceased, as they focus on the natural cycle of life and death rather than traditional funeral practices that may be seen as elaborate or artificial.
It's important to note that green burials may not be available in all areas and may not be suitable for everyone. It's important to carefully consider the options and make a decision that is right for you and your loved ones.


Faith, faithfulness. Related to the word Amen.
Tree of Life, another name for the Torah
Law and observances for the whole legal system of Judaism. Derived from the Hebrew word halach – to walk – so it really means how we walk in this world.
Ha-kadosh Baruch Hu
“Holy Blessed One”
God’s omnibenevolence: The One who is good and causes good. (“God’s omnibenevolence shines strong: Ha-tov v’ha-meitiv in all frames of reference.”
(See Artson, p. 157)
Kol d’mamah dakah
Still, small voice – we think of this as your inner voice, your soul/God speaking.
Doorpost, or a case containing Scripture affixed to a doorpost as a literal interpretation of Deuteronomy 6:9.
Prayer assembly, or the quorum required for prayer.
A homiletical interpretation of – or a commentary on – a Torah text, sometimes in the form of a more detailed Rabbinic story about a story in the Torah. The word derives from the verb darash, when means “seek” or “inquire”. Collections of midrash often give varied – and sometimes conflicting – interpretations and present them side by side, inviting the reader to derive meaning from all.
The written summary of the oral Torah, i.e. the orally transmitted laws and ethics based on Scripture, c. 200 CE. The Mishnah makes up one strand of the Talmud.
God’s commandments, spiritual obligations
Soul, living being
The collected legal and ethical discussions of the rabbis, edited c. 500 C.E. Includes the Mishnah and Gemarrah (commentary) on the Mishnah. (Mishnah+Gemarrah=Talmud)
Prayer boxes worn during weekday morning prayers by those who observe this practice. These are worn by all denominations of Jews, if that is their practice, including women. The practice is based on a literal interpretation of Deuteronomy.
Fringes on prayer shawl (Numbers 15:40)
The Five Books of Moses, God’s law as revealed to Moses. (Or, more narrowly, the scroll containing this text; more broadly, the interpretations of the five books (or even all Jewish teaching.)
The Hebrew Bible – Torah, Prophets, Writings.
Tanakh is an acronym for Torah, Neviim (Prophets), Ketuvim (Writings),
which is the order the Hebrew Bible follows.
Absence, potentiality, no-thing; “cosmic chaos.” The state of things before creation. (Genesis 1:2)
Self-contraction; God contracted the Divine self to make room for creation.
The Holy Name, as revealed to Moses (Exodus 3:13-15)
This is how God’s name is written throughout the Torah: Yud, Hay, Vav, Hay.
This is the unpronounceable, unknowable Name of God. It may be based on the verb “to be”, combining past, present and future.
Names for God
Describing, or naming God is beyond our abilities, so we use words that describe different aspects of God, including aspects that are thought of as feminine:
Rachamana – The Compassionate One. (Rachamin is the word for compassion, which comes from the word rechem – which means womb.)
Shechinah – The Indwelling One. (From the word shachan which means to dwell. Often thought of as a feminine aspect of God.)
Shaddai – another name for God which is associated with a feminine quality, God as nurturer. (Shadda-im are breasts in Hebrew.)
Eloha – seemingly feminine word for God, rarely used. Instead, Jewish tradition tends to use Elohim, a male plural form of the same word. Rabbi Artson describes a modern playful combination of this word with the word for “mommy” – Ema – Elohema.
Aspects of God: In Kabbalistic thought (Jewish Mysticism) there are ten sephirot – aspects of the Divine. Hokhmah means wisdom; Binah means discernment or insight.
Many thanks to Elaine Goodman (member of St. Benedict’s), and to Rabbis Linda Bertenthal (of Congregation Beth David) and Janice Mehring (of Congregation Ohr Tzafon) for compiling this glossary of Hebrew words.


A violent storm at Asgardstrand is said to have inspired this picture. The force of the wind os suggested by the bending of the central tree, continued in the cloud striations above it, and the wisps of hair blown up from the head of the
woman in white. The women cover their ears with their hands, as if to shut out the whistle of the wind and the wail of the sea; the central building has been identified and stood on the coast at Asgardstrand. But the blurred forms,
softened contours and highly atmospheric treatment give the scene a spectral quality, with the women emerging like phantoms. In consequence it is easy to conceive that nature's turbulence is intended to reflect an inner turbulence of the
mind. Just what is this spiritual malaise, however, is difficult to determine. Here Munch combines several different themes he used in other pictures of the 1890s,
producing an enigmatic result. Firstly, the hands placed over the ears,
as in The Scream
, probably expresses some sort of fear. Secondly, the lonely individual, the woman in white, separates herself from the crowd. Thirdly, this woman walks down the pathway through the rocks
towards the sea, not shown but to be reached very soon. Munch often depicted the sea as a medium through which the light of the sun or moon would, to quote Caradoc Evans, 'call virgins to awake'. Dressed in white, this woman is clearly
virginal, and storm or no storm, she must be facing the moon, else her costume could not possibly shine with such brilliance. Fourthly, there is the background building which the women have apparently left, with the tree bisecting it like
a nose between quadruple eyes. In some of Munch's paintings such buildings are obviously sources of fear and that may be the meaning intended here. It has been suggested that the building is lit up because a wedding feast is taking place.
Were this the case, the bride would be leaving in fearful anticipation to call on natural forces to arouse sexual desire; in Munch's mind man's life was part of, and wholly determined by, the general evolution of nature, and sexual
intercourse associated with fear of the inevitable cycle of life and death.


Originally published in NextAvenue.org
There’s a saying: When White America catches a cold, Black America catches pneumonia. So, if there is an impending retirement crisis in America, what does that mean for African Americans? The answer to that question is discouraging.
There is a huge gap in retirement preparation of African Americans compared to White Americans, generally speaking. According to the Urban Institute’s Nine charts about wealth inequality in America:
The average White family had more than $130,000 in liquid retirement savings (cash in accounts such as 401(k)s,
403(b)s and IRAs) vs. $19,000 for the average African American in 2013, the most recent data available.
The wealth gap is growing. The average wealth of White families in 2013 was more than $500,000 higher than that of African American families ($95,000). In 1963, the average wealth of White families was $117,000 higher than for Black families.
According to the Federal Reserve, in 2013, the median White household had $13 in net wealth for every $1 in net wealth of the median Black household.
White families accumulate more wealth over their lives than African American families, on average, which widens the wealth gap as they age. In their 30s, Whites have an average of $140,000 more in wealth than African Americans (three times as much). By their 60s, Whites have over $1 million more in wealth than African Americans (11 times as much).
“The American dream has not happened for African Americans and Hispanics,” says Signe-Mary McKernan, economist and co-director, opportunity and ownership initiative at the Urban Institute. “Retirement wealth is at the end of the cycle. A lot of things can happen along the way before you get there.”
The pay gap and the wealth gap are among the many reasons African Americans enter retirement in poor financial shape, says Maya Rockeymoore, President of Center for Global Policy Solutions in Washington, D.C. Other explanations include financial literacy and investing habits.
The Pay Gap
“There is a pay gap when it comes to what African Americans earn when it compares to Whites, even when you control for education,” says Rockeymoore. “We are starting with less.”
The hourly pay gap has widened to the worst in 40 years, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) — a roughly 27 percent difference in 2015. Whites earned an average of $25.22 an hour vs. $18.49 for Blacks, the EPI says. Declining unionization, the failure to raise the minimum wage and lax enforcement of anti-discrimination laws have contributed to the growing Black-White wage gap, according to the EPI.
“We need to be having forums addressing labor-market decisions,” Rockeymoore says. Blacks are earning less than Whites and it is not a reflection of talents or skills, she notes. “It is a reflection of discrimination in the labor market. We talk about the gender-pay gap, but we need to talk about the racial-pay gap.”
The Wealth Gap
According to the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances, in 2013, the median White household had $13 in net wealth for every $1 in net wealth of the median Black household. Also, according to a Pew Charitable Trusts report, “What Resources Do Families Have For Financial Emergencies”, the typical White household has slightly more than one month’s worth of income in liquid savings, compared with just five days for the typical African-American household.
The Federal Reserve report said that Whites are five times more likely to receive large gifts and inheritances than Blacks and the amounts tend to be much larger for Whites. “That is one of the main issues,” says financial planner Nick Abrams of AJW Financial Partners in Columbia, Md. “We [African Americans] are starting at ground zero every generation. That is hurting us financially.”
Rockeymoore agrees. “The wealth gap is serious,” she says, pointing to disparities between Blacks and Whites regarding employer-sponsored retirement plans.
“A significant number of us [Blacks] are in jobs where we do not have access to pre-tax preferred retirement vehicles like 401(k) or 403(b) accounts,” says Rockeymoore. Many Blacks work in small businesses where such plans frequently are not offered.
“If we do work in jobs that offer tax-preferred vehicles, we tend to not contribute at rates that Whites do. And we take out loans at higher rates,” adds Rockeymoore.
One solution, she notes, would be more access to such employer-sponsored plans.
Home ownership also plays a big part in the wealth gap. The typical White household aged 47 to 64 has housing wealth of $67,000; the typical household of color in this age group has zero home equity, according to the December 2016 report, “Social Security and the Racial Gap in Retirement Wealth”, from the National Academy of Social Insurance.
Debt can limit the ability to achieve other financial goals, especially retirement planning, too. “Among African American employees surveyed who are offered an employer-sponsored retirement account but contribute less than the employer match or do not contribute at all, 40 percent say that paying down debt is a higher priority for them than making retirement contributions, according to Prudential’s 2015-2016 African American Financial Experience.
There are also big differences in financial literacy between Blacks and Whites. Only one in 10 African Americans work with a financial professional compared with one in four White Americans, the Prudential report said.
“Many African Americans have had no history of someone who was a grandfather or someone who gave them some level of financial education in that household,” says James Brewer, president of Envision Wealth Planning in Chicago and president of the Association of African American Financial Advisors. “So, one of the challenges is around some level of financial education.”
Theodore Daniels, president of the Society for Financial Education and Professional Development, agrees. “There has got to be more education. People have got to be willing to attend financial education workshops. Some people don’t know what they don’t know. Once they attend, they say ‘I can do this.’ If they are not educated, they are not comfortable making decisions, and they won’t do it,” Daniels notes.
Some analysts also say that African Americans often shy away from investing in the stock market. “Whatever discretionary income we have, we tend not to invest in equities,” says Rockeymoore. “We don’t have a diversification.”
This may be due to a lack of comfort with the stock market.
“African Americans are risk-averse,” says Deborah Owens, a former Fidelity Investments vice president who calls herself America’s Wealth Coach. “So, one of the major reasons they have less in retirement savings is they are ultra-conservative, particularly African Americans who work in the public sector and nonprofit organizations.”
Owens says Black investors typically focus on guaranteed or fixed investments that are low-risk or no-risk. As a result, their retirement funds aren’t compounding at a high rate of return.
According to the Federal Reserve, the average balance of African Americans in 401(k)s is only $23,000. And Social Security and the Racial Gap in Retirement Wealth found the average balance for African Americans in pensions and IRAs was $10,300 vs. $105,600 for White Americans.
Owens believes many African American workers don’t take full advantage of all the choices in their employer-sponsored plans because they don’t understand them. “The tendency to be risk averse is directly correlated to their lack of knowledge,” she says.
What Employers and Policymakers Could Do to Help
Brewer believes employers could play a bigger educational role.
“It is important for companies or organizations who have higher percentages of African American employees to realize that there are some differences, and they need to bring in people who have some cultural sensitivities to those differences, and come up with a plan to help those groups,” says Brewer.
He says African Americans need financial advice on issues such as having higher student loan debt than White counterparts and, often, a greater need to financially assist less affluent family members. Rockeymoore says African Americans, even in retirement, tend to support other family members, including children and adult children. Also, they are disproportionately taking care of grandchildren, making them unable to save more for retirement.
All in all, says Rockeymoore: “There needs to be a national campaign to encourage young African Americans to save and invest. Home ownership is the pathway to wealth. They [Blacks] need to be educated in the homebuying process and also to diversify their investments to include stocks and bonds.”
McKernan believes policymakers also need to take action to close the racial retirement security gap. “This country is built on the premise that it provides economic opportunity,” she says. “But this country continues a history of discrimination and the result of that is passed from generation to generation.”
Rodney Brooks is a personal finance and retirement writer whose work has appeared in USA Today, The Washington Post and elsewhere.


An early stepped
Build a Pyramid
The ancient Egyptians loved pyramids. There are
sixty-seven, of various sizes, scattered around the city of Cairo
alone. The most famous, and largest, are at Gizeh, where what
is believed to be the three tombs of Khufu, Khafre, and Menkure,
are lined up side by side.
The end tomb, Khufu's, which is often referred
to as "The Great Pyramid," just by
itself is an impressive structure. It stood 480 feet tall when
completed and contains twice as much volume as the Empire State
Building. Until the 19th century it was the tallest building ever
erected. Not bad for a structure 45 centuries old.
So, how did the ancient Egyptians construct such
an impressive monument so long ago? Some wild theories exist.
Swiss Author Erick von Daniken suggested
that aliens assisted the construction using advanced technology.
Herodotus of Halicarnassus, a Greek writer who viewed the pyramids
around 450 B.C. was told that giant machines were used to lift
the blocks into place with the aid of 100,000 slaves working,
for the entire year, for twenty years.
Probably neither of these are correct. Most likely
the Pharaoh employed a large work force, indeed as many as 100,000
men, but for only a fraction of the year. During the months of
July, August, September and October, the Nile River flooded the
land. This was actually a blessing for the Egyptian farmers as
it allowed new fertile soil to be laid down over the fields. But
it meant the farmers were unable to grow crops during this period.
It is likely that the Pharaoh required his subjects to work on
public projects, like the pyramids, during this season.
Egyptian records indicate that the laborers, while
being drafted against their will, were actually well cared for
by ancient standards. Regulations have been found covering the
maximum amount of work allowed per day, the wages received and
holidays entitled to, each worker. By only requiring work to be
done during flood periods, the Pharaoh could get a lot done without
impacting the normal Egyptian economy.
He probably also employed a much smaller work force
year round on the project. Some would have been employed doing
the skilled stonework while others planned and prepared the site
for the laborers that would be available during the next flood
The shape of the pyramid are the logical one for
producing buildings of great height when the building material
available is stone. The design mimics the natural geometry of
a mountain, an incline of about 52 degrees. The Egyptian architects
realized the ever widening base would easily support the increasing
number of stone blocks above it making the structure very stable.
An average 2 and 1/2 ton limestone block used in
the pyramid construction would have probably taken 8 men nine
or ten days to move from the quarry, float across the Nile, and
drag to the top of the pyramid.
most likely method of getting the blocks to the top of the structure
was through massive construction ramps. Exactly how the ramps
were laid out is unknown and have been the source of heated debate
between archeologists for many years. A long straight ramp (as
pictured in the recent film 10,000 B.C.) seems to have
been too massive and impractical for something as big as the Great
Pyramid. To reach the top with a shallow enough grade to be able
to pull stones up it the ramp would have needed to be a mile in
length and contain a volume of material equal to that of the Great
A more practical design would have been a spiral
ramp going up around the pyramid. However, such an arrangement
would have only allowed a narrow path to the top and the turns
at each corner would have been difficult to negotiate while towing
a 2 ½ ton stone.
French architect Jean-Pierre Houdin advanced the
theory that a spiral ramp was used on the inside of the pyramid
to move the stone blocks. According to Houdin a straight external
ramp was used to get materials to the 140 foot level. From there
workers dragged the stones through a set of gently rising tunnels
just inside the outer walls. The last tunnel would exit on the
monument's top. A 1986 microgravity survey of the pyramid discovered
a peculiar anomaly: a less-dense structure in the form of a spiral
within the pyramid that may turn out to be what is left of Houdin's
tunnels. Scientists are now seeking permission from the Egyptian
government to do more non-invasive tests that would prove or disprove
Whatever the shape of the ramps may have been topped
with a surface of Tafla, a clay. Tafla, when wet, becomes very
slippery and may have allowed the Egyptian builders to use shorter,
steeper ramps than might have otherwise been possible. By wetting
the ground in front of the block a slick path would be created
allowing the stone to be dragged by rope as it sat on sledges.
It is also possible the stones could have been moved
on rollers. By placing rounded logs under the stone, crude wheels
would have made the load easy to pull. Pictures inscribed on ancient
monument walls, though, suggest the blocks were dragged without
the aid of rollers. Once a stone was at the top of the pyramid,
it was probably moved into its final position with the use of
We can see the Egyptains didn't become great pyramid
builders right away. They needed some practice. They started by
cutting tombs into the rock of the desert floor and building mastabas
(from the Arab word meaning "bench") over them. Mastabas were
raised, flat, platforms. Some were twenty-five feet high and two-hundred
feet square. Imhotep, architect to the Pharaoh Zoser, changed
this by building his king a mastaba and then placing another,
smaller mastaba right on top of it. On top of that he placed another
even smaller mastaba. When he was finally done the structure had
six levels and resembled a stepped pyramid.
number of stepped pyramids were built after that, but the most
interesting is the one at Meidum built for Pharaoh Seneferu. It's
an example of an early design that failed. The pyramid, which
has four levels, is in near ruins today with many of its blocks
laying in a heap around the base. Why did it do so poorly when
many other pyramids are in much better shape? The architect of
this pyramid apparently had not yet learned the importance of
laying the foundation on solid rock rather than sand. Also, the
construction trick of tilting the blocks on a slope inward toward
the center of the pyramid had not been invented. By tilting the
blocks slightly inward, the weight of the blocks helped lock them
into the structure.
Without this trick and with a poor foundation, the
pyramid at Meidum was easily shaken apart during earthquakes.
Later, better built pyramids show that the Egyptians learned as
they built and their masterpieces have stood the test of the centuries.
Copyright Lee Krystek 1997.
All Rights Reserved.


SocialFunds.com -- The second edition of the Climate Vulnerability Monitor, commissioned by the 20 nations of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF) and conducted by DARA, paints a grim picture of the future of a world in which climate change remains unchecked.
The report found that climate change is already responsible for 400,000 deaths per year, and the global carbon-intensive economy accounts for another 4.5 million annually. In 2010, economic losses from the carbon economy and climate change totaled more than $1.2 trillion, or almost two percent of global gross domestic product (GDP).
And that's what's happening already. By 2030, the report warns, "A combined climate-carbon crisis is estimated to claim 100 million lives between now and the end of the next decade." Furthermore, "Global GDP in 2030 is estimated to be well over 3% lower than it would have been in the absence of climate change and harmful carbon-intensive energy practices."
Not at all surprisingly, the hardest hit has been and is most likely to remain the world's poor. "Least Developed Countries (LDCs) faced on average in excess of 10% of forgone GDP in 2010 due to climate change and the carbon economy, as all faced inequitable access to energy and sustainable development," the report states. Nevertheless, "The whole world is affected by these comprehensive concerns," the report continues. "250 million people face the pressures of sea-level rise; 30 million people are affected by more extreme weather, especially flooding; 25 million people are affected by permafrost thawing; and 5 million people are pressured by desertification."
As is well understood by now, things are going to continue to get worse before they begin to improve, even if the global community were to fully embrace a low-carbon economy today. "The world is already committed to a substantial increase in global temperatures," the report warns, due to a number of factors; not the least of which is the lack of meaningful action by many national governments.
Nevertheless, "The losses incurred already exceed by a significant margin any costs of reducing emissions in line with a low-carbon transition," the report points out, and there is time yet to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. But national policymakers will have to commit firmly to the establishment of a low-carbon economy, and international efforts must be coordinated to mitigate the impacts on the world's poorest.
The report also provides recommendations for investors, advising them to perform comprehensive risk analyses that allow for the emergence of a low-carbon economy. For example, "only a very narrow window of legislative action in favor of a firm response to climate change would strand half or more of the world's existing stockpiles of carbon-based fuels as unmarketable." Therefore, if companies in carbon-based energy sectors cannot demonstrate to investors a robust plan for diversification into low-carbon alternatives, "corporate leadership are carrying investor resources along a risky political gamble."
Many more recommendations aimed at all key stakeholders are included in this important report. The 2015 deadline for meeting the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs), which were developed before the impacts of climate change were fully understood, is in serious jeopardy, and "the MDGs may not now be fully attained unless additional resources are devoted to the cause, targeting in particular progress specifically jeopardized by climate change impacts."


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Bamboo is one of the most versatile landscape plants for the home garden, impressive as a specimen and when trained as a privacy screen. In Tasmania, it also is grown for food and as a garden construction material, handy for making everything from trellises to ornamental fences. The two basic types of bamboo are clumpers and runners. Clumping varieties grow from a central core and spread very little. Runner-type bamboo spreads quickly by means of underground rhizomes sent out in all directions to propagate the plant. The Permaculture Association of Tasmania recommends a number of species of each type along with their respective varieties.
Choose a location that is suitable for the type of bamboo you have selected, as clumping varieties tend to prefer shade areas with filtered sunlight whereas runners are adapted to full sun. Check the site requirements for your species of bamboo and locate accordingly.
Make your planting holes twice as wide as the roots of the bamboo. Loosen the soil for another 1 foot around the planting to make it easier for the roots to penetrate and spread. Make each hole deep enough so that the base of the plant is 1 inch above ground level after planting.
Irrigate the bamboo with 5 gallons of water after planting. Repeat for the first three days. Provide 1 inch of water per week during the first year of growth thereafter. Adjust your watering to local conditions and check the plants for any curling of the leaves, which indicate a lack of water.
Install a root barrier, if your are planting runner type bamboo. Keep the plants under control, especially if you plant them next to an adjoining property. Make a solid root barrier of wood, metal or plastic, with the latter being the most common type and the easiest to install. There also are very thin films specially made to stop for bamboo rhizomes. Dig a trench around the bed or along a property line and install the barrier to a depth of 30 inches. Keep at least 2 inches of the barrier above grade after installation to prevent the rhizomes from growing over the top. Prune the rhizomes when they come to the surface after hitting the barrier.
Spread 3 to 4 inches of mulch around the bamboo to help retain water and provide organics to the soil.