Search Results

Authors G Great Expectations by Charles Dickens: class prejudices, the convict stain and a corpse-bride ➝ Back to Top

Poets Louise Wallwein (poet) Louise Wallwein ​ Louise Wallwein MBE is an award-winning playwright, poet and performer. She grew up in children's homes in the UK; she lived in thirteen different homes. Louise wrote her first play at the age of 17 and her career took off in 1998. Her plays have been broadcast by the BBC and she was Poet in Residence in Queensland, Australian in 2006 and Writer in Residence at the Centre for Creative Writing in Winnipeg, Canada also in 2006. External Website

News - broadcast, print, internet, magazine articles Care Experienced student behind new John Lewis Partnership brand: Made with Care John Lewis 2023 The John Lewis Partnership unveils Made With Care. A new lifestyle brand that combines great design and desirable products while creating a platform for talented people who have grown up in the care system. First design from the new brand launched at event to mark one year of the Building Happier Futures programme. The first product is designed by Michael Archibald, an 18-year old aspiring artist from Glasgow who has experienced care. Michael has crafted an inspiring piece of art to feature on a fashionable tote bag. Michael applied to take part in Made with Care through Who Cares? Scotland, the Partnership’s charity partner. He has worked with the John Lewis in-house design team and creative partners Saatchi & Saatchi to create his unique design. External Website

Performing Arts Diana Anaid Diana Anaid ​ Australian singer, Diana Anaid (b. 1976), was in orphanages and foster care as a child. Diana Anaid is the performance name of Diana Gosper. Diana's mother died when she was one, and from then she lived a wandering gypsy life with her father, as well as in children's homes and foster. Diana finally settled down in Northern NSW when she was 15, taught herself to play guitar, and has made a living out of singing. External Website

Non Fiction They Carried the Sword Janet Hitchman 1966 Biography of Thomas John Barnado (1845-1905) External Website

Biography of Care Experienced People Martha Matilda Harper and the American Dream Jane Plitt 2000 Martha Matilda Harper was born the 4th child of Beady Gifford Harper and Robert Harper, a tailor, in a village on the outskirts of Oakville, Ontario. At the age of 7, when her father was facing a significant financial crisis, Martha was sent away to live with relatives and become a servant. At the age of 12, she moved in to become a servant for strangers. In 1882, Martha relocated to Rochester in New York. One of her tasks for her new employer, Luella Roberts, was to care for Luella's hair and it wasn't long before friends of Luella's began requesting Martha to care for their's too. At a time when servants cared for their mistresses’ hair, or hairdressers came to the house, Martha set up in business in a shop, investing her life savings of $360 to open the Harper Hairdressing Parlor. Eventually women asked her to set up business in other cities and Harper decided to duplicate her shop throughout the country. She hired working classing women, primarily former domestic servants, to operate franchises. Harper chose locations for shops, provided products, training and advertising, and often the initial funding for women to set up shops (which they paid back) and then as women—or agents as Harper called them—ran their own businesses, Harper was able to significantly expand hers. According to Jane Plitt, Martha Matilda Harper became the “mother of American retail franchising” (p. 62) although her model did not become a dominant one until the second half of the 20th century. External Website

Performing Arts Goldie Goldie ​ Clifford Joseph Price MBE (1965), better known as Goldie, is a British musician, music producer, DJ, visual artist and actor. He was born in Walsall, aEngland to Margaret, a Scottish woman and Clement, a Jamaican man. At the age of three he was put into the state care system and for the next 15 years he lived in a number of foster and children’s homes. After the filming of Bombin’ (1988), Goldie was taken to New York by the filmmakers. He met with street artist Brim Fuentes in New York, then moved to Miami where he supported himself by selling gold caps for teeth. After his return to London in 1990, Gold became involved in the rave scene and pioneered “jungle music” which “combine hardcore beat, hip-hop, funk and reggae”. He then launched his own label, Metalheadz in 1994 and worked with a range of artists including David Bowie. Goldie has been awarded two honorary degrees and an MBE and is the author of two autobiographies. External Website

Radio & Podcast JRR Tolkien Short History of (JRR Tolkien) 2023 JRR Tolkien (1892-1973) was orphaned at the age of 10 and a catholic priest became his guardian, https://www.careexperienceandculture.com/master/j.-r.-r.-tolkien Tolkien’s childhood and the influence of his mother before she died—she home schooled him for a time—in encouraging his reading and imagination is one of the topics explored in this podcast. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._R._R._Tolkien Tolkien’s wartime experience, marriage to Edith and his children acting as his first audience for his now beloved stories are others. External Website

News - broadcast, print, internet, magazine articles Katherine Rundell's top 10 orphans Katherine Rundell 2014 From Harry Potter to Alex Rider, just where would children's literature be without orphans? Katherine Rundell – winner of the Blue Peter book award 2014 for best story – shares 10 of the best orphans External Website

Films/Videos The Butcher Boy (film) ​ 2007 The Butcher Boy is based on the 1992 novel by Irish writer, Patrick McCabe. It is billed as a black comedy. It tells the story of Francis "Francie" Brady who ends up in an 'reform school' where he is sexually abused by one of the priests. When Francie returns home his long term friend has made friends with someone else, his alcoholic father dies, and Francie descends in to a fantasie life of increasing brutality. External Website

Radio & Podcast A Journey through the Disney Animated Classics Daniel Lammin ​ Daniel Lammin in conversation with social historian Frank Golding, who was in foster care and an orphanage as a child. They talk about Disney’s swashbuckling adventure 'Peter Pan', discuss the real experiences of children removed from their families, the complex roles of mothers and fathers in a child’s life, and the reality of never wanting to grow up. External Website

Films/Videos The Kid (1921) ​ 2021 The Kid is a 1921 American silent comedy-drama film written, produced, directed by and starring Charlie Chaplin, and features Jackie Coogan as his foundling baby, adopted son and sidekick. This was Chaplin's first full-length film as a director (he had been a co-star in 1914's Tillie's Punctured Romance). It was a huge success, and was the second-highest-grossing film in 1921, behind The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. In 2011, The Kid was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." External Website

Performing Arts Lena Horne Lena Horne ​ Lena Mary Calhoun Horne (June 30, 1917 – May 9, 2010) was born in Bedford–Stuyvesant, Brooklyn an American singer, dancer, actress, and civil rights activist. Horne was raised mainly by her grandparents, Cora Calhoun and Edwin Horne. Her father, Edwin Fletcher "Teddy" Horne Jr. (1893–1970), left the family when she was 3 years old and moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Her mother, Edna Louise Scottron (1894–1976), was the granddaughter of inventor Samuel R. Scottron. She was an actress with a black theater troupe and travelled extensively. Horne's career spanned over 70 years, appearing in film, television, and theater. She belonged to the upper stratum of middle-class, well-educated black people. External Website

Poetry The Aboriginal Mother and other poems Eliza Hamilton Dunlop 1981 Eliza Hamilton Dunlop was raised by her paternal grandmother in Ireland. She migrated to Australia with 2nd husband, Duncan Dunlop in 1838. By the time she was in her teens, Eliza Hamilton Dunlop was already a published poet. Her lament, “The Aboriginal Mother”—published in The Australian on 13 December 1838—was provoked by her outrage at the Myall Creek massacre. On 10 June 1838, around 28 (the total death toll was never established) Wirrayaraay people were slaughtered at Myall Creek Station in NSW. Seven men were publicly hanged for the massacre on 18 December 1838. Unsurprisingly, there was more anger at the execution of British citizens than there was at the slaughter of Wirrayaraay people. But Dunlop was astonished at the backlash against her and her poem. Although she continued to have her poetry published in colonial newspapers, her work was largely neglect after her death in 1880. External Website

Authors O Strong Black Woman ➝ Back to Top

Behind the Scenes Russell Lewis ​ ​ Russell Lewis (born 11 September 1963 in London) is an English television writer and former actor. He has worked hard to preserve his anonymity so there is little about his background to be found online. Lewis was born in 1963 in Battersea, south London, raised and formally adopted by his maternal grandmother and her second husband, who provided his surname. He speaks of “a certain lived experience of dark secrets and unhappy families that has stood me in good stead when it comes to Endeavour”. Protective of “the sensitivities of all concerned who are still alive”, he describes his background as “potentially still a bit of an emotional minefield”. Lewis was a child actor.He attended “an academically wonky stage school” between age four and 16, which is why there’s a photo of him on an obscure website: he landed a part in the 1972 period biopic Young Winston, directed by Richard Attenborough, playing the even younger Winston. External Website

Films/Videos The Changeling (crime drama) ​ 2008 Changeling is a 2008 American crime drama based on real life events from the 1920s. Six months after Christine Collins reports her son missing, he is returned to her by the police. However, the boy she then looks after at police insistence is not her son. External Website

Films/Videos The Mission ​ ​ The Mission (2023) is a documentary presented by award-winning Australian journalist, Marc Fennell. 2 episodes in the 3-part series tell the story of “one of the largest art heists in Australian history, the theft of 26 masterpieces from a Western Australian monastery”, New Norcia Mission. The 3rd episode tells the story of a different crime, the cruel treatment of Aboriginal Australian children at the ‘orphanages’ there. Not only were the children forcibly removed from their parents – thus are members of the Stolen Generation – but the Royal Commission into Institution Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (2013-2017) found that the Benedictine Community of New Norcia was one of the worst offenders when it came to catholic priests sexually abusing children. The Mission also hears from survivors who were physically, verbally, and emotionally abused there too. External Website

Films/Videos The Blind Side ​ 2009 A story featuring Michael Oher who played for the Baltimore Ravens of the US National Football League. The story follows a homeless Michael who has been through the foster care system being taken in by the Tuohy family who encourage him in his football career. External Website

Non Fiction The State of It Chris 2021 Government cuts, unregulated care homes, inadequate staff training - campaigner and care home consultant Chris Wild has seen it all. The low standards and frequent abuse of children in care has long been a focal point of his loud message: we are failing our young people and something needs to change. Chris delves deep into the lives of care home kids, from experiences with county lines, drugs, trafficking, knife crime, gang violence to child exploitation and sexual abuse. He tells the stories of the voiceless, the children who have been left behind, compounded by his own experiences of growing up in care. How is the care system failing our young people and controlling just who and what they can become? What help do we really give children after their time in care is over, left to fend for themselves? Is it too late to fix the state of it? External Website