The Biggest Time Machine Articles From Our First Year
We've reached our first birthday! These were the highlgihts.
Welcome to another edition of Londonist: Time Machine.
And it’s a very special edition, because this week we mark one year since the newsletter started. I thought I’d take the opportunity to look back over those 12 months and highlight the 10 most popular articles.
That’s for the main section. First, a brief announcement.
📣📣 We have a new sister newsletter! Londonist: Croydon Edit is for anyone interested in that most fascinating of London boroughs. Author Will Noble takes off in style with a feature on Croydon Airport. It was once London’s largest, and even featured a Harry Beck route map, in the style of his famous tube map. As with this newsletter, you can sign up for free, or support Londonist: Croydon Edit as a paying subscriber (which comes with additional perks). There’s a 20%-off launch offer throughout June. You might also be interested in Londonist: Urban Palette, our visual arts newsletter written by Tabish Khan.
The 10 Most Popular Articles From Londonist: Time Machine’s First Year
Thank you! Those are the only words I can open with. When we started Londonist: Time Machine 12 months ago, it was something of an experiment. Would people want to sign up for a history newsletter? What was this Substack thing? Was the audience there?
It certainly was. One year on, we have well over 9,000 subscribers, and many more people chance across our articles via the Web. Hundreds of those subscribers go one step further and pay a very small contribution each month to help fund the work. To those wonderful people, I am particularly grateful. As you’ll see from the highlighted articles below, your contributions are helping to support some unique work, which looks at London history in ways that nobody has tried before. This takes time, and wouldn’t be possible without reader support. So thank you once again!
From the beginning, we’ve tried to make Londonist: Time Machine more than ‘just another thing to read’. We’ve hosted several “historic pub” gatherings for paying subscribers, taking in the best of Borough, Fleet Street and Wapping. We’ve also organised a handful of behind-the-scenes site tours, with more to come soon. I hope, in our second year, we can grow the community spirit further and get to know one another over a shared love of London history.
This is the 143rd edition of the newsletter in just 12 months. Most are written by me, but paying subscribers also get an additional newsletter on Sundays by Lydia Manch. She’s pulled together some remarkable lists, including 5 Pieces of London’s Kubrickian history, 5 London Women of the Second World War and, an eye-opener for me, 5 Moments From London’s Baseball History. This newsletter is very much a team effort, and I’m hoping to publish a few guest posts from other writers in coming weeks.
So, 12 months in, but I feel like we’re only just getting started. We have a time machine, and the whole of the city’s history (and perhaps future) to explore. But before embarking on further adventures, I think it’s a good moment to look back at the ten most-read articles of the first year, all of which have topped 13,000 views (some much more).
10. A Celebration (and Map) of London: The Biography
Peter Ackroyd’s London: The Biography will be a quarter century old in 2025. No other book has turned quite so many people on to London’s vast, interconnected and “illimitable” history. I decided to re-read this masterpiece and make a map of every street, alley and building mentioned by Ackroyd within its near-1,000 pages. The result shows us the areas and locations favoured by the writer and, more tellingly, the places he doesn’t mention (hint: south London). If you like the concept, I made a similar ‘geobibliome’ for the complete novels of Charles Dickens, and the canon of Sherlock Holmes. Read more.
9. The Remarkable, and Grim, History of Southwark Bridge
The turquoise crossing is not the most famous or beloved of London’s bridges, but it certainly has an eventful past. Many men were killed during construction of the original Southwark Bridge, which featured the longest iron span in the world. The bridge would go on to witness explosions, a tragic sinking, and a clown in a bathtub pulled by geese. Read more.
8. What was in London *Before* London
When the Romans arrived around AD 43, they found a meandering river bordered by marshes and woods, with no permanent settlements. There was no London. But nor was the region uninhabited. Archaeologists have found evidence of jetties in the Thames, ancient trackways and other remnants of Iron-Age people. Who was living here and, to paraphrase Spinal Tap, what were they doing? Read more.
7. Magnificent Roupell Street - From Swamp to Movie Set
Those ancient marshes were only fully drained in the 19th century, when large blocks of Lambeth and Southwark were finally built over. Among these new developments was Roupell Street, with its charismatic terraces that are so beloved by film-makers and Instagrammers today. I’ve traced the history of the street, including its long ambivalent relationship with the motor car. Read more.
6. Tudor London in Colour, Part 3
London’s oldest surviving map dates from the 1550s and is known as the “Copperplate map”, because it is engraved onto copper plates. Only three out of 15 plates survive, but they offer one of the best glimpses of Tudor London. The Copperplate map has always been presented in black and white. I decided to colour the three plates in, to better distinguish its richly illustrated elements. This article was the final instalment, showing the City east of St Paul’s, including London Bridge. It is the most degraded of the three copper plates, and it took me many hours to retrace the buildings before colouring them all in. Read more.
5. How to Collect the Lost Churches of London
Remember those sticker albums of childhood, with collectable images of footballers or movie characters? Well, now someone’s done it for the City of London churches of Christopher Wren and others. Simply walk into one of the surviving churches and look out for the free packs of cards on the information desk. You can even send off for an album in which to keep your collection. The project’s author has also produced highly detailed maps showing the locations of all 109 ancient churches of the Square Mile. Read more.
4. The Curious Alleys of Borough High Street
This Southwark road is one of London’s oldest, having been established by the Romans as the main approach to London Bridge. Over the centuries, numerous coaching inns grew up in the alleys to the side of Borough High Street. All except the George have long since vanished — the coming of the railways removed the need for horse-drawn coaches between towns. However, the network of alleys that supported the inns is still largely intact, and very rewarding to explore. Read more.
3. London’s Oldest Map, Now in Colour Part 2
The second part of my project to colour in the Copperplate map of the 1550s takes in the area around St Paul’s Cathedral and down to the river. Here we see the still-uncovered River Fleet, a flotilla of boats on the Thames, and a surprising number of fields between Holborn and Fleet Street. Read more.
2. A New Map of Medieval London
The second-most popular article on Londonist: Time Machine is also one of our most recent. Only last week, I wrote about a new map of the medieval city, pieced together by academics using primary sources. They also crafted a Tudor map, showing London some 35 years before the oldest surviving chart (the Copperplate). The article proved so popular with readers that the maps have both now sold out! Read more.
1. The Oldest Map of London, Now in Colour
The most popular article over our first year was the one in which I introduced the Copperplate map, and coloured in the panel showing Moorfields and Spitalfields (complete with tiny archers and women doing laundry). I’m very pleased this proved popular, as it took many, many hours to colour in. Read more.
So, there we are, the 10 most-read articles from the first year of Londonist: Time Machine. Clearly, maps have proven the most popular subject with readers. And there’s much more to come. I recently began a project to colour in the John Rocque map of 1746 (and then overlay its lost waterways onto a modern street map). It’s an exquisitely detailed plan of Georgian London that will take many months to complete. Part 2 should be with you next week. (I’ve got plenty of non-cartographic features lined up for coming weeks too!)
It’s been a treat to look back on this first year of Londonist: Time Machine. I just know the second year will be even bigger and brighter. Before I sign off, I would be so very grateful if you could do just one small thing to help us take the newsletter up to the big 10,000 subscriber mark:
Think: do I have any friends or family who like their history and/or London?
If yes, then please, please let them know about this newsletter. You can use the button below if you like.
As ever, feel free to leave a comment, or email me on matt@londonist.com with any thoughts, suggestions, questions, riddles, queries, bribes or marmalade.
Congrats Matt 🎈and pleased to say I’m currently traveling south to KX for a family day out round the capital.
Matt, I'm so glad you and Londonist: Time Machine are bringing such tantalizing bits of London history to my inbox. Things are crazy here in the US and your work takes me to a different time and place. Congratulations 🎊🍾 🎉🍻