21st Century Dodos: A Collection of Endangered Objects (and Other Stuff) (29 page)

Countries that No Longer Exist

Pick up any atlas, spin any globe, unfold any map of the world, and chances are that it will be out of date.

Mr Milne, my old history teacher (I have already mentioned him in these pages), used to have a tear in his eye when he told us, ‘There was once a day when the sun would never set on the British Empire.’ And he would proudly display his old globe with its great swathes of pink, the colour of choice for the many countries Britain somewhat impolitely annexed in days of old. That pink began to vanish like a bad rash following a couple of antihistamine tablets, once these countries claimed their independence.

But independence is not the only reason that countries change their names – revolutions, wars, political upheaval, and unification can all lead to new countries, new flags, and new national anthems.

Let us take a few moments to reflect on the following nations, large and small, that are now confined to the rare postage stamp album of history.

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English Counties that No Longer Exist

The boundaries of fair England have been fixed and set in stone for hundreds of years. No one really disputes where it ends and Scotland starts, or where Wales actually is. The English may not necessarily want to go there, but do at least know where they are.

The boundaries within England, however, have changed quite a lot over the years. In England, we currently have 48 counties. Most of these have been around for donkey’s years but governments have mucked about with them several times, and some counties have been abolished altogether.

Take plucky Avon, for example. It was created as recently as 1974, and was formed by taking bits of Somerset and Gloucestershire and sticking them together with the city of Bristol. But in 1996, it was decided it wasn’t needed, everything was put back pretty much where it was before, and no more was said about the matter.

Avon isn’t the only county to have been erased from the atlas of time. Cleveland suffered the same fate, being carved out of the North Riding of Yorkshire, also in 1974, only to be abolished and plonked back again sometime later.

Then we have the bizarre merger of Herefordshire and Worcestershire, which were squeezed together to form the single county of Hereford & Worcester (the thinking presumably being that if you took the ‘shire’ off the end of each they could fit snugly alongside each other). Twenty-odd years later they were amicably divorced, and back the way they were once more.

The same with Humberside. Some bright spark decided it deserved to be its own county until an even brighter spark thought it best to plonk it back as it was. Are you detecting a pattern here?

Interestingly enough, the Royal Mail have often chosen to ignore county changes because they proved too expensive to administer.
The most notable example of this is the postal county of Middlesex. There is no actual county of Middlesex any more; it was swallowed up by Greater London in the ’60s, but the region still remains as a distinct postal district.

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Telegrams from the Queen

We still refer to a centenarian as receiving ‘a telegram from the Queen’, even though the old dear hasn’t telegrammed anyone since 1981, when telegrams themselves ceased to be issued in the UK.

Since then, Her Majesty has resorted to sending a more traditional card, although these no longer come automatically on your birthday. Someone, presumably a relative, as you are too busy watching
Countdown
and trying to remember the names of your 24 great-grandchildren, has to apply in advance to ensure that you get the special greeting.

It is not only those of us who reach 100 who get a card from the Queen. If you live to 105, then you get another one, and then they keep coming every year till you pop your clogs. She also sends out messages to couples celebrating their 60th wedding anniversaries. Likewise, 70th and 80th anniversaries are also marked in this way.

The reason that the messages are no longer sent out automatically is quite simple – we are all living longer, and it just became too big a job to manage. Less than 3,000 telegrams were sent in the year that Elizabeth II ascended to the throne, but by 2007 there were nearly 8,500 100th birthdays alone, plus over 26,000 diamond anniversaries.

Similar traditions exist in other countries. Centenarians in the US receive a letter from the president, and in Japan they get a silver cup. But the best gift of all goes to any Irish citizens who manage to reach their 100th birthday – they get sent just over €2,500 from the president, even if they no longer live in Ireland.

I hope they blow it all on cheap booze and a night down the bingo.

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Lighthouse-keepers

While there are still a small number of manned lighthouses around the globe, the last British lighthouse-keeper handed in his keys in 1998. It is one of the first professions to become completely extinct in this country. Think about it, there are still a few coopers and blacksmiths, and possibly one or two jesters, around. Apart from executioners, I am struggling to think of another job that has completely vanished in this way.

Lighthouses would usually be manned by three keepers, often living on site for months at a time. Their job was to keep the light working – polishing the lens, trimming the wick (before the days of electricity), and other routine maintenance – at all times. Chores would be shared among the men, rotating responsibilities each day. Some lighthouses were on the mainland, and it was possible to leave them to replenish supplies as and when needed, but many were on rocks and islands out to sea, and keepers were stuck there until the next crew arrived, often two months later.

Many of the original lighthouses are still in operation, but are now automated and only require occasional maintenance – there is no need for anyone to live on site. Some of the decommissioned lighthouses have become holiday homes, or museums that are open to the public.

North Foreland lighthouse in Kent was the last one to become automated, over ten years ago.

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Pipe Smoking

Perhaps the clearest indication of the decline of pipe smoking is a quick look through the winners of the ‘Pipe Smoker of the Year’ award across the ages.

1965 Harold Wilson

Even though I am too young to remember Wilson’s time as Prime Minister (I was a toddler during his second term in the ’70s), even I instantly associate him with a pipe. Of the first 20 results on a Google image search for his name, 17 feature Wilson with one in his mouth. In several of them he is puffing away and emitting a plume of smoke. Can you imagine such a thing today – Tony Blair or David Cameron smoking a pipe in the middle of an interview? Come to think of it, it would be pretty awesome, wouldn’t it? In 1976 he won the award again, this time named Pipe Smoker of the Decade.

1968 Peter Cushing

Vanquisher of vampires, saviour of big-breasted Hammer damsels in distress, one of the finest Sherlock Holmes to appear on screen, and he was even Dr Who in the film version of the TV show. A proper English gentleman, and pipe smoker.

1969 Jack Hargreaves

Old bloke presenting programmes about country life from a shed. Smoking a pipe in nearly every piece of footage he filmed.

1970 Eric Morecambe

Comedy legend.

1973 Frank Muir

A huge hero of mine and, alongside Denis Norden, half of one of the most successful comedy writing teams of all time. He was also the longest running team captain on
Call My Bluff
. Again, archetypal English pipe smoker, and gent.

1974 Fred Trueman

Cricketing legend.

1983 Patrick Moore

Monocled nutty astronomer, and closet xylophone genius, of considerable size. Again, a classic pipe smoker.

1986 David Bryant

For those who don’t remember David Bryant, he was one of the country’s leading bowls players in an age when bowls was frequently shown on television and would garner a considerable viewing audience. He played every game with a pipe in his mouth. Later on, rules and regulations banned him from smoking while playing. He then played with an empty pipe in his mouth.

1992 Tony Benn

In what I consider to be the final great year of the award, it was given to a man who must have wondered what he had done wrong in the previous 30 years not to have won it before. Another politician permanently associated with the pipe, he saw his rival Harold Wilson win it twice, decades before he was finally given the prize.

At this point things started to go a bit wrong. It would be easy to suggest that pipe smoking had gone out of fashion, but I am not sure it had ever really been in fashion. You could also point to the increasing concerns about tobacco and health, although I would argue that pipes, although clearly not good for you, never quite had the doctors and health experts as up in arms as cigarettes. Perhaps this was because 14-year-old-kids were rarely nipping behind the bike sheds for a quick puff on a pipe. Whatever the reason, pipe smoking seems to have gone downhill after Anthony Wedgwood Benn picked up his award in 1992.