Beauty pageant at Black Rock

The Black Rock Lido, a once beloved fixture of Brighton’s seafront, opened its doors on 8 August 1936. The Art Deco building boasted a 165 by 60 foot pool filled with over 330,000 gallons of crystal-clear water. More than just a swimming spot, the lido offered sunbathing terraces, a top-notch restaurant, a paddling pool for children - and a venue for beauty pageants! One such gala - from 60 years ago - was captured in a Michael Gillings film, now freely available to view at the British Film Institute website.

According to Tim Carder’s Encyclopaedia of Brighton, the name Black Rock probably came from a large rock or cave that existed at the foot of the cliffs, though it may have arisen because colliers were forced to unload their cargos outside the then town boundaries to avoid local coal taxes. Precisely for that reason, Black Rock was chosen in 1818-1819 by The Brighton Gas Light and Coke Company to build a coal-gas production works. Carder notes that some terraced housing followed, as did the opening of an inn, The Abergavenny Arms. In 1901, Volk was granted permission to extend his railway east from the Banjo Groyne all the way to Black Rock.

The lido, in its heyday, drew up to 80,000 visitors annually, hosting impressive swimming displays and even being considered as a training ground for Olympic athletes. The pool continued to operate during the war years, and after the war it hosted beauty pageants. The BFI online has a fabulous film of the 1965 pageant. Here’s the caption: ‘Michael Gillings’ remarkable film, made on a breezy day, sees would-be beauty queens parading for the judges at the 1965 Miss Brighton contest. The contestants strut along the poolside at Black Rock Lido, though the wind plays havoc with their elaborate bouffant hairdos. The contest continues later in the day, though now in sunshine, to a packed audience. After much posing in line-ups a winner is eventually chosen and photographers and officials swarm around her.’

Unfortunately, the pool’s glory days were numbered. The 1970s brought the construction of Brighton Marina, which spelled trouble for the once-popular swimming spot. Construction dust and noise drove visitors away, and attendance plummeted. Structural issues emerged, with the pool developing cracks and beginning to tilt. By 1978, the lido had shut its doors for the last time. It was demolished the following year.

For decades after, the site lay dormant, an ugly buffer between the Marina and the joys of Brighton Beach stretching miles to the west. Various redevelopment ideas have come and gone, but none took hold. Brighton & Hove City Council does have ambitious plans to rejuvenate the eastern seafront - see, for example, ‘Fantastic new refectory’ - but the site of the pool remains no more than a car park. Memories of visiting the pool as well as old photographs can be found at My Brighton and Hove.

The most important factor

After yesterday’s exuberant enjoyment of the city’s beach and bathing facilities (see Feel free to whoop), let us go back 240 years to the 1780s, when there was no lesser craze for salty water, nor any less of a connection between the sea and the town’s fortunes. Here is the introduction to a history of Brighton as found in A History of the County of Sussex. (The image - from the same source - is captioned: Brighton from the East Cliff 1875).

‘The County Borough of Brighton contains 10,503 acres and includes the ancient parishes of Brighton, Preston (part), Patcham, Ovingdean, and Rottingdean. The original parish of Brighton lay on the southern slopes of the Downs near the centre of the bay which stretches westward from Beachy Head to Selsey Bill. It was divided by the valley of the Wellesbourne, now occupied by the Steine and the Level. To the east of the valley the cliffs rise steeply from the sea; the soil is all chalk, but the under-cliff, which has been eroded by the sea, may have been an alluvial deposit. The Downs behind the town rise to some 500 ft above the sea-level and the main roads from London and Lewes crossed them to meet to the north. Many towns in England underwent a great transformation in the 18th century, but in some ways the process at Brighton was unique. The sea has always been the most important factor in the history of the town. It has been from the earliest times both its great enemy and also its chief means of subsistence. The fisheries absorbed the greater part of the population; arable farming was limited, and sheep-farming, though profitable, did not employ many men. In the early 18th century the town passed through a period of great depression, when by a curious stroke of fortune the sea brought back prosperity. In the first place this was due to the fashionable craze for sea-bathing as a cure for innumerable ills, but permanently it was the result of the changed attitude of English men and women towards the sea. A quotation from one of the earliest guide-books to Brighton, published in 1780, marks this change to the modern point of view.’

‘The salubrity of the air, the excellent quality of the water, the pleasing healthful and convenient situation of the town, its moderate distance from the metropolis, the unrivalled beauty of the circumjacent country, and many other advantages, both of nature and art contribute to give Brighthelmston a superiority to the other watering places. . .  On the place called the Clift there is a range of buildings commanding a fine prospect of the sea.’ 

This latter quote comes, originally, from the late 1780s guide, A Description of Brighthelmston and the Adjacent Country or The New Guide for Ladies and Gentlemen using that place of Health and Amusement - this is freely available to view online at Internet Archive. A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 7 (ed. L F Salzman, 1940) is also available online, at British History Online.

Feel free to whoop

What a bustle, what a myriad colours, what a cacophony in the sea this lunchtime, with hundreds of individuals bracing the winter waters (approx. 8 °C) for the Big Swim 2025. Friends and families were there too, in abundance, on the pebbles - enjoying, weatherwise, one of the most pleasant days of the year so far. (See also  Definition of exhilaration.)

According to the organisers - PinkNicky at Sea Lanes - the aim of the event was to celebrate International Women’s Day and to ‘create a noisy, colourful spectacle on the beach’. Another aim was to gather 1,000  swimmers across the South coast - on Brighton Beach but also in Dorset (where a parallel event was hosted by Land and Wave)..

Here’s the planned timetable for the Brighton event (to see a video of last year’s event click here).

11.00 Sponsors/Partners/Volunteers Welcome and Briefing

11.00-11.45 Swimmers arrive - Bird&Blend will be handing out tea samples (don’t forget your mugs)

11.45 Welcome and Safety Brief

12.00: Warm Up

12.10: Group Photo and Drone Coverage

12.20: Swimmers enter the water - Please do not enter the water until you hear the safety signal

1.30 Event closes - Please go to Sea Lanes event space, if you need to warm up. Please feel free to enjoy your picnic on the beach.

And here are Nicky’s suggestions for spreading ‘a little happiness’

- Bring snacks to share

- Say hello to your fellow swimmers

- Hug your swimming neighbours on the beach

- Feel free to whoop with delight as you enter the water

- If you see anyone on their own, please make them feel welcome

- Wear your most sparkly outfits

- Take a selfie and use the hashtag #thebigswim

Helpless before the froth and foam

On Brighton Beach - 

A man stands alone, apart, upon a sea wall

Waiting for what, he does not recall

For the majesty of nature to touch his spirit?

For long-forgotten memories to stir his soul?

For the largest wave to take him to the deep?

Time has wrought him older than his age

For what, for why has it brought him to this stage

As well-worn as the stones beneath his feet

As troubled as the worried waters in his view  

As wise and foolish as each imagined quest 

And does this ocean prospect halt his pinings

Bring him answers, cut short the longings?

Still fixed he is, a rock among the restless

Still as thoughtless as a mighty gale

Still ever helpless before the froth and foam

Here, once, long ago . . .

Here is the third of 25 stained glass window designs on the Palace Pier which AI and I are using as inspiration for some of these BrightonBeach365 daily posts - see Stained glass window 1 for background. This one depicts a coastal scene with sandy beach, a patchwork blue sea, and white chalk cliffs topped with green hills - reminiscent of the iconic Seven Sisters near Eastbourne. A seagull soars in the turquoise sky.

Limerick starter

By the cliffs where the wild seagulls glide,

And the waves kiss the shore in their stride,

Stands a view bathed in light,

Stained in blue, gold, and white,

A bright window where memories still hide.

Here, once, long ago . . . (in the style of Virginia Woolf)

The sea, endless, undulating, the light on it like fragments of glass scattered, shifting, uncatchable. She stood on the cliff’s edge, the air thick with salt and memory. Here, once, long ago - or was it only yesterday? - she had stood with her mother, small hand in the larger, fingers pressed into the cool linen of her dress.

‘The tide,’ her mother had said, ‘comes and goes. Just like us.’

Now the tide was low, revealing sandbars slick and golden, the blue water folding over them in sheets of silk. The white bird, fixed in its motion, rose, dipped, hovered - no, not the bird, the light. Or was it her thought, circling, returning, never quite alighting?

She had left. The city had swallowed her, the rhythm of trains and traffic erasing the lulling hush of waves. And yet, here, in this moment, the sea reclaimed her, drew her back into itself, as if she had never been gone at all. The sky stretched, the cliffs stood, the bird soared, unchanging. Only she, trembling, felt the passage of time, the slow etching of years upon the mind like wind upon the chalk-white stone.

She stepped forward, down the winding path that led to the shore, her boots slipping slightly on the damp earth. The wind pressed against her, urging her on, carrying with it the scent of seaweed and brine. She remembered running down this path as a child, feet bare, pebbles sharp beneath her soles, her mother’s voice calling her name, half warning, half laughter.

At the water’s edge, she bent, fingers skimming the foam as a wave retreated. The cold shocked her skin. A piece of sea glass, smoothed and pale, lay half-buried in the sand. She picked it up, held it to the light. Blue, like the window in the old chapel on the hill. Like the sky before a storm.

Footsteps behind her. A voice - soft, familiar.

‘You always did love the sea.’

She turned. And for a moment, the years dissolved like the foam at her feet.

Now you see them . . .

Brighton Beach is justly famed for its starling murmurations during the winter months. Usually as dusk approaches and before roosting for the night, many thousands of these birds swarm and swoop through the sky - between and near both piers - dancing together in what look like carefully-choreographed ensembles, thus creating the most mesmerising patterns. Crowds of humans gather on the beach and the pier, cameras in hand, to capture the sight. And the photographs they take can be made yet more photogenic (startling even!) with either of the piers in the background and/or the setting sun.

NOW YOU SEE THEM . . .

These two photographs were taken a few minutes apart last evening(the sun drops fairly quickly below the horizon line at this time of year). I was not able to capture the beautiful shapes made by the murmurations - though wonderful videos and gorgeous stills of them can be found elsewhere, such as on Facebook and Instagram. However, the above photo gives a sense, maybe, of how each bird twists and turns through the sky, painting the air with movement - pure, wild, and apparently weightless - to form a scene both serene and dramatic, a fleeting moment of natural beauty.

NOW YOU DON'T . . .

According to The Woodland Trust, thousands of starlings all swirling and swooping together means one thing: safety. The sheer volume of birds confuses predators like peregrine falcons and makes it much harder for them to pick off individual birds. The characteristic shapes of a murmuration come from the rapid changes in direction. Starlings have extremely fast reactions, so when one bird changes speed or direction, the birds around it do too. This also allows the birds to move within the murmuration itself, meaning that no one bird spends too much time at the edge of the group, where they’re vulnerable to predation. When roosting, apparently, they also like to snuggle up together for a warmer night.

Apart from Brighton, other famous murmuration sites include: Shapwick Heath, Somerset Levels (where six million birds were recorded in 1999); Aberystwyth Pier, Ceredigion; Leighton Moss, Lancashire; Fen Drayton, Cambridgeshire; Minsmere, Suffolk; Newport Wetlands, South Wales.

White arrows dropping from the sky

Found this morning on the pebbles in Hove - one bedraggled, dead northern gannet. Where did it come from, and how did it meet its final fate? One photographer has described these birds diving as ‘white arrows dropping from the sky’.  Unfortunately, not this one any longer,`

Northern gannets (Morus bassanus) are large, striking seabirds - with white body and black wingtips - which live in huge colonies on rocky cliffs and islands. Typically, they remain most of the year between late February and early October when they set out on a long journey to winter on the west coast of Africa. 

The northern gannets breed in their colonies between April and June, building nests from seaweed and other debris. The female lays a single egg, and both parents take turns incubating the egg for about 44 days. Once hatched, the chick is fed regurgitated fish by its parents; it fledges at around 10-12 weeks old. However, young gannets do not reach sexual maturity until reaching 4 or 5 when they join the breeding colonies and begin the cycle again. Average lifespan is 17 years, and their wingspan can reach 1.8 metres. They feed by circling high above the waves, before folding their wings back and make spectacular dives into the water headfirst to catch fish. They have special adaptations, such as air sacs in their chest and strong skulls, to withstand high impacts. 

The most significant colonies of northern gannets are located in Scotland. Bass Rock is the world’s largest: it had over 75,000 pairs (i.e. 150,000 individuals) as of about ten years ago. However, it was badly hit by Avian Flu, and the population was thought to have dropped 30% in 2023. Other larges colonies (over 10,000) also exist at St Kilda and Sula Sgeir (Outer Hebrides), and Ailsa Craig (Firth of Clyde). Elsewhere in the British Isles colonies are sited at Bempton Cliffs on the Yorkshire coast, Grassholm in Wales, and Little Skellig in Ireland (the latter with over 30,000 breeding pairs). 

Northern gannets are currently classified as ‘Least Concern’ by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, though they do face threats from climate change, pollution, and entanglement in fishing gear. Possible causes for the death of the gannet in these photos are: natural causes, i.e. old age, disease, or injury; exhaustion after severe winter storms; food shortages; pollution, which can weaken birds and make them more susceptible to disease; Avian Flu. More information can be found at Wikipedia and the Scottish Seabird Centre.

Richard Creagh’s website includes some spectacular photographs of northern gannets, as well as his own testimony of observing them (from 2017): ‘Gannets are the largest Irish seabird, with a wingspan just short of two metres. They are beautiful birds to watch, and what really sets them apart for me is their stunning dives. Ever since I first noticed them that afternoon in West Cork I’ve been drawn to those white arrows dropping from the sky in pursuit of fish. Diving from as high as forty metres gannets hit can hit the water at 60mph.’

Interestingly, there’s a comment on the same website from Stephen O’Melia who recalls watching northern gannets while swimming just along the coast from Brighton at Worthing: ‘It was around 3.00pm, about 90 minutes after high tide when a gannet approached a couple of women floating in the sea. It made an attempt to attack them but was eventually driven off by a third swimmer. But it circled round and attacked again. It later approached two other swimmers before flying off. This took place about 30 to 50 feet from the shore. I have never seen a gannet in Worthing before, and none of the other swimmers had either. No one was hurt but it was the persistency in the bird's approach which was surprising. We wondered whether it was unwell.’

Ruff’s beach photographs

This fabulous photograph of Brighton Beach was taken nearly 130 years ago by George Reuben Ruff, commonly referred to as George Ruff junior, He was born around 1858, and appears to have inherited his father’s interest in painting and photography - his father had turned professional a year two after George was born. As a young man Ruff Junior studied painting in London, producing mainly landscapes and still life. At the time of the 1881 Census, he is recorded as an ‘Art Student (Painting)’.

By the early 1890s, Ruff was back in the Brighton area taking photographs as a so-called Gentleman Amateur (with independent means). He made his home in the Preston area of Brighton but, by 1893, was living at Cambridge Villa, not far from Thomas Booth’s Natural History Museum on Dyke Road. In the 1901 Census, he was recorded at that address living with his wife Mary. In 1903, the couple adopted a young girl named Dorothy, and then they also had a son.

In the 1890s and the early 1900s, Ruff junior wandered along the beach and esplanade of Brighton’s seafront, armed with the recently introduced portable camera, snatching pictures of children paddling in the sea, boys and girls playing on the beach and other animated scenes. He also captured seaside entertainers in action. One photograph, taken in 1904, shows Professor Reddish entertaining holidaymakers on the West Pier by ‘flying the foam’ , a stunt which involved diving from the pier head on a bicycle. 

In 1905, the Ruffs moved from Coventry Street to a house a few streets away in Chatsworth Road, near Dyke Road Park. Ruff is assumed to have died in 1913 - as, thereafter, only his wife’s name appears on the voting lists.

Spartacus-Educational has an excellent history of Ruff Senior and Junior along with many examples of their work. This snap of Ruff Junior himself can also be found at that same website. However the photograph above, taken in 1896, of children on the beach - with a crisply realised image of a bathing machine and its reflection - comes from the book Palace Pier, Brighton by Albert Bullock and Peter Medcalf.

Vegetated shingle

In recent years, much progress has been made with the Black Rock Rejuvenation project but, specifically, I am curious to know how the council is progressing its plans ‘to increase the amount of vegetated shingle at the eastern seafront’. My photographs show the allocated areas fenced off from public access earmarked to allow new growth. Although there are signs of green growth, it doesn’t appear that the planned biodiversity improvements are yet thriving.

It is now nearly five years since Brighton Council’s Black Rock project was given planning approval. Achievements since then include junction upgrades at Duke’s Mound to improve pedestrian and cycle safety; upgraded crossing points and improved existing crossing points on Volk’s Railway; refurbishment and opening of the Reading Room (see ‘Fantastic new refectory’; and a new 3-metre wide boardwalk running from the existing Volk’s Workshop in the west to the Volk’s Station at Black Rock.

Council exhibition boards to be found on display in the area give plenty of information about the various aspects of the project. One, in particular, is titled ‘Black Rock Rejuvenation - Improving biodiversity’. This states:

‘The Black Rock rejuvenation will deliver significant environmental and ecological improvements, making the eastern seafront a more sustainable, accessible, and attractive place to visit. It will include the creation of an ecology trail along with removing invasive non-native species from the Kemp Town Slopes and reintroducing native plants, wildflowers, and chalk grassland. It will also seek to increase the amount of vegetated shingle at the eastern seafront. Some of it will have to be relocated to facilitate the realignment of the sea wall. However, with the additional area to be replanted and seeded there will be a net gain in biodiversity through the provision of 1.5 hectares of vegetative shingle alongside the new beach boardwalk.’ The board also shows some examples of ‘native species that are likely to form part of the reseeding and replanting’ in the first phase (see below). 

Patches of green growth can be seen in the cordoned off areas of shingle, as in the photographs above, but a lot of the growth seems to be more weed-like than a biodiverse selection of shingle flora. Time, hopefully, will allow the kales, poppies, rockroses and buck-thorns to spread and flower.

#BrightonBeach365 #BrightonBeach #Brighton #BrightonLife #VisitBrighton #BrightonUK #BrightonAndHove #brightonpier #Blackrock

Snapshots of Storm Eunice

Storm Eunice, which hit Brighton four years ago today, was an extremely powerful extratropical cyclone with hurricane-force winds. A red weather warning was issued on 17 February for parts of South West England, with a second red warning issued on 18 February, the day the storm struck, for London, the South East and East of England.

Eunice is considered to be have been one of the most powerful storms to impact the south coast of England since the Great Storm of 1987. It set a new record for the fastest wind gust recorded in England at 122 mph (196 km/h) at The Needles, Isle of Wight. A Getty Image photo of Brighton Pier was shown on the BBC website (coincidentally, very similar to my photo above). Elsewhere in the country, the storm caused the deaths of three people.

The storm wreaked havoc across a large swathe of Western, Central and Northern Europe; millions of people were left without power across affected areas, and many homes had sustained damage. The UK was particularly hard hit, with 1.4 million homes left without power at its peak.

On the day, Brighton and Hove City Council issued a news release: ‘Brighton and Hove’s beaches can be extremely dangerous in stormy weather with violent waves coming from different directions, coupled with freezing temperatures and high spring tides. Our seafront team patrol the 13km (eight miles) of our seafront and look out for the safety of the public but we urge people to keep well away from high waves and rough seas.’

From my personal diary, 18 February 2022

‘Eunice has come and gone. I cycled down to the sea front which was quite a challenge (but on returning it was like being on an electric bike!). The sea was furious, with enormous waves rolling in so high that they were at the level of the pier, and if you’d been standing on the pier boards, the sea would have been washing over your feet. The pier was, of course, closed. Large danger signs were out on the beach, deterring people from getting too close to the surf crash. There were quite a few people around, not enough to call it a crowd, and most of them were taking, or trying to take, photos. Sheltered on the east side of the pier, it was fairly comfortable to stand and watch the roaring, boiling sea, and the foam ride along the pier sides, and under, but on the west side, it was too windy, and too wet, as sea spray was more often than not filling the air. Very exciting to see. I took a few photos myself, but was afraid of the camera getting wet.’

#palacepier #BrightonBeach365 #BrightonBeach #Brighton #BrightonLife #VisitBrighton #BrightonUK

200, 100, 80, or 8 billion?

Time, I thought this morning, to consider how many pebbles there are on Brighton Beach. I decided to make my own calculation before doing any online research or employing my AI friends.

This is how I did it. 

The beach is four miles long, lets say 6.5km - see How long is Brighton Beach

At the lowest tides, there is widespread sand, so this provides a boundary to the seaward edge of the beach and to the depth of pebbles onshore.

The width of the beach at low tide might average out along the length at, say 50m; and the depth of the pebbles might vary from 0 (at lowest tides) to, say, 10 metres - making an average depth of pebbles to be 5 metres.

The total volume of pebbles therefore is 6,500 x 50 x 5.

Average size of a single pebble. This is more difficult. The pebbles vary from shingle to fist-sized. So I’ll make two calculations, one based on large average pebble size, 0.04 m cubed (0.000064), and one based on a lower pebble size, 0.02 m cubed (0.000008).

Using the large pebble size I calculate the total number of pebbles at 25,390,625,000 i.e roughy 25 billion; using the small pebble size I get 203,125,000,000 i.e. roughly 200 billion.

Next I went to Perplexity, which gave me this calculation.

Beach volume: 6,400 m (length) x 50 m (width) x 1 m (depth) = 320,000 cubic meters,

Volume of a single pebble: (4/3) x π x (0.01 m)³ ≈ 0.000004189 cubic meters,

Estimated number of pebbles: 320,000 / 0.000004189 ≈ 76.4 billion,

Therefore, it says, a reasonable estimate for the number of pebbles would be in the range of 70-80 billion.

And to ChatGPT

The beach is about 5.5 km (5500 m) long.

The average width of the pebble-covered area is around 50 m.

The average depth of pebbles is 0.5 m.

Pebbles are packed with an estimated 50 percent void space (air gaps).

The average size of a pebble is around 2 cm in diameter, meaning each pebble takes up roughly 8 cubic cm (0.000008 cubic meters).

Total volume of pebbles: 5500 × 50 × 0.5=137500

Adjusting for void space: 137500 × 0.5=68750 of actual pebbles

Number of pebbles: 68750 ÷ 0.000008 = 8,593,750,000

And, finally, I did a quick search of the Argus website where I found an article dating back to 1999 about Dr Cornwell, 63-year-old physics lecturer, who had estimated the total number of pebbles as 100 billion. ‘It would take,’ he said ‘one man about 2,500 years counting at one a second to add them all up.’ He also noted, the article said, that there are ten trillion times as many atoms in a pebble as there are pebbles on Brighton Beach!

In summary, my highest estimate is 200 billion, a scientist’s calculation is 100 billion, and two AI’s give respectively 80 and 8 billion. Clearly, much depends on the original assumptions, particularly of average pebble volume and pebble depth. But 200 billion is a mind-boggling number.

By way of trying to visualise the number 200 billion here are some comparisons.

- If you laid £1 coins end-to-end, 200 billion coins would stretch for over 1,800,000 miles, nearly 75 times around the Earth.

- If you stacked £1 coins, the pile would reach over 13,000 miles high, almost halfway to the moon.

- 200 billion is a number comparable to the number of stars in a galaxy.

Underwater fairy lights?

Found on Brighton Beach: a golden spray of tinsel? gossamer seaweed? washed up underwater fairy lights? botanical jewellery? 

None of the above. This is actually the fine, branched stems of a species of marine hydroid called Amphisbetia operculata. Hydroids are part of a larger group of animals called Hydrozoa (within the phylum Cnidaria which also includes jellyfish and corals).

Hydroids exist in a colonial polyp form. Colonies can be a few centimeters in length, but individual polyps are much smaller. Unlike many hydrozoans that alternate between polyp and medusa stages, Amphisbetia operculata does not have a medusa stage. Instead, it reproduces by releasing planula larvae, which swim for a short time before settling and growing into new colonies.

Like other hydrozoans, it is a filter feeder, relying on cnidocytes (stinging cells) for prey capture. Though they can be found in freshwater, they mostly live in shallow sea waters, attached to rocks, shells, seaweed, or other underwater surfaces. See more about Amphisbetia operculata at Aphotomarine.

Cool facts. While Amphisbetia operculata might be considered a rather lovely but otherwise benign and uninteresting sea creature, some species of hydroids have a little more pizazz about them. For example, Turritopsis dohrnii is sometimes called the ‘immortal jellyfish’. It has the unique ability to reverse its aging process - instead of dying, it can revert to an earlier life stage and start over, meaning it could, in theory, live forever under the right conditions. 

Certain hydroids, like those in the genus Aglaophenia, can grow on discarded fishing nets, ropes, or other debris, creating ghostly underwater structures that float in the currents.

And, finally, there are some hydroids that form colonies in which different polyps specialise in different tasks (some feed, some reproduce, and some defend the colony with stinging tentacles) - making for a superorganism!

Mystery Brighton Beach man

It is 15 years ago to the day that a passer-by found - on 12 February 2010 - a well-dressed man on Brighton Beach, east of the pier, soaking wet and unconscious. He was taken to the nearby Royal Sussex County Hospital where he was diagnosed with hypothermia (the beach in February is pretty cold). It soon became clear that he had no idea who he was; and although he had a few personal belongings there was nothing to identify him. There have been a few other reported cases of unidentified individuals being washed-up (literally or metaphorically) on British beaches, and the media loves a good beach mystery - see also Reggie Perrin disappears, again and again and again . . .

After exhausting various lines of inquiry, the police decided to appeal to the public, using a photograph of the mystery Brighton Beach man, and this led to his fiancee identifying him as a 26 year old from London. Although still in a fragile state two weeks later, he was said to be making a good recovery. According to the police, the man’s family was informed but neither they nor the man himself wished for his name to be released to the public. See more at the BBC and The Independent.

Some five years earlier, a disoriented individual had been found in a dripping wet shirt and tie near the beach on the Isle of Sheppey. He was taken to Medway Maritime Hospital in Gillingham, but refused to say who he was or to speak at all. However, when given pen and paper, he drew a piano (see The Guardian), and subsequently played a piano for hours, with staff describing it as a way for him to control nerves and tension. He was dubbed the ‘Piano Man’, and the case attracted international attention. Some four months later he claimed his memory had returned, and he revealed his identity as Andreas Grassl from Germany. An article in the Mirror provided a few more details: Grassl had come to Britain on a Eurostar train after losing his job in Paris; he had been planning to commit suicide when he was discovered on the beach, and he would not talk because he was so distressed. See Wikipedia.

Much more recently, in September 2023, there was a similar case of a man - this time dressed in black motorcycle gear - who was found near Weymouth’s seafront in Dorset. Initially he was unable to tell police who he was or where he came from. Investigators eventually determined that he was a 43-year-old Latvian man. See the Lad Bible for more.

A £3.75m view of Brighton Beach

For sale: a grade 2-listed, Regency mansion on Brighton’s Kemptown seafront. All yours for a sweet £3.75m. ‘This magnificent property,’ estate agent Foster & Co says, ‘enjoys panoramic sea views whilst providing unparalleled elegance across six storeys of beautiful Georgian architecture’. 

Built in 1828, 9 Eastern Terrace has an illustrious history. Although the details seem patchy, it is widely reported that in 1910, when the last King of Portugal, Manuel II, was exiled during the revolution, he fled to England, and lived for a while at 9 Eastern Terrace before moving to reside in Fulwell Park, Twickenham. In 1932, aged only 42, he died unexpectedly, from an acute swelling of the throat and suffocation. Some regarded the death as suspicious partly because, the year before, an intruder had been caught in the grounds of Fulwell, and the intruder had been linked to a Portuguese republican terrorist group.

9 Eastern Terrace later became the Royal Sussex Hotel and then part of the Municipal Training College until at least 1965. Around 1995, the property was bought for £125,000 by Doctors Jennifer and Noushin Farhoumand, both members of the Brighton and Hove Bahá'í Spiritual Assembly. Dr Noushin Farhoumand, who died in July 2023, was a distinguished consultant psychiatrist who is said to have dedicated his career to advancing mental health services and education. Jennifer Farhoumand was a consultant in public health medicine. Both were trained at Makerere University Medical School in Uganda.

Foster & Co lists the properties impressive characteristics: circa 10,000 sq. ft. across six opulent storeys, a self-contained basement apartment, five reception rooms, eight bedrooms, double-height mezzanine library, full-sized billiards room, marble fireplaces, alabaster pillars, and a spectacular sweeping stone staircase. Plus a roof terrace, balcony and private courtyards.

The Farhoumands let out their property to film makers, on at least a couple of occasions. In 1999, the production team for Neil Jordan’s End of the Affair (an adaptation of Graham Greene’s novel of the same name) selected 9 Eastern Terrace to represent a seaside hotel where pivotal scenes between the lead characters unfold. These scenes of an extra-marital affair were played by on-screen lovers Ralph Fiennes and Julianne Moore. (See The Free Library). 

In 2013, the first-floor drawing room of 9 Eastern Terrace was used for The Left-Hand Path, a supernatural thriller written by local author Louise Pennington (Baroness Bentinck), based on her erotic novel, Jessica’s Lover. Terri Dwyer, a former Hollyoaks actress, played the female lead and was quoted in The Argus as saying of the house: ‘[It] is amazing. It’s beautiful, there’s a real character to it and it’s been great to film in. When you’re doing a film it’s particularly nice when a set contributes to the role, so it’s quite easy to become Jessica in this kind of ornate, grandiose room.’

A catshark that is a dogfish

Found on Brighton Beach: a small-spotted catshark (Scyliorhinus canicula) often called a dogfish. No, it’s not sunbathing, it’s dead, probably having been scavenged (yet not consumed). Sunlight does, though,  cast a warm glow on the fish and its pebble resting place.

The slender, elongated body has a pale, creamy underside and is covered in small, dark spots. Its gills can be seen through the open mouth, and its pectoral and dorsal fins are clearly visible. The tail appears slightly curled.

The small-spotted catshark is a small shark, so named due to the dark spots and blotches covering its skin. Individuals typically grow to around 60-70 cm in length, though some can reach up to one metre. Like all sharks they have very rough skin, covered in hard ‘dermal denticles’ - which literally means ‘tiny skin teeth’. If rubbed the wrong way, the fish feel very coarse like sandpaper but this provides them with an effective chain-mail like protection. 

Catsharks are predators and feed on crabs, molluscs and other small fish. When threatened, they curl up into a donut shape - probably to look bigger and harder to eat! They are highly common around the UK, harmless to humans, and live in sandy, gravelly, or muddy seabeds. As with all sharks and rays, their egg cases are known as mermaid’s purses; these have tendrils that anchor them to seaweed or rocks until they hatch.

What about this odd confusion of names? Wikipedia gives several other names for the small-spotted catshark: sandy dogfish, lesser-spotted dogfish, rough-hound and morgay (in Scotland and Cornwall). In the early days of animal classification, naturalists like Linnaeus initially grouped most sharks under the Squalus genus (Latin for shark). Over time, scientists refined their classification, moving this particular species into the Scyliorhinus (catshark) genus in the early 1900s. However, fishermen have traditionally used the term ‘dogfish’ for any common or abundant small sharks, regardless of their actual scientific classification. 

So, if you like, you can be both a dog(fish) person AND a cat(shark) person at the same time - though not a catfish, which is something entirely different!

Arnold Bennett in Brighton

Here is Arnold Bennett, the most successful British author of the early 20th century, writing in his diary exactly 115 years ago today.

3 February 1910

‘The other morning I watched the sea-gulls helping the scavenger to scavenge the remains of the daily fish market on the beach. Rain. Strong wind. They could not alight. They had a lot of balancing and steering to do. They dived again and again for the same bit of offal, missing it, till they got it. Then each prize-winner sailed off against the wind with difficulty towards the Palace Pier, and out of my sight somewhere; but some seemed to swallow the piece en route. I was watching them alight in the water the other day; all did exactly the same; a planing descent, then, close on water, 2 or 3 half-flaps, a raising of the head, and they were afloat.’

Bennett was born into a large family in Hanley, Staffordshire, in 1867. Aged 16, he left school to work for his solicitor father, but in 1889, he escaped to London where an interest in journalism led him to become an editor, and then editor-in-chief, of a magazine called Woman. His debut novel - A Man from the North - was published in 1898, and gave him sufficient confidence, a couple of years later, to give up his day job and become a full-time writer. 

From the outset, Bennett adopted an unmistakable style, aligned to the French realists, aiming to depict a real and gritty - rather than romantic - view of life, with all its everyday and banal activities, not least when connected with poor social conditions. At the turn of the century, he moved to Paris, then buzzing with literary and artistic talent, where he stayed for the best part of a decade. During this time he met and married Marie Marguerite Soulié. 

In early 1910, Bennett and Soulié stayed for a few winter months in Brighton at the Royal Albion Hotel as the guest of its flamboyant proprietor Sir Harry Preston. Bennet had done all his research for a new book, to be called Clayhanger, and he used his time in Brighton to write most it, averaging about 1,000 words a day. The novel was published before the end of the same year, and, by early 1911, he was writing a sequel, Hilda Lessways, part of which would be set in Brighton.

Bennett’s authorial skills were put to use during the war, by the end of which he was in charge of propaganda in France. He separated from his wife in 1921, and the following year became involved with Dorothy Cheston, an actress, who bore him a daughter. Though he continued to churn out novels, their critical reputation declined during the 1920s, his literary style coming to be seen as old-fashioned. Nevertheless, his non-fiction was much sought after, and he was famously the highest paid literary journalist in England, with a weekly column in the Evening Standard. He caught typhoid on a trip to France and died in 1931.

Bennett began keeping a diary in 1896, and continued to the end of his life. The excellent journals, which were inherited by Dorothy Cheston, are said to contain over a million words. They were edited by Newman Flower and published in three volumes by Cassell in 1932-1933, titled The Journals of Arnold Bennett 1896-1928. In his introduction, Flower says Bennett’s diaries show him in the manner of a modern Pepys; elsewhere, though, they are considered to have been inspired by the famous French diaries of Edmond and Jules De Goncourt, themselves very influential in the realist/naturalist movement.

Here is another extract from Bennett’s diary written in Brighton.

5 January 1910

‘This morning at 9:45 I began to write ‘Clayhanger’. I felt less nervous and self-conscious than usual in beginning a book. And never before have I made one-quarter so many preliminary notes and investigations. I went out for a little recess, and at 1:30 I had done 1,000 words, which was very good for a first day.

We went to the Aquarium after tea, and heard mediocre music, and saw first-rate fishes, etc., living long under highly artificial conditions. The seals and alligators seemed to be intensely bored and sick of life, but perhaps they weren’t. Then I came back and wrote half an article for the ‘Nation’ about the Hanley music-hall.

Earlier in the afternoon I went out and viewed the shore, and the launching of fishing boats. All kinds of activity in progress, spoiling to be described. But now that I am on my novel I am tied up again for six months from anything really swagger in the way of description.

Weather misty. No visible round trace of the sun. The hotel is haunted by barrel organs. In fact in various ways Brighton seems to be what London was. Its architecture is old Belgravia and Tyburnian.’

And, finally, here is an extract about Brighton not from the diaries but from Bennett’s novel Hilda Lessways:

‘The putting-on of brakes took her unawares. The train was in Brighton, sliding over the outskirts of the town. . . Hilda saw steep streets of houses that sprawled on the hilly mounds of the great town like ladders: reminiscent of certain streets of her native district, yet quite different, a physiognomy utterly foreign to her. This, then, was Brighton. That which had been a postmark became suddenly a reality, shattering her preconceptions of it, and disappointing her she knew not why. She glanced forward, through the window, and saw the cavern of the station. . .

Her first disappointment changed slowly into expectant and hopeful curiosity. The quaint irregularities of the architecture, and the vastness of the thronged perspectives, made promises to her romantic sense. The town seemed to be endless as London. There were hotels, churches, chapels, libraries, and music-shops on every hand. The more ordinary features of main streets - the marts of jewellery, drapery, and tobacco - had an air of grandiose respectability; while the narrow alleys that curved enigmatically away between the lofty buildings of these fine thoroughfares beckoned darkly to the fancy. The multiplicity of beggars, louts, and organ-grinders was alone a proof of Brighton’s success in the world; the organ-grinders, often a man and a woman yoked together, were extraordinarily English, genteel, and prosperous as they trudged in their neat, middle-class raiment through the gritty mud of the macadam, stolidly ignoring the menace of high-stepping horses and disdainful glittering wheels. Brighton was evidently a city apart. . .’ 

The caricature of Bennett above (by Oliver Herford in The American Magazine) was sourced at Wikipedia, The book cover here is one of many different editions available at Abebooks.

More about Bennett and his diaries can be found in my book Brighton in Diaries (History Press, 2011)

____________________

It is winter after all

Dawn and a low tide on Brighton Beach

Sands uncovered squelching under foot

Ripples rather than waves gently rolling to the pebbles

Wind but a breeze yet a cold edge to its freshness

It is winter after all

To the west, two piers, one visible through the other

Silhouette structures, rusting geometries

A lone metal detectorist, equipped and earnest

Patterned reflections, dark and grey

It is winter after all

To the east, a rising sun so gold it could be rich

Laying down its lights and beams for all to see

And a column of fiery blazing sand 

Inviting you to walk that way, to burn

It is winter after all

 

 

Stained glass window 1

In the beginning, piers were built as landing stages for boats, though they evolved into promenades where people could enjoy the sea and the sea air without getting wet. However, there is another way of looking at piers: as the elongation of beaches. In this, I am with Rachel Carson who wrote, in her 1955 book The Edge of the Sea: ‘A pier is but a pathway for those who wish to walk where the land meets the sea, a man-made extension of the beach’s timeless conversation with the tide.’

Thus, just as I have defined the limits east and west for BrightonBeach356 - see How long is Brighton Beach? - I am now stating my intention to consider the piers as part of Brighton Beach, a la Carson!

Moreover, I am also revealing an intention to run a series of posts inspired by the much over-looked stained glass windows in the Palace of Fun building on Brighton Pier. There are 45 windows, though two have slats rather than glass, and there are 24 designs in two sizes. Most designs appear twice, and the duplicates are sometimes reversed or with a slight detail change. 

These beautiful and characterful stained glass designs seem to have been cheapened by their amusement arcade surrounds, and forgotten over time - I can find no evidence of them being designed or installed, I will, however, have more to say forthwith about these windows. Meanwhile, over the 365 days of 2025, AI and I will endeavour to let each one inspire their own daily post. 

A limerick starter

Two windmills stood high on the hill,

Turning round with a whistling thrill.

They spun day and night,

With the sea in their sight,

And they never, not once, stood still!

The Windmills and the Sea (in the style of D. H. Lawrence)

The wind rushed over the rolling hills, bending the grasses with its force, carrying the scent of the distant sea. Mary stood at the crest of the land, watching the twin windmills turning - slow, steady, relentless. They had always been there, just as her father had always been at sea, just as her mother had always stood at this same window, waiting.

Below, the land curved in smooth undulations of green and brown, reaching towards the edge where the cliffs met the vast expanse of blue-grey water. The tide was coming in, waves curling against the rocks with a kind of eternal purpose, much like the windmills.

She had grown up in their shadow, listening to their groaning creak as they spun in the wind, their movements as inevitable as the cycle of seasons. They stood like sentinels, watching over the land and the sea alike. But today, Mary felt a change. There was something different in the air, a charge beneath the steady rhythm of the blades slicing through the sky.

A figure moved near the base of the western mill - Samuel. His presence always unsettled her, a shadow in the otherwise predictable landscape. He was a man of the land, thick-shouldered, hands rough from work, and yet his eyes carried something deeper, something searching.

‘You’re watching the sea again,’ he said as he came closer, wiping sweat from his brow.

She did not turn. ‘The tide’s changing.’

He followed her gaze. ‘It always does.’

She wanted to tell him about the feeling in her chest, the stirring that had begun to take root ever since she had received word of her father’s ship - lost. Not wrecked, not sunk, just. . . missing. Somewhere beyond the horizon. She wanted to tell him that she felt as if the windmills, steady and ceaseless, were whispering something new today.

But instead, she said, ‘One day, I will leave.’

Samuel’s hands tensed at his sides. ‘And where would you go?’

She exhaled, watching the windmills, the sea, the endless sky. ‘Anywhere the wind takes me.’

A gust of wind rushed over them, and the great wooden blades groaned, turning, turning - just as they always had, just as they always would.

And yet, for the first time, Mary felt something shift.

Brighton’s first ever RNLI boat

According to the RNLI web page on the history of the Brighton Lifeboat Station, it is 200 years ago this very day (30 January) that the newly-launched Royal National Institution for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck (RNIPLS) established its first lifeboat on Brighton Beach. And it was only last year that the RNLI as a whole celebrated the 200th anniversary of its founding - it used this 1904 colourised photograph of the then new lifeboat at Brighton in its publicity for the occasion. In 2024, the organisation boasted 238 lifeboat stations (UK and Ireland) and more than 240 beach lifeguard units. Moreover, the RNLI claims its lifeboat crews and lifeguards have saved over 146,000 lives over the last two centuries. (See also RNLI to take over beach safety.)

Brighton’s very first lifeboat, according to Wikipedia, was a 22-foot vessel designed by Henry Greathead and transferred from Newhaven. It was not, however, well-suited for local waters and by 1816 had fallen into disuse. In 1824, the RNIPLS was founded. Early in 1825, it established a Brighton branch and, on 30 January, installed its first lifeboat, housed in a cave near the Chain Pier. The facility was closed in 1837 due to construction of Madeira Drive. Subsequently, various organisations - including the Brighton Humane Society and Brighton Town Council - operated their own private lifeboats.

The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), which succeeded the RNIPLS in 1854, opened a new station in Brighton in 1858 with the town council providing a space on the beach, opposite the Bedford Hotel and close to the West Pier. The first lifeboat here was a 30-foot self-righting vessel, but, according to Wikipedia, was never named, and only made three service launches. The station was moved in 1868, and then again in 1886 after the building of groynes on the beach (which hampered lifeboat movement). The new station this time was located on the Western Esplanade, between the piers, employing two of the spacious arches that were being constructed as part of seafront re-developments.

Arch 109 was used to house the RNLI’s lifeboat whilst arch 110 was used to store equipment. Meanwhile, the town council operated its own lifeboat from arch 111. The site was used continually until 1931 when the RNLI withdrew and consolidated its operations at a newly-built station in Shoreham with a motor lifeboat. Thereafter, Brighton had no lifeboats for more than 30 years, but, in 1975, donations by patrons of a public house in London called The Rising Sun, helped purchase a new boat, housed east of the Palace Pier. This served until a station at the new Marina was in operation.

Since 2011, Brighton Lifeboat Station has employed an Atlantic 85-class inshore lifeboat named Random Harvest. The station averages around 60 rescues annually within two miles of its base at the Marina.

The old arches - since the 1930s - have been occupied by Brighton Sailing Club. On the wall between arches 109 and 110 is a very worn plaque, more or less unreadable today. It records the lifeboat Robert Raikes which, in 1867, replaced three lifeboats that had been serving the town. Raikes was the founder of the Sunday School movement, and part of the funds for the boat had been raised by Sunday School children. Apparently, on the back wall of one of the arches there still remains a large ring anchored into the masonry, used to haul the lifeboat back into the arch.

161, what have you done?

Strolling along the wide Hove esplanade is always a pleasure. This morning, there was a roaring wild sea on the one side, with many a pebbles having been thrown up on the walkway, scattered, and of course the uniformly aligned and very colourful beach huts on the other. It’s hard not to notice that despite a rainbow selection of colours on the doors, there’s little in the way of pattern. All doors are either a single colour or have vertical stripes of varied or less varied colours. 

However, I found one exception this morning - beach hut 161. My immediate thought was - what have you done? Yes, it has stripes, but there’s another pattern going on too. Is that a selection of coloured pebbles scattered across the stripes, trying to organise themselves into vertical lines, trying hard to comply with the rules?

Brighton & Hove Council, of course, has a regulation on the look of beach huts. Pre-2021, they all had to be exactly the same colour, but the rules were changed so that now the roof and upper sides must be painted in a specific turquoise colour, while the Plinth and lower sides must be painted in a specific red colour. Doors, however, can be painted in any single solid colour or vertically striped in multiple colours. Good luck 161, in your endeavours to fit in and yet not fit in.

Meanwhile, it you are thinking of getting your hands on a Hove beach hut, you would probably need to pay upwards of £20,000, that’s if you can find any for sale. Moreover, there’s an annual license fee currently standing at around £500, and a transfer fee which has recently increased to 10% of the sale price or four times the annual licence fee, whichever is higher. Renting could be an option but that would cost you £1,731.89 annually!