Julie Summers | |
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Born | 1960 |
Occupation(s) | Writer Researcher Historian Actress |
Years active | 2004 - Present |
Known for | Inspiring Home Fires |
Notable work |
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Julie Summers (born 1960) is an English author, historical consultant [1] and writer, best known for the book Jambusters. The book focuses on several women who were members of the Women's Institute during World War II and who were inspiration for the ITV series Home Fires. She is the granddaughter of Philip Toosey and the great niece of Sandy Irvine.
She was born at Clatterbridge on the Wirral Peninsula in 1960. She attended Culcheth Hall School, Altrincham; Howell's School, Denbigh and Wycombe Abbey School. She was at Munich Business School 1978-80 and spent one year at Deutsche Bank. She then studied German and History of Art at Bristol University; Courtauld Institute of Art: Medieval Architecture. At the Royal Academy of Arts was secretary 1986-1989 to Norman Rosenthal, then she was Deputy Curator for the Henry Moore Foundation 1989-1996, a freelance exhibition organiser 1996-2000 and Head of Exhibitions at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford 2000-2004. [2]
Summers was also the research consultant on the popular film The Woman in Black: Angel of Death .
The Bridge on the River Kwai is a 1957 epic war film directed by David Lean and based on the 1952 novel written by Pierre Boulle. Boulle's novel and the film's screenplay are almost entirely fictional, but use the construction of the Burma Railway, in 1942–1943, as their historical setting. The cast includes William Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, and Sessue Hayakawa.
The Burma Railway, also known as the Siam–Burma Railway, Thai–Burma Railway and similar names, or as the Death Railway, is a 415 km (258 mi) railway between Ban Pong, Thailand, and Thanbyuzayat, Burma. It was built from 1940 to 1943 by South East Asian civilians abducted and forced to work by the Japanese and a smaller group of captured Allied soldiers, to supply troops and weapons in the Burma campaign of World War II. It completed the rail link between Bangkok, Thailand, and Rangoon, Burma. The name used by the Japanese Government was Tai–Men Rensetsu Tetsudō (泰緬連接鉄道), which means Thailand-Burma-Link-Railway.
Andrew Comyn "Sandy" Irvine was a British mountaineer who took part in the 1924 British Mount Everest expedition, the third British expedition to the world's highest mountain, Mount Everest.
The evacuation of civilians in Britain during the Second World War was designed to defend individuals, especially children, from the risks associated with aerial bombing of cities by moving them to areas thought to be less at risk.
Brigadier Sir Philip John Denton Toosey was, as a lieutenant colonel, the senior Allied officer in the Japanese prisoner-of-war camp at Tha Maa Kham in Thailand during World War II. The men at this camp built Bridge 277 of the Burma Railway as later fictionalized in the book The Bridge over the River Kwai by Pierre Boulle, and since adapted into the Oscar-winning film The Bridge on the River Kwai in which Alec Guinness played the senior British officer, Lt Col Nicholson. Both the book and film outraged former prisoners because Toosey did not collaborate with the enemy, unlike the fictional Lt Col Nicholson.
The Bridge over the River Kwai is a novel by the French novelist Pierre Boulle, published in French in 1952 and English translation by Xan Fielding in 1954. The story is fictional but uses the construction of the Burma Railway, in 1942–1943, as its historical setting, and is partly based on Pierre Boulle's own life experience working in rubber plantations in Malaya and later working for allied forces in Singapore and French Indochina during the Second World War. The novel deals with the plight of World War II British prisoners of war forced by the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) to build a bridge for the "Death Railway", so named because of the large number of prisoners and conscripts who died during its construction. The novel won France's Prix Sainte-Beuve in 1952.
Ann Howard is an Australian author and historian. She has written books on the history of the Australian Women's Army Service, including You'll Be Sorry! How World War II Changed Women's Lives. Her more recent books include A Carefree War: The Hidden History of World War II Child Evacuees, which she wrote after interviewing more than 100 Australians about their experiences. Howard made a podcast of this material on Afternoon Light with Georgina Downer Podcast 157, at the invitation of Melbourne University. A resident of Dangar Island on the Hawkesbury River, New South Wales, for over 50 years, Howard has also authored four books on the island's history.
Julie Graham is a Scottish actress from Irvine, Ayrshire. Her credits include Taggart (1986), The Fruit Machine (1988), Nuns on the Run (1990), Harry (1993–1995), The Near Room (1995), Preaching to the Perverted (1997), Bedrooms and Hallways (1998), Some Voices (2000), At Home with the Braithwaites (2000–2003), William and Mary (2003–2005), Bonekickers (2008), Doc Martin (2011), Tower Block (2012), The Bletchley Circle (2013), Shetland (2014-2022), Benidorm (2016-2018), Doctor Who (2020), Queens of Mystery (2019–2021), Midsomer Murders (2023), and Ridley (2023).
At the end of the Second World War, there were approximately five million servicemembers in the British Armed Forces. The demobilisation and reassimilation of this vast force back into civilian life was one of the first and greatest challenges facing the postwar British government.
While not being urged to avoid competition, women had few opportunities to compete in sport in Australia until the 1880s. After that date, new sporting facilities were being built around the country and many new sport clubs were created. Athletic events were being held in schools in Australia by the early part of the twentieth century. The Glennie School in Toowoomba was one school to host races for girls during their annual girls' sport day. During the 1920s, girls were able to run while wearing bloomers, instead of skirts. The first meeting for women's athletics took place in 1926 and was organised by the NSWAAA. The purpose of the meeting was to determine if it would be possible to send women to compete in the 1928 Summer Olympics based on merit. Only one female athlete was determined to be good enough to send. That was E.F. Robinson. The first women's national athletics body designed to govern the sport in Australia was founded in 1932 and was called the Australian Women's Amateur Athletic Union. It was designed to oversee state organisations in Victoria (1929), Queensland (1921), New South Wales (1932) and South Australia. (1932) The first Australian woman to travel overseas to compete was E.F. Robinson, who went to the 1928 Summer Olympics where she ran in the 100-metres. She came in third and was the only Australian female on the 1928 Australian Olympic team.
Ruth Langdon Inglis was an American journalist and author. She is known for her books about child-rearing.
The Bletchley Circle is a television mystery drama series, set in 1952–53, about four women who worked as codebreakers at Bletchley Park. Dissatisfied with the officials' failure to investigate complex crimes, the women join to investigate for themselves.
Major Joseph Gordon Smith was a soldier who served with the 2nd Battalion of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders and the Royal Army Ordnance Corps. Smith served in Malaya during the Second World War and survived being held as a prisoner of war by the Japanese. During his imprisonment, Smith experienced many hardships and was forced to work on the Burma Railway, an experience which was illustrated by the film The Bridge on the River Kwai.
Major Arthur Moon was an Australian army doctor who saved the lives of dozens of Far East prisoners of war as the Thailand-Burma Railway was being constructed during World War II.
Home Fires is a British period television drama about the life of Women's Institute members on the Home Front during the Second World War. Set in a rural Cheshire community called Great Paxford, the series is produced by ITV, and launched its first series in May 2015. The first series is set between September 1939 and early 1940.
Simon Block is a British screenwriter and producer best known for his work on the Julie Summers inspired ITV series Home Fires.
The County Herb Committees were a nationwide medicinal plant collecting scheme, established by the British Ministry of Health during the Second World War.
Pauline Bird-Hart is a British retired rower who competed at the 1976 Summer Olympics and the 1980 Summer Olympics.
Giliana Balmaceda became Giliana Gerson was a Special Operations Executive agent during the Second World War. She was the first female SOE agent to be sent to occupied France.
Tamarkan was a Japanese prisoner of war work camp during World War II. The camp was initially used for the construction of the bridge over the Khwae Yai or Mae Klong River and not the River Kwai. The camp was located about five kilometres from the city of Kanchanaburi. In November 1943, Tamarkan was turned into a convalescent camp and hospital. By 1945, the camp was gone.