dorothy mead

Mead (1928–1975) was a British painter.

Mead was born in London, England,She first met David Bomberg (1890–1957) when he was teaching at the Dagenham School of Art in 1944.The Becontree estate was the largest public housing project in the world when it was completed in the mid-1930s. Recognising the need for education but with no responsibility to provide it, the London County Council transferred 24 acres on the western edge of the estate to Essex County Council, who built a technical college (the South East Essex Technical College) and a secondary school (South East Essex Technical High School) on the site. The College opened in 1936, in a building designed by J.Stuart.

During World War II, the College was commandeered by the British Army and the Royal Air Force.The secondary school moved to a new site in Cannington Road in 1960.The technical college was renamed Barking Regional (Meads Pieta)College of Technology in 1965, following the creation of the London Borough of Barking. In 1969 it became the Barking Campus of the North East London Polytechnic, which in turn became the Polytechnic of East London in 1988 and the University of East London in 1992.In 2006 the campus was closed and sold for redevelopment by Taylor Wimpey. Flats in the main building is being marketed as "Mayesbrook Manor", and new buildings on the rest of the site are being branded "Academy (Bomberg)Central". She followed him when he moved to the City Literary Institute in London and then to the .The City Lit is an adult education college in Covent Garden, central London, offering over 4,000 part-time courses in areas such as languages, visual arts, music, drama, humanities and more, available during the evenings, daytimes or weekends..Polytechnic where she studied under Bomberg from 1945 to 1951.he was one of the most audacious painters of his generation at the Slade. His treatment of the human figure, in terms of angular, clear-cut forms combined with enormous energy, shows his determination to bring about a drastic renewal in British painting. Mead was a founder member of the Borough Group in 1946 together with other pupils of Bomberg including Cliff Holden.

From 1956 until 1959, Mead was a mature student at the Slade School of Art, following Bomberg's inspiration.Here she met artist and teacher Andrew Forge. She had a major influence on students such as Patrick Procktor and Mario Dubsky and was the first woman president of the student annual exhibiting society, Young Contemporaries (later renamed New Contemporaries), in 1959. In the same year she was required to leave the Slade, despite having won awards for her work, as a result of her having refused to sit the course on perspective, belieivng - with Bomberg - that the approach was invalid. A thesis by her explaining her view was not accepted by the principal, William Coldstream. In the Arts Council series of touring exhibitions, Six Young Painters, Mead exhibited in 1964 with other artists including Peter Blake, William Crozier, David Hockney, Bridget Riley, and Euan Uglow(below). Mead joined the London Group of artists in 1960 and was President from 1971–73, succeeding Andrew Forge in the position.

The collection of the Tate Gallery and other art museums include work by Mead.Mead's paintings were shown at the 1991 exhibition Bomberg and his Legacy, held in Eastbourne at the Towner Art Gallery. In 2005, a retrospective exhibition was held thirty years after her death. Despite the esteem she had earned from fellow artists, it was her first ever solo exhibition.

victorian reforms

In Italy today many are calling for revolution as the government create  new economic problems every day for the people and the poor.As we drift back to what the Victorian worker experience in his period it well to remember exactly what the period was as regards its impact on the working class and the poor.
There is a general feeling present within most people's minds today that the Victorian age was one of total misery and alienation where people's lives were subjected to constant abjecation to the needs of capitalism and that of the British Empire, much of this might be true but it was also an age where reforms were carried out for diverse reasons,some because of genuine concern as regards the workers and poor classes and others because of the need to forstall revolution. Marx had said that the first worker revolution would come in the industrialised countries, he thought that no one could withstand the lives that the workers led in the United Kingdom. He was wrong revolution came in a peasant Russia.
 The Russians did not carry out reforms and so the revolution came . All revolutions only happen because of one thing , that of dire and unlivable circumstances. The French and the Russian are examples.Both of these revolutions were followed up with blood thirty vendetaas on the part of the workers and the poor, the French one the more bloody of all.
 The main reforms were made principally by Gladstone and Disraeli. But both wanted all reforms to be gradual. The idea of reforms was to have an educated work force and to avoid revolt or revolution.These reforms created one of the most advanced states in the world compared to what was happening worldwide 

Victoria’s reign (1827-1901) was an age of important reforms in the political and social fields.
The three Reform Acts:
* (1832) First Act abolished rotten boroughs, redistributed seats on a more equitable basis in the counties, and extended the right to vote to any man owning a household worth £10. For many conservatives, the effect of this act was revolutionary.A rotten, decayed, or pocket borough was a parliamentary borough or constituency in the United Kingdom that had a very small electorate and could be used by a patron to gain undue and unrepresentative influence within Parliament.

A rotten borough was an election borough with a very tiny population, often small enough that voters could be personally bribed. These boroughs had often been assigned representation when they were large cities, but the borough boundaries were never updated as the town's population declined. For example, in the 12th century Old Sarum had been a busy cathedral city but was abandoned when Salisbury was founded nearby; despite this, Old Sarum retained its two members. Many such rotten boroughs were controlled by peers who gave the seats to their sons, other relations or friends; they had additional influence in Parliament because they held seats themselves in the House of Lords.

Pocket boroughs were boroughs that could effectively be controlled by a single person who owned most of the land in the borough. As there was no secret ballot at the time, the landowner could evict residents who did not vote for the person he wanted.

In the 19th century there were moves toward reform. This political movement was successful with the Reform Act 1832, which disfranchised the 57 rotten boroughs and redistributed representation in Parliament to new major population centres. The Ballot Act of 1872 enacted a secret ballot, making vote bribery impossible as the briber has no way of knowing how the person voted.

* (1867) Reform Act extended the right to vote to all settled male tenants (the electors were two millions in England and Wales). Before the Act, only one million of the five million adult males in England and Wales could vote; the act doubled that number. In its final form, the Reform Act of 1867 enfranchised all male householders and compounding was also subsequently abolished in the process. However, there was little redistribution of seats; and what there was had been intended to help the Conservative Party . The idea of giving workers the vote may have been simply that of making them feel a part of society thius enabling them to feel they were also running the country or contributing to it. This of course may have been very far from the truth.
* (1884) The Act and the 1885 Redistribution Act tripled the electorate again, giving the right to vote to most agricultural labourers.
Women weren’t granted voting rights until the Act of 1918, which enfranchised all men over 21 and women over 30.Most women were considered to have a lack of understanding in things that needed real logic and contemplation and one gets the feeling at least myself that the powers that were thought that the vote would have been wasted on them, and of course women were not seen as a threat. Government and the powers that were had been shaken by huge mass meetings of workers, one of which on Kennington Common had drawn over a million workers.

The factory act 

The Factory Act (1833) prevented children from being employed more than 48 hours a week and no person under eighteen could work more than 69 hours a week. Adult workers, however, continued to work long hours and remained unprotected by the State until 1847, when the Ten Hours’ Act limited the working hours to ten a day for all workers. 

In 1862 the Mines Act banned women and children under 10 from working in mines. Poor law amendement act

The Poor Law Amendment Act (1834) refused outdoor relief to those people who could not support themselves by admitting them to a workhouse.Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts. This removed the political disabilities imposed on non-Anglican Protestants by legislation passed in 1673 and 1661 respectively. Following the repeal of these Acts, Dissenters could sit in parliament and participate in local government. The Act changed the Anglican constitution into a Protestant constitution.

1829        Catholic Emancipation Act. This controversial legislation allowed Catholics to sit as MPs for the first time since the Elizabethan Act of Settlement (1558/9). The Act was passed by Wellington's government despite huge opposition; the constitution now became Christian but non-denominational.
Metropolitan Police Act. This was the culmination of the work of Robert Peel to establish a civilian, unarmed police force. It was the foundation of policing in Great Britain and was based on his work in Ireland.

1831        (Hobhouse) Factory Act. This was the third Factory Act, its predecessor being the 1801 Health and Morals of Apprentices Act and the 1819 Factory Act. Hobhouse's Act forbade night work for persons under the age of 21.

1832        Reform Act. It took almost two years for this Act to reach the Statute Books and brought Britain to the verge of revolution. The Reform Act was the first systematic change to the constitution; it extended the franchise to include those who did not own landed property and was the first of a series of constitutional changes.

1833        Factory Act. Passed by the Whig government, this Act was an attempt to regulate the working hours of women and children. It left much to be desired but was a step towards government regulation of working conditions.
Abolition of Slavery Act. This was the culmination of a lengthy campaign that had begun during the 18th Century. The legislation was finalised by the Jamaica Act of 1839.
first Education grant. Although not a piece of legislation, the grant of £20,000 for the provision of schools was the first time that the goverment had involved itself in education in any way. The first Education Act did not reach the Statute Books until 1870.

1834        Poor Law Amendment Act. Following the 1832 Reform Act, the PLAA was intended to reduce the poor rates; it was not intended to help the poor who suffered as a result of the legislation. The PLAA replaced the existing poor laws and was responsible for the establishment of workhouses throughout the country. The poor were treated as criminals and people starved rather than apply for poor relief because that meant that they would become inmates of the dreaded "poor law bastilles".

1835        The Municipal Corporations Act was a local government version of the 1832 Reform Act. It made existing municipal corporations more answerable to the electors and allowed other towns to apply for incorporation.

1836        Civil Marriages Act: after the passing of this law, non-Anglicans were able to marry either in their own Church or in Registry Offices. The Church of England lost its monopoly over marriage services
Tithe Commutation Act: this provided for the payment of tithes to the Church of England in cash, depending on the price of wheat.
reduction of Stamp Duty. The Government's decision to reduce the stamp duty was primarily due to the success of the "war of the unstamped", and in 1836 the duty was reduced from 4d to 1d, in order to take the unstamped newspapers off the streets while allowing legal newspapers wider circulation.

1837        Registration Act (of Births, Marriages and Deaths). Although the 1833 Factory Act restricted working hours for young people, there was no means of telling the age of a person since no official records existed. Anglican churches had to recorde baptisms, marriages and burials but there were few records for non-Anglicans. This legislation made it compulsory for all births, marriages and deaths to be registered at a Registry Office; certificates were issued for each event and a second copy was retained at Somerset House in London. The administration of this Act was within the remit of the Poor Law Commission.

1838        Irish Poor Law Amendment Act. After a Commission reported that the 'importation' of the English 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act was inappropriate for Ireland, the government brought in its own "experts" and the 1834 PLAA was passed for Ireland. It was implemented just before the outbreak of the potato blight and proved to be inadequate to meet the crisis.

1839        The Jamaica Act finalised the 1833 Abolition of Slavery Act, setting the remaining slaves and apprentices free in the British colonies.
The Rural Constabularies Act extended the 1829 Metropolitan Police Act and required counties to establish their own police forces. The Act was passed in the face of Chartist activity.

1840        Penny Post. This was the idea of Sir Rowland Hill. Prior to this, recipients paid for any letters that were sent to them. Hereafter, the sender attached an adhesive, pre-paid label to any items that were posted. The most famous 'stamp' of this period is the Penny Black.

1842        Railway Act. This first piece of railway legislation was mainly a safety Act to ensure that railways ran safe services. New lines had to be inspected by the Board of Trade, which could demand traffic returns and inquire into accidents.
The Mines Act prohibited the employment of all females and boys under 10 years old from working underground in mines.

1844        The Railway Act ("Parliamentary Train Act") followed Gladstone's Committee of inquiry into railway policy. By this law, the government assumed the absolute right to take control of all railways in times of national emergency and to fix fares and freight charges. It also said that railway companies had to provide a minimum service of one train each day each way, travelling at not less than 12 miles per hour and stopping at every passenger station, charging no more than 1d. per mile for third class passengers.
Bank Charter Act. This Act tied the issue of bank notes to the Bank's gold reserves and required it to keep the accounts of the note issue separate from those of its banking operations. The Bank of England had to produce a weekly summary of both accounts.
This Factory Act legislated only for textile factories and was the successor to the 1833 Factory Act. It said that women and young persons (13-18) were to work no more than 12 hours per day; children under 13 were to work no more than 6½ hours per day and no child under 8 was to be employed.
The Companies Act aimed to prevent 'reckless speculation' and to prevent the establishment of dubious compaines by making it compulsory for all companies to be registered officially. The companies also had to issue prospectuses and publish accounts regularly.

1846        Repeal of the Corn Laws. The Corn Laws had been passed in 1815 and had raised the price of wheat artificially, leading to an economic depression. A concerted campaign for the repeal of the Corn Laws had been going on since 1838. Consequent upon the repeal, the career of Sir Robert Peel was terminated.
Gauges Act. This was another piece of railway legislation that prohibited the extension of the 7' gauge, except on the Great Western Railway and said that a third line of 4' 8½' had to be laid where 7' track met 4' 8½" line.

1847         Factory Act. Yet another piece of compromise legislation by the Whig government, this so-called '10-Hour Act' said that women and children between the ages of 13 and 18 could work a maximum of ten hours a day or 58 hours a week. The precise times of work were not set down and the 'relay' or shift system survived. Working hours for men were left untouched.
Poor Law Act. This Act followed on from the 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act and replaced the Poor Law Commission with a Poor Law Board headed by a government Minister. Poor releif became more responsible to parliamentary control.

1848        Public Health Act. This was the first piece of legislation that attempted to deal with issues of public health. However, it was permissive rather than compulsory in towns other than Municipal Corporations. The Act established a central Board of Health and allowed Local Boards of Health to be set up if more than 10% of the population petitioned for one. No central inspection was required for authorities that had Boards of Health outside the legislation. Towns where the death rate exceeded 23 per 1,000 were obliged to set up a Board of Health.

1849        Repeal of the Navigation Acts. These laws had been introduced in the Seventeeth Century and said that goods being imported into Britain and her colonies had to be carried either in British ships or the ships of the country where the goods had origin. The laws had been modified during the 1820s but finally they were repealed.

1850        Factory Act. The law dealt only with textile factories. Women and young persons (13-18 years old) were to work in factories only between the hours of 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. or 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. but working hours were raised from 10 to 10½ per day.
Coal Mines Inspection Act. The 1842 Mines Act had not dealt with safety in the mines; this legislation attempted to rectify that omission. More inspectors were provided to enforce the 1842 Act and were to produce reports of conditions and safety standards in the mines. The coal mine owners opposed all attempts to regulate conditions in the mines and many of these men sat in the House of Lords; one of the most influential was the Marquis of Londonderrry who owned many of the coal mines in the north east of England, particularly around Durham.

1851        Ecclesiastical Titles Act. In 1850 Pope Pius IX restored the Catholic hierarchy in Britain, giving the Catholic Church a hierarchy like that of all Catholic countries.Th Ecclesiastical Titles Act was an anti-Catholic measure intended to prevent the newly createdCatholic dioceses from taking existing Anglican diocesan names. Ironically, many of the Anglican dioceses had continued to use established Catholic names after the Reformation. The law was repealed by Gladstone in 1871.

1855        Abolition of stamp duties on newspapers. In June the final remaining penny of the British newspaper duty was removed and in September the Daily Telegraph appeared at the price of 1d. For the British working man, the newspaper became what reformers in the 1830s had predicted: 'the readiest, the commonest, the chief vehicle of knowledge'.

1856        County and Borough Police Act. The Metropolitan Police was established in 1829; in 1839 the Rural Constabularies Act was passed. This third piece of legislation obliged the counties to organise police forces, subject to government control and devised a system of inspection already in use in factories, workhouses and education. Grants to the police became dependent on the efficiency of the force: it was estimated that half of them were not efficient. The Act shifted the emphasis from the prevention of crime to its detection.

1857        Matrimonial Causes Act. By this Act, divorce courts were established. Women were given only limited access to divorce which could be obtained only on a specific cause other than adultery. Right of access to children after divorce was extended and women were able to repossess their property after a legal separation or after a protection order given consequent upon the husband's desertion.

1858        Abolition of the property qualification for MPs: this was one of the demands made by the Chartists. From this date, men did not have to own property in order to stand as candidates in parliamentary elections.
Jewish Disabilities Act implemented. In 1847, Baron Lionel de Rothschild was elected as an MP for London but objected to taking the oath which included the phrase "on the true faith of a Christian". He asked to be sworn in on the Old Testament. It took eleven attempts in the House of Lords to have the oath changed. Subsequently, Jews were able to take their seats in both Houses.

1859        Molestation of Workmen Act. This Act allowed peaceful picketing in the event of strike action taking place. The Act said that 'no person, by reason merely of his endeavouring peaceably and in a reasonable manner, and without threat or intimidation, direct or indirect, to persuade others to cease or abstain from work, in order to obtain the rate of wages or the altered hours of labour agreed to by him and others, should be deemed to have been guilty of "molestation" or "obstruction".'

1860        Food and Drugs Act. This was the first attempt at legislation to prevent the adulteration of food. It was common to find harmful additives in staple foods: white lead in flour, ground glass in sugar, red lead in coffee for example. The new law made the inclusion of additives a criminal offence. However, it was not very effective and had to be amended in The Mines Regulation and Inspection Act increased the number of mines inspectors and prohibited boys below the age of 12 from working underground.

1861        Repeal of paper duties. Gladstone helped the publishing industry by abolishing the excise duty on paper. This made producing newsapers cheaper still; it revived rural paper works and encouraged the growth of London newspapers and the provincial press.

1866        Sanitary Act. Finally, it was recognised that the 1848 Act had failed to produce the desired results: this was due mainly to that Act being permissive rather than compulsory. The 1866 Act compelled local authorities to improve local conditions and remove nuisances (health hazards). They became responsible also for the provision of sewers, water and street cleaning. The Act enforced the connection of all houses to a new main sewer; it set definite limits for the use of cellars as living rooms, and established the definition of 'overcrowding'. Every town was to appoint Sanitary Inspectors and the Home Secretary was empowered to take proceedings for the removal of nuisances where local authorities failed to act. 

1867        the second Reform Act. This extended the franchise to most urban working men.
Master and Servant Act. This Act amended an existing piece of legislation; strikers could now be prosecuted only for breach of contract. The Trade Unions were still dissatisfied, however, because it was possible for criminal proceedings to take place on the grounds of 'aggravated causes'.

1869        Disestablishment and Disendowment of the Irish Church. This Act came into effect on 1 January 1871. All ecclesiastical property belonging to the Church of Ireland, except churches in use, was vested in the Commissioners. Compensatoin was set at £16 million: half of the capital of the confiscated property and surplus funds were to be used for the relief of suffering. The Act also said that no Irish bishops were to sit in the House of Lords. Nonconformist ministers were to be given a grant from the Regium Donum (gift of the monarch) The Church of Ireland was to have a General Synod that was elected triennially by the dioceses.

1870        Irish Land Act. This law was passed by Gladstone's government and was intended to protect tenants against unfair eviction. Landlords were required to pay up to £250 to tenants who had been evicted unfairly and tenants were assisted in the purchase of their holdings by being able to borrow up to ²/₃ of the cost from the government.
Married Women's Property Act. This piece of legislation allowed women to keep £200 of their own earnings.
(Forster's) Education Act. This Act was intended only to 'plug the gaps' in the educational provision that existed. The two religious organisations that ran schools were given grants and the Act provided for the establishment of so-called 'Board Schools'. Education was neither free nor compulsory under this legislation.
Cardwell's army reforms begin. Cardwell was the Secretary of State for War; his reforms continued for over ten years.

1871        University Test Act. Until the passing of this Act, all academics and students at Oxford and Cambridge Universities had to be practising members of the Anglican Church. By this legislation, the privileges of the Anglican Church were removed and the universities were open to all with suitable abilities regardless of religious faith.
Civil Service reforms. Posts in the Civil Service were dependent upon privilege and connection with the 'right' people until this legislation. Thereafter, positions were open to all who could pass the examinations. The Foreign Office was excluded from the legislation, however, and continued to be the domain of privilege and connection.
Trade Union Act recognised unions as legal bodies with the right to own property and funds. Unions were allowed to protect these at law and they were also allowed to conduct strikes.
Criminal Law Amendment Act. This took away the power of strike action: although TUs could conduct strikes under the Trade Union Act, this second piece of legislation forbade the use of picketing of any description )even peaceful picketing). Consequently, it would be almost impossible for a strike to be conducted.
Abolition of the purchase of Commissions. This was one of Cardwell's Army Reforms by which officers in the British Army were to be appointed by merit and ability rather than being able to buy rank. The legislation met great opposition.

1872        Licensing Act. Gladstone believed that drink was the curse of the working man and wanted to introduce sobriety as a character-reform. He also believed that a sober, hard-working man would be able to save money and therefore have savings for his 'retirement'. This Act

• gave magistrates the power to issue licenses to public houses; where it was thought that there were too many of these, magistrates were able to close down some of them
• public houses now had to close in towns at midnight and at 11 p.m. in the countryside - so that agricultural labourers could walk home and arrive before midnight
• the adulteration of beer was made illegal: it was common for salt to be added to it, to make the consumers thirsty and so drink more.

1872        Ballot Act: this was one of the things that the Chartists had demanded. The Act introduced the secret ballot to all elections, making them less corrupt and less subject to bribery and corruption. The legislation was opposed by landlords and employers who could no longer control the votes of their tenants and workers.
Coal Mines Regulating Act. This insisted on the introduciton of safety methods such as fan ventilators, stronger timber supports, wire ropes, imporved winding gear and better safety lamps.
Public Health Act. This divided England and Wales into Health Authority districts, each of which had to have its own Medical Officer of Health and accompanying staff. The duties of the Health Authorities were not specified and most Health Boards were unwilling to spend the required money on radical reforms.

1873        Judicature Act. This Act rationalised the legal system in Britain by united seven different courts into one High Court of Justice.

1874        Licensing Act. This was an amendment to Gladstone's Act and provided for longer opening hours.
The Factory Act reduced working hours to 10 per day; it also said that no child couild be employed until the age of 10 and no young person could work full time until the age of 14.

1875        Artisans' Dwelling Act: local authorities were given the power to buy and demolish slum houses and replace them with modern, healthy housing. Because of severe opposition, the powers were permissive rather than compulsory
Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act. This again legalised peaceful picketing and allowed unions to cary out as a group whatever individuals could do in law. Unmions could no longer be charged with conspiracy for taking such action.
Public Health Act: This legislation was the work of Richard A Cross. The Act set down in detail what local authorities had to do in terms of public health:

• ensure that there was an adequate water supply, drainage and sewage disposal
• nuisances were to be removed
• offensive trades were to be regulated
• contaminated food was to be found, confiscated and destroyed
• cases of infectious diseases were to be reported to the local Medical Officer of Health who then had to take appropriate action
• further regulations dealt with matters concerning: markets; street lighting; burials

Employers and Workmen Act: this put workmen and their employers on the same legal footing in cases of breach of contract: breach of contract was a civil offence. Prior to this legislation, if a workman broke his contract it was deemed to be a criminal offence, whereas if an employer did so it was only a civil offence.

1876        (Sandon's) Education Act. School Attendance Committees were established to encourage as many children as possible to take advantage of educational opportunities and parents were made responsible for ensuring that their children received basic instruction. The Committees could help to pay the school fees if parents were too poor to do so themselves - but this was not compulsory.
Merchant Shipping Act: this was the work of Samuel Plimsoll and was aimed at preventing ship owners sending unseaworthy or overloaded ships to sea, at the expense of the sailors' lives. The Act required a series of 'lines' to be painted on the ship to show the maximum loading point. It was not until 1890 that Board of Trade officials applied the regulations that Plimsoll had intended.Plimsoll is still a household name because of what is known as the Plimsoll line, this governs the cargo of a ship as regards its weight.

1878        Factory and Workshops Act. All workshops and factories employing more than 50 people were now to be inspected regularly by government inspectors rather than by local authorities (as previously).

1880        Employers' Liability Act aplied to all manual workers except seamen and domestic servants; it gave to injured employees or their dependents the same rights to recover damages from their employers that non-employees always enjoyed

1881        Irish Land Act. This was another piece of legislation passed by Gladstone and it gave to Ireland what Irish tenants had been requesting for many years: the so-called "3 Fs" - fair rents, fixity of tenure and free sale of the tenancy. The Act also provided for the establishment of Land Courts which would decide on what was a 'fair rent'. Unfortunately, the Land League did everything it could to prevent the Act from working and the evictions and violence in Ireland continued.
(Mundella's) Education Act. This made attendance at elementary school compulsory for all children between the ages of 5 and 10. Parents had to pay 'school pence' - about 3d. per child per week. Often, poor parents could not afford this sum of money.

1882        The Married Women's Property Act allowed all married women to continue as the separate owners and administrators of their property after marriage.

1884        third Reform Act. This extended the franchise to most adult males.

1885        Redistribution Act. This Act went hand in hand with the Reform Act: all boroughs with fewer than 15,000 inhabitants lost their MP; those with fewer than 50,000 MPs lost one MP. There were now 142 seats available for redistribution and these were given to densely populated areas. Constituencies were reorganised so that there were 647 single member constituencies of the 670 in existence.

1888        County Councils Act. This legislation established County Councils. The old local government boards (about 27,000 of them) were replaced by 67 elected County Councils which had extensive and compulsory powers to deal with matters such as road maintenance, the building of bridges, the establishment of a police force and the administrative duties that had previously been within the remit of JPs. Some sixty towns with populations over 60,000 became County Boroughs with the same powers as County Councils. Under this legislation, unmarried women were allowed to vote for councillors although they were not allowed to become councillors themselves.

1891        The Fee Grant Act effectively made elementary education free of charge

1894          Local Government Act (often referred to as the Parish Councils Act) . This Act divided the counties into Urban District Councils and Rural District Councils, each with its own elected coucil. Rural District Councils were divided into civil Parish Councils which had to be elected if the population exceeded 300. Generally, the civil parishes had the same boundaries as the ecclesiastical (Church of England) parishes. Women were now allowed to stand as candidates and sit as councillors on these councils.

1897        Workmen's Compensation Act. This law said that an employer should compensate a workman who was injured, and the dependants of a workman who was killed at work, irrespective of any negligence on the part of the employer or his other employees. The Act was restricted to a limited number of employments, the so-called "dangerous trades" that included the building trade.

Beatniks or beats

If we look at any important thing that has happened within the experience of human beings most of these are based on people prepared to ask questions that do not want to be answered. Within art many of the great artists were either kicked out of their schools or universities for asking questions and insisting upon an answer.Others simply left Academia disgusted with its lack of answers. Jack kerouac was one.Road trip below, cassidy and leary
 When human beings ask difficult questions then art and society progresses, when those questions are not asked because someone cannot stand the truth then life remains stagnant.
Art is based on conflict as is life and we may also call this struggle.Jack Keouac distinguishes Beats from the Lost Generation of the 1920s pointing out how the Beats are not lost but how they are searching for answers to all of life’s questions. “How to live seems much more crucial than why. Beat describes the state of mind from which all unessentials have been stripped, leaving it receptive to everything around it, but impatient with trivial obstructions. To be beat is to be at the bottom of your personality, looking up.Beat means you are anti materialistic thus anti bourgeois.above cassidys wife, the first one.
America was in the grip of anti-communist feeling with the senator Macarthy running the show.
It was in this climate that the young generation was seeking meaning. Amidst all the conflict and contradiction, the Beats were seeking out a way to navigate through the world. As John Clellon Holmes put it, “Everywhere the Beat Generation seems occupied with the feverish production of answers—some of them frightening, some of them foolish—to a single question: how are we to live?
Jean-Louis "Jack" Kerouac was born in the Roaring 20's in March 12, 1922  and left this world just as the hippy dream started to die in October 21, 1969.(above anti communist Macarthy)
 He had been was an American novelist and poet. He is considered a literary iconoclast and, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, a pioneer of the Beat Generation.
The Beat Generation was a group of American post-World War II writers who came to prominence in the 1950s, as well as the cultural phenomena that they both documented and inspired. Central elements of "Beat" culture included experimentation with drugs, alternative forms of sexuality, an interest in Eastern religion, a rejection of materialism, and the idealizing of exuberant, unexpurgated means of expression and being.
Jack Kerouac introduced the phrase "Beat Generation" in 1948 to characterize a perceived underground, anti-conformist youth movement in New York. The name arose in a conversation with writer John Clellon Holmes. The adjective "beat" could colloquially mean "tired" or "beaten down", but Kerouac expanded the meaning to include the connotations "upbeat," "beatific," and the musical association of being "on the beat".We may think also that a heart did really beat while most just ticked and when a heart "beats" it lives.
Kerouac was born in a French-Canadian neighborhood of Lowell, MA. He grew up in a devout Catholic home, and this influence manifested itself throughout the work. During high school, Kerouac was a star football player and earned a scholarship to Columbia University. He dropped out then served on several different sailing vessels, he returned to New York in search of inspiration to write. Here he met the likes of Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs who would not only become the characters in the book but also form the core of the Beat Generation

Allen Ginsberg's Howl (1956), William S. Burroughs's Naked Lunch (1959) and Jack Kerouac's On the Road (1957) are among the best known examples of Beat literature. Both How  and Naked Lunch were the focus of obscenity trials that ultimately helped to liberalize publishing in the United States. The members of the Beat Generation developed a reputation as new bohemian hedonists, who celebrated non-conformity and spontaneous creativity.

The original "Beat Generation" writers met in New York. Later, in the mid-1950s, the central figures (with the exception of Burroughs) ended up together in San Francisco where they met and became friends with figures associated with the San Francisco Renaissance.

The term San Francisco Renaissance is used as a global designation for a range of poetic activity centered on San Francisco and which brought it to prominence as a hub of theAmerican poetic avant-garde.

However, others (e.g., Alan Watts, Ralph J. Gleason) felt this renaissance was a broader phenomenon and should be seen as also encompassing visual and performing arts, philosophy, cross-cultural interests (particularly those that involved Asian cultures), and new social sensibilities.

In the 1960s, elements of the expanding Beat movement were incorporated into the Hippie counterculture. Kerouac is recognized for his spontaneous method of writing, covering topics such as Catholic spirituality, jazz, promiscuity, Buddhism, drugs, poverty, and travel.  
Kerouac became an underground celebrity and, with other beats, a progenitor of the hippie movement, although he remained antagonistic toward some of its politically radical elements.
 In 1969, at age 47, Kerouac died from internal bleeding due to long-standing abuse of alcohol. Since his death Kerouac's literary prestige has grown and several previously unseen works have been published. All of his books are in print today, among them: On the Road is a novel written in April 1951, and published by Viking Press in 1957. It is a largely autobiographical work based on the spontaneous cross-country adventures of Kerouac and his friends during the middle of the 20th century. It is often considered a defining work of the postwar Beat Generation that was inspired by jazz, poetry, and drug experiences. While many of the names and details of Kerouac's experiences are changed for the novel, hundreds of references in On the Road have real-world counterparts.At the time of publication, On the Road was not the first book to criticize contemporary American culture. A nonconformist sentiment characterized the arts and popular culture of the 1950s as a way of rejecting societal norms. Many of the best selling books of the time achieved this same mission.

J. D. Salinger produced the first shock to the tranquil suburban landscape with the publication of The Catcher in the Rye in 1951. His protagonist Holden Caufield struck a chord with young readers also at odds with the adult world. Caufield’s rejection of the regimentation and “phoniness” of the world around him resonated with the struggle for meaning that drove the Beat Generation. Salinger’s rejection of traditional middle-class values signaled the first widely recognized public stand against the cultural conformist pressure

When the book was originally released, The New York Times hailed it as "the most beautifully executed, the clearest and the most important utterance yet made by the generation Kerouac himself named years ago as "beat," and whose principal avatar he is."
Other books were Doctor Sax, The Dharma Bums, Mexico City Blues, The Subterraneans, Desolation Angels, Visions of Cody and Big Sur.The two main characters of the book are the narrator, Salvatore “Sal” Paradise, and his new friend Dean Moriarty, much admired for his carefree attitude and sense for adventure, a free-spirited maverick eager to explore all kicks and an inspiration and catalyst for Sal’s travels. The novel contains five parts, three of them describing road trips. The narrative takes place in the years 1947 to 1950, is full of Americana, and marks a specific era in jazz history, “somewhere between its Charlie Parker Ornithology period and another period that began with Miles Davis.” The novel is largely autobiographical, Sal being the alter ego of the author and Dean standing for Neal Cassady. The epic nature of the adventures and the text itself creates a tremendous sense of meaning and purpose for the themes and lessons. Kerouac provides not only the story of a literal journey but also that of an intense internal quest and a pursuit of freedom and self-determination.
The word Beatnik was a media stereotype of the 1950s and early 1960s that displayed the more superficial aspects of the Beat Generation literary movement of the 1950s  .The origins of the Beat Generation can be traced to Columbia University and the meeting of Kerouac, Ginsberg, Lucien Carr, Hal Chase and others. Though the beats are usually regarded as anti-academic, many of their ideas were formed in response to professors like Lionel Trilling and Mark Van Doren. Classmates Carr and Ginsberg discussed the need for a "New Vision" (a term borrowed from Arthur Rimbaud), to counteract what they perceived as their teachers' conservative, formalistic literary ideals.
Neal Cassady was introduced to the group in 1947, and had a number of significant effects. Cassady became something of a muse to Ginsberg; they had a romantic affair, and Ginsberg became Cassady's personal writing-tutor. Kerouac's road-trips with Cassady in the late 1940s became the focus of his second novel, On the Road. Cassady's verbal style is one of the sources of the spontaneous, jazz-inspired rapping that later became associated with "beatniks". Cassady impressed the group with the free-flowing style of his letters, and Kerouac cited them as a key influence on his spontaneous prose style.Kerouac has admitted that the biggest of these themes is religion It was really a story about 2 Catholic buddies roaming the country in search of God. And we found him.."The Beats had a more liberal definition of God and spirituality closely related to personal experience.It was an attempt to replace the model of manhood dominant in capitalist America with a model rooted in foundational American ideals of conquest and self-discovery, they saw conformity as restricting, but in many senses, they view women this way as well. “Reassigning disempowering elements of patriarchy to female keeping, they attempt to substitute male brotherhood for the nuclear family and to replace the ladder of success with the freedom of the road as primary measures of male identity.If we are talking about women within the book then the interactions of the book come down to women denuding men and thus losses of masculinity. He likens his writing to Impressionist painters who sought to create art through direct observation.for instance an impressionist painter wanted the viewer to feel the atmosphere of the moment rather than respond to the view and precise brush lines.  He endeavored to present as raw of version of truth as possible which did not lend itself to the traditional process of revision and rewriting but rather the emotionally charged practice of spontaneity he pursued. Today the more reckless and youthful parts of the text that gave it its energy are the parts that have “run afoul of the new gentility, the rules laid down by the health experts, childcare experts, guidance counselors, safety advisers, admissions officers, virtuecrats and employers to regulate the lives of the young.” He claims that the “ethos” of the book has been lost.The ethos is for self revelation.
On the Road has been a major influence on many poets, writers, actors and musicians, including Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, Jim Morrison, Hunter S. Thompson, and many more. "It changed my life like it changed everyone else's," Dylan would say many years later. Films such as Easy Rider, Paris, Texas, and even Thelma and Louise.

In his book Light My Fire: My Life with The Doors, Ray Manzarek (keyboard player of The Doors) wrote "I suppose if Jack Kerouac had never written On the Road, The Doors would never have existed."

uk nude