London Trivia: Please stand of the right

On 4 October 1911, Earls Court opened to the public the first underground escalator. To reassure passengers ‘Bumper’ Harris, a clerk of works, was assigned to assuage passenger’s anxiety by demonstrating the escalator’s convenience and its safety. He had, unfortunately, a wooden leg leading to the speculation of having lost it in a previous escalator journey, the leg had been crushed between two carriages carrying rubble. On 4 October 1936 The Battle of Cable Street took place as Eastenders battled with Oswald Mosley’s marching fascists the Blackshirts Sumptuary law prescribed precisely what different echelons of London society were permitted to wear only aristocrats could wear pointy boots The 6,000-year-old timber piles visible at low tide in front of MI6’s building are remnants of a Mesolithic structure beside the River Effra Below Greenwich Park at Croom Hill Gate is a Bronze Age cemetery, excavations in the 18th century found glass beads, wool and hair, as well as shields and…