150+ Iconic Reasons To Celebrate
Being British Neville Martin
For many years, Great Britain has been eating itself from within. The great institutions and academia have become obsessed with a country that is one half of the great Anglo-American dragon, with London the more evil partner, having allegedly clocked up more centuries of worldwide exploitation and corruption than Washington. The rise of social media has allowed the coalescence of a class of leftist agitators who, for reasons best known unto themselves, have come to hate Britain and all it stands for. They have come to believe that the country of their birth is racist, worthy only of derision, whose fundamental structures and traditions are fit only to be torn down. Kurt Schlichter, a senior columnist for Townhall.com, wrote: “Leftists don’t merely disagree with you. They don’t merely feel you are misguided. They don’t think you are merely wrong. They hate you. They want you enslaved and obedient, if not dead. Once you get that, everything that is happening now will make sense.” The left-leaning intelligentsia, despite the vast national investment in the deployment of their academic intellect, have formed the mistaken impression that even the most iconic symbols of British nationalism need to be obliterated. Patriotism has become a dirty word. For example, the bronze statue of Churchill in Parliament Square has been specially targeted for defacement, prompting Telegraph columnist and former Labour MP Tom Harris to comment: “The Left think it's rebellious to hate Churchill, but it just shows how little they understand Britain.” Even many of the British celebrities of stage and screen, who perhaps owe more than most to the national tradition for outstanding theatrical success, have found themselves decrying their national heritage. The Cambridge-educated British actress Dame Emma Thompson, whose theatrical attainments give her less justification than most women of her profession to project themselves as the characteristic ‘bitter old lady’, nevertheless described Britain as “a tiny little cloud-bolted, rainy corner of sort-of Europe, a cake-filled misery-laden grey old island,” and subsequently quit her home country for Venice. Even the national broadcaster, the BBC, no longer seeks to represent or entertain the saner half of the population. The Sun wrote in 2020: “It is clear from its news, its commentary, its dramas and its dismal, lazy comedy that it despises the voting majority which — to the out-of-touch corporation’s disbelief — repeatedly backed both Brexit and the Tories. The BBC does not represent Britain. Its decision now to censor ‘Rule, Britannia!’ and ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ ought to be the last straw.
“Boris Johnson has rightly joined many others in condemning it. And though it is not for the PM to decide the BBC’s output, his government can and should end its publicly funded financial model. “The Beeb could turn this around. It just doesn’t want to. It dislikes much about Britain and is ashamed of our past. Its woke staff are interested only in causes and ideas beloved of middle-class metropolitan Remainer graduates like them. Mainstream views shared by the ordinary majority, older Conservative voters in particular, are held in contempt if they are considered at all. “So Tories, who won a huge election mandate only months ago, are treated with cynical disdain. Meanwhile left-wing activists are routinely given platforms on news programmes where they masquerade as ‘ordinary people’ or even Newsnight journalists.” We have over the past few years become a country paralyzed by our own division, strategic confusion, and myopic self-doubt. For so long we have been embarrassed about our history and wealth. We can — and must — start trusting ourselves again. The reality, which the cognoscenti and literati choose to ignore, is that these islands have an outstanding heritage: a uniquely creative legacy of worldwide impact which embraces the developments of unparalleled scope and profound influence on global science, industry and culture. Centuries of invention, scientific discovery, geographical exploration and cultural development have edified, enlightened and enriched the world’s populations. This is our birthright and deserves to be celebrated. The following pages pay homage to over 150 historic British advances — and their creators — which have changed the world. This is a legacy unique amongst the nations; I would defy any historian to catalogue a broader or more numerous inventory of the influential national attainments of any country in the world. But how many of them are included within the educational curricula… (or, more pertinently, how many are NOT)? But British academia considers it more appropriate to focus the attention of the education system on the socially cancerous ‘critical race theory’ or its intellectually-challenged teachings on transgenderism. The guilt trip and navelgazing to which we subject our children must stop.
150+ ICONIC REASONS TO CELEBRATE BEING BRITISH
CULTU RAL DEVELOPMENT Parliamentary democracy World’s first industrial revolution World’s first modern postal service English – the common language William Tyndale King James Bible Concept of Common Law Abolition of the slave trade Adam Smith (“The Wealth of Nations”) Emmeline Pankhurst Henry VIII Elizabeth I Victoria Elizabeth II John Wesley BBC World Service Fleet Street
William Tyndale
POLITICAL LEADERSHIP Sir Winston Churchill Oliver Cromwell William Wilberforce Benjamin Disraeli Sir Robert Peel David Lloyd George James Ramsay MacDonald Aneurin Bevan Margaret Thatcher
Sir Robert Peel
ENGINEERING Isambard Kingdom Brunel George Stephenson Thomas Telford Edmund Cartwright (invention of power looms) Sir Richard Arkwright (cotton spinning frame) Henry Bessemer (mass production of steel) Benjamin Huntsman (invention of spring steel) Harry Brearley (invention of stainless steel) Thomas Newcomen (the steam engine) Richard Trevithick (the steam locomotive) James Watt (the condensing steam engine) Sir Joseph Bazalgette (London Sewage System) Sir Frank Whittle (the jet engine) Henry Royce and Charles Rolls (Rolls Royce) R.J. Mitchell (The Supermarine Spitfire) Railways
Isambard Kingdom Brunel
ARCHITECTURE Sir Christopher Wren John Nash Augustus Pugin Charles Rennie Mackintosh Richard Rogers Sir Christopher Wren Isambard Kingdom Brunel
SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY Sir Charles Darwin (The Origin of Species) Sir Isaac Newton (Laws of Gravity) Rosalind Franklin (DNA Double Helix) Francis Crick and James Watson (Structure of DNA) Henry Cavendish (Hydrogen Gas) Joseph Priestly (Oxygen) Michael Faraday (Electromagnetism) James Watson and Francis Crick
SCIENTIFIC DEVELOPMENT Francis Bacon (The Scientific Method) John Logie Baird Stephen Hawking Charles Babbage Sir Humphry Davy Alan Turing Alexander Graham Bell Sir Tim Berners-Lee (World Wide Web) Sir James Dyson Alexander Graham Bell
MEDICINE Joseph Lister (pioneer of antiseptic surgery) Sir Alexander Fleming (penicillin) William Harvey (human circulation system) Edward Jenner (smallpox vaccination) Godfrey Hounsfield (the CT Scanner) James Young Simpson (anaesthetic chloroform) Florence Nightingale
Florence Nightingale
ART J.M.W. Turner John Constable Henry Moore Laurence Stephen Lowry David Hockney Banksy
Banksy Artwork
ARTISTIC DESIGN Josiah Wedgwood Thomas Chippendale Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown Clarice Cliff Mary Quant Vivienne Westwood Sir Norman Hartnell
Clarice Cliff Teaset
VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY Sir Walter Raleigh James Cook David Livingstone Sir Ernest Shackleton Captain Robert Falcon Scott
Sir Walter Raleigh
MILITARY LEADERSHIP Boudica Sir Francis Drake Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson Alfred the Great Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Archibald David Stirling Colonel T. E. Lawrence Lieutenant Colonel Herbert (‘H’) Jones
Colonel T. E. Lawrence
POETRY Geoffrey Chaucer William Wordsworth John Keats Alfred Lord Tennyson Wilfred Owen Pam Ayres William Wordsworth
LITERATURE
J.R.R. Tolkien
William Shakespeare Charles Dickens Robert Louis Stevenson (Treasure Island) John Bunyan (The Pilgrim's Progress) Brontë Sisters Jane Austen (Pride and Prejudice) Sir Walter Scott (Ivanhoe and Rob Roy) J.R.R. Tolkien (Lord of the Rings) George Orwell (1984 and Animal Farm) Ian Fleming (James Bond) D. H. Lawrence (Lady Chatterley’s Lover) Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Sherlock Holmes) Agatha Christie (Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot) Lewis Carroll (Alice in Wonderland) J.M. Barrie (Peter Pan) C.S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia) J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter) (Historical legend) Robin Hood (Historical legend) King Arthur
MUSIC Edward Elgar Henry Purcell Gustav Holst Ralph Vaughan Williams Benjamin Britten W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan The Beatles The Rolling Stones Sir Elton John Sir Cliff Richard Sir Bob Geldof David Bowie Freddie Mercury Gilbert and Sullivan
THEATRE
Dame Judi Dench
Sir Ian McKellen Sir Michael Caine Dame Vanessa Redgrave Sir John Hurt Dame Maggie Smith Sir Sean Connery Dame Judi Dench Sir Lawrence Olivier Sir Peter O’Toole Sir Alec Guinness
BROADCASTING Lord John Reith Richard Dimbleby Sir David Attenborough Desert Island Discs The Archers Blue Peter The Two Ronnies Morecambe and Wise Top of the Pops Monty Python Steptoe and Son Steptoe and Son
FILM MAKERS Sir Charlie Chaplin Sir Alfred Hitchcock Richard Attenborough Ken Loach David Lean John Schlesinger
Sir Alfred Hitchcock
DEVELOPMENT OF SPORT Codification of the rules of Football Origination of the game of Cricket Origination of the game of Rugby Football Origination of the modern game of Golf Origination of the game of Tennis Marquess of Queensberry Rules 1857 Sheffield Rules of Football
…. Of course the list is by no means complete: this is merely a starter. Now add your own entries of the thousands of Britons who helped make this country great.