Wishing you long life, health and happiness - a celebration of longevity

A few days ago, ex-US president Jimmy Carter passed away, having only recently celebrated his 100th birthday on 1st October, and it got me thinking...

It reminded me that after again watching the marvellous 1971 film The French Connection I looked for for more info and discovered that Gene Hackman is still alive and kicking – he'll be 95 next month! 

As I looked at Hackman’s body of work, I noticed that Warren Beatty and Faye Dunnaway his co-stars in the 1967 movie Bonnie and Clyde are also still with us, currently 87 and 83 respectively. 

Impressed and delighted, I started compiling a list of elderly famous faces, not just actors, adding to to the list as and when someone popped into my head. 

The list got longer and longer and I didn't really know what to do with it until now because Jimmy’s passing has reminded me that at the end of the year we often look back at the people we’ve lost in the last 12 months and I thought it would be nice, a good idea, to celebrate the people who are still with us. 

Some tenuous London links to Jimmy Carter:
A ghostsign in Walworth Rd, scraffito in Carter Lane EC4, a cafe in Homerton (also RIP), Carters' Steam Fair (shown during its last travelling show in July 2022) and mosaic threshold in Maida Hill (more here)

To keep the of list short, I am here showing only those people are at least 90 years old at the time of writing (31 Dec 2024). This means that Warren and Faye haven't made the cut. I'm sure there are many other any other Jazz Age babies who haven't as yet popped into my head – please let me know if you can add to the list. Titles and awards excluded (Sir, Dame, OBE, etc).

Eva Marie Saint, 4 July 1924 

June Lockhart, 25 June 1925

Dick Van Dyke, 13 Dec 1925

David Attenborough, 8 May 1926

Desmond Morris, 24 Jan 1928

Mel Brooks, 28 June 1926

Estelle Parsons, 20 Nov 1927

Noam Chomsky, 7 Dec 1928

Frank Gehry, 29 Feb 1929 

Joan Plowright, 29 Oct 1929

Tippi Hedren, 19 Jan 1930

Buzz Aldrin, 20 Jan 1930

Gene Hackman, 30 Jan 1930 

Robert Wagner, 10 Feb 1930

Joanne Woodward, 27 Feb 1930 

Douglas Hurd, 8 March 1930 

Jasper Johns, 15 May 1930  

Clint Eastwood, 31 May 1930

Bernie Ecclestone, 28 Oct 1930 

Robert Duvall, 5 Jan 1931 

Norman Tebbit, 21 March 1931

Barbara Eden, 23 Aug, 1931

Rita Moreno, 11 Dec 1931

Gerhard Richter, 9 Feb 1932 

Prunella Scales, 22 June 1932

Phylidda Law, 6 July 1932

Ellen Burstyn, 7 Sep 1932

Petula Clark, 15 Nov 1932 

Katharine, Duchess of Kent, 22 Feb 1933 

Frankie Valli, 3 May 1934

Kim Novak, 13 Feb 1933

Sheila Hancock, 22 Feb 1933 

Michael Caine, 14 March 1933

Michael Heseltine, 23 March 1933 

Joan Bakewell, 16 April 1933

Willie Nelson, 29 April 1933 

Joan Collins, 23 May 1933

Roman Polanski, 18 Aug 1933

Tom Skerritt, 25 Aug 1933

Tom Baker, 20 Jan 1934 

Richard Chamberlain, 31 March 1934

Shirley Jones, 31 March 1934 

Jane Goodall, 3 April 1934 

Shirley MacLaine, 24 April 1934

Frankie Valli, 3 May 1934 

Alan Bennet, 9 May 1934

Nanette Newman, 29 May 1934

Eileen Atkins, 16 June 1934

Jamie Farr, 1 July 1934

Jean Marsh, 1 July 1934

Sofia Loren, 20 Sep 1934

Brigitte Bardot, 28 Sep 1934

Judi Dench, 9 Dec 1934 

You'll also find a short version of this on Substack 

Department of National Heritage – two blue plaques in Holloway, N7*

(Edited from my Substack feed):
At the southern end of Tufnell Park Road, N7, almost opposite the Odeon cinema, there are some of Holloway’s oldest houses. Two of them sport elliptical blue plaques* and I’ve often stopped to admire them without really thinking about them, as I did again whilst out for a stroll last week:

Until I started writing this, I hadn’t noticed it is actually one house with an extension at the side, which today is a separate house with its own front door. As you can see, the main property is currently available for rent. Also, the darker of the two badges sits at the centre of the paired villas so might also apply to its symmetrically opposite partner to the right (mostly out of shot here).

Department of National Heritage / Grade II listed house

I’ve not seen the like anywhere else in London and I wonder if this elliptical design predates the ubiquitous circular ones?

Being as these are different shades of blue, I’d assume they were affixed at different times. I’m tempted to date the darker one on the main part of the house to the late 1880s when this was an upwardly mobile area for the middle classes** - the people living in these older houses at that time would likely have been keen to prove the historical kudos whilst proclaiming ‘we were here before you!’The lighter badge would surely have been added when the house was subdivided into two properties.

UPDATE: Hmm. Ah No... Turns out they might only date from 1982: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-of-national-heritage

Whenever they date from, I'm pretty sure that these two small beauties are the only blue plaques of any kind in N7.

………..

*Plaques or badges? Is it a size thing?

**Yes, really! Find out more on my Mr Pooter’s Holloway guided tour bringing The Diary of A Nobody to life, soon to be available in January via janeslondonwalks.com

This Wall Has Artistic Importance – Waithman Street, EC4

If you venture up the stairs at the side of 100 New Bridge Street, EC4 (heading for Carter Lane) turn immdiately right at the top into Waithman Street. Here you will find a wall featuring approx 12 panels (could be more than that, I forgot to count them). 

I took these pics back in August 2021 and completely forgot to do anything with them until now, purely because someone told me that this area is due for regeneration. Indeed, these panels might have been removed by now. I will go and check again soon, but for now here are some of the pics I took three years ago showing some of the pleasing repeat patterns that can be created by a limited range of shapes. 

Along the wall there are occasional small plaques that tell us...

Nice eh? It's the sort of thing I would have been mesmerised and inspired by as a child when one of my favourite hobbies was designing repeat patterns on graph paper. Here are a couple of my efforts from age 8/9.

Actually, having dug out that scrapbook, I now see that I have created more bubble pics than any other type. Hmmm... I'll have a think about how include those as part of a future post. 

Brixton Bovril to Bovril Castle

In central Brixton, near the library and facing the Town Hall, there is a huge ghostsign advertising Bovril*, a beef extract product that is still available today. 

Bovril was created by John Lawston Johnson in 1897 – its popularity and success enabled him move into and adapt a house that can be found a few stops along the railway line from Brixton, at Kingswood House, Sydenham Hill. Indeed the house is better known as Bovril Castle and is today home to an Kingswood Arts centre. I went there recently as part of an organised guided tour and found it to be an absolute delight...

Opposite Brixton station entrance in Atlantic Road there's a different type of ghostsign showing that this used to be a branch of Stone (television and radio). It's been looking like this for over 15 years and I'm always surprised that no one has yet simply wiped away the dirt:

Up to the platform. Brixton station is lovely. I love the fancy wooden canopies and the metalwork:

Sydenham Hill station is cute but very strange. From the lovely footbridge there's an evocative view into tho tunnel heading southward:

On the southbound platform there's a tiled artwork created by young people that appears to be missing some elements. On exiting the station, there's no proper street – instead you make your way up this stepped ramped path that leads into a post-WW2 housing estate. I hear that the station had originally been built merely to serve Kingswood House, there being nothing else in the immediate vicinity. 

The shops in Seeley Drive were all closed or empty bar one. It all seemed very quiet and spooky. Where were the locals?

I spotted some creative graffiti on what I assume used to be a fountain in the grounds of the Kingswood House. I was early for the tour so I walked around the house and looked back at it from near the benches by the kids' playground. It's easy to see why it's called a castle. 

Ooh... the guide opened the doors so I headed over to the house and spotted an intriguing maker's plaque within a rusty crackled panel that I assume allows access to the basement. The plaque is for John Tann of 11 Newgate, London. 

The name rang a bell and later I recalled I'd seen the same name on a wall in Hackney advertising a family business that made security products, specifically safes and vaults. Indeed the Tanns are credited as making the very first safe – more here which makes for fascinating reading if you have an hour or so!

And so into Kingswood House. The room our tour started in still retains some marvellous old plasterwork on the ceiling, said to be Tudor era, though I am not sure why depictions of Alexander and Hector Troy are repeated across the space. Perhaps they simply denote power and leadership?

The fireplace surround is also impressive, both the wood and the plasterwork within. In fact the whole building is littered with architectural details of the most marvellous kind, the guys at Kingswood Arts having spent ages painstakingly restoring the building after years of neglect in the latter part of the twentieth century. This includes a lovely marble floor in the conservatory (which I completely forgot to photograph) that was covered in carpet which had been glued directly onto the marble. Crazy!  

Here follows some more pics which show the parquet floors, panelled walls, a sun damaged tapestry and a wonderful galleried room.   

Do pop in and have a look. Kingswood Arts centre is a crowdfunded facility for arts of various kinds and is also available for hire for events. There's also a good cafe there too.

*There also a few lines on there advertising Butlin's holidays, but people rarely notice that!

Mapping the Tube 1863-2023 – A chronology of Harry Beck's (and others') London Underground maps at The Map House, 54 Beauchamp Place

One for fellow map nerds and London Transport fans. There is an excellent exhibition at The Map House showing the evolution of the tube map, the like of which I am not sure has been seen before. 

In the gallery room at the rear of the shop there is an arrangement of framed pocket maps that clearly shows how the tube map has been adapted as new routes and stations have been added to comply with Harry Beck's original design.  

The first pic above shows the earliest folding pocket map printed in 1911. I found the wall of maps totally absorbing and for quite some time I played a kind of spot the difference comparing one map to the next, particularly interested in a period when both the Bakerloo and Northern lines were shown as parallel verticals.

Another thing that interested me was the inclusion of the Victoria line in the 1960s – first designed as a complete diagonal. On the opposite wall there are some of Beck's original pencil sketches which include this idea. 

There are also other unique pieces here as well as large format posters and folding maps. 

The exhibition was due to finish this month but they tell me it will now extend to mid-December

If you can't get to the exhibition before it closes, all the maps will continue to be available at the shop and online, as well as many other maps and globes and prints on various subjects etc.