Unable to sleep, I’ve been wandering the intertubes searching for interesting reading. Found some stuff I think we should all take a peek at, who knows where it might be useful…

1. The FBI’s Jack the Ripper casefile. It contains some interesting behavior patterns for the JTR vics as well as suppositions about his MO. The whole article is an interesting read, very suppositional, but that’s probably unavoidable in a situation like this. Choice picks:
   
2. Welcome to the Twilight City. There are a few articles here detailing Late Victorian London, with an emphasis on nightlife and night atmosphere and prostitution. Choice picks:

“A gloomy place, the Twilight City was never pitch black: the lights from smaller shops, the glimmer of lamps on passing vehicles and glow from household windows meant the urban landscape was always lit to some degree*. Even in the miasma of a thick fog objects were discernable on the nocturnal streets of London. The ‘pea-souper’ is such a powerful image that it is repeated time and again in films, books and illustrations. Yet the most dangerous element of the fog was not from possible criminals hidden by its embrace, but rather from the industrial toxins within it: thousands died from its poisonous effect to the lungs.5 During the day it was fairly common for the fog to combined with industrial smog, creating a ‘day-darkness’. It was not uncommon then for the Twilight City to become a 24-hour feature of urban life.”

“The more professional and streetwise prostitutes, Walkowitz asserts, forged safety and support networks among themselves. They frequently worked in pairs, she writes, ‘to protect themselves from abusive men and to overpower and rob tipsy customers.’86 White concurs stating: ‘Some prostitutes lured their clients in to be robbed by their bully [pimp or boyfriend, or both]. Often this could occur in a hotel room after the man had fallen asleep. Or if on the streets, the prostitute could take the client into a dark alley where the bully would mug him or, if he put up a fight, beat him to a pulp and then steal any valuables.’”The more professional and streetwise prostitutes, Walkowitz asserts, forged safety and support networks among themselves. They frequently worked in pairs, she writes, ‘to protect themselves from abusive men and to overpower and rob tipsy customers.’86 White concurs stating: ‘Some prostitutes lured their clients in to be robbed by their bully [pimp or boyfriend, or both]. Often this could occur in a hotel room after the man had fallen asleep. Or if on the streets, the prostitute could take the client into a dark alley where the bully would mug him or, if he put up a fight, beat him to a pulp and then steal any valuables.’”

3. casebook.org has a really excellent collection of articles about London streetlife, with emphasis on the impoverished east end and night-time. Choice picks:

“See there in that doorway of a house without a glimmer of light about it. It looks to be a baby in long clothes laid on the floor of the passage, and seemingly exhausted with crying. Listen for a moment at this next house. There is a scuffle going on upon the staircase – all in the densest darkness – and before you have passed a dozen yards there is a rush down-stairs and an outsurging into the street with fighting and screaming, and an outpouring of such horrible blackguardism that it makes you shudder as you look at those curly-headed preternaturally sharp-witted children who leave their play to gather around the mêlée.”

“In Whitechapel Road, between the church and Mile-end Gate on this night everything is to be bought from the stalls which line the roadway, especially on the left-hand side going towards the Gate from the City. Amidst the flaming naphtha lights can be discerned toys, hatchets, crockery, carpets, oil-cloth, meat, fish, greens, second-hand boots, furniture, artificial flowers, &c. Round every stall are eager women, bartering with the salesmen. It is evident that the poor mother must husband her farthings. The meat must be bought, and so must those boots for her young son; his old ones are so worn that they cannot keep out the wet any longer. Here are women chaffering in good-humoured content because their husbands have been able to give them a shilling or two extra this week; others with difficulty restraining the tears which are welling to their eyes because the price of meat at the stalls is so high that the dear little ones at home will no be able to taste any again this week.”

I’ve really only scratched the surface here. The sites are filled with a great richness of detail that will surely be helpful as we move forward in creating this world in the most visceral manner possible. If you’ve got some time to spare would recommend you browse over to there and read a bit.

I’ve also managed to find some good reference books among there, and have put out library requests for them.

-raza

I found some good resources to get us started.

Wikipedia’s map of the JTR murders help localize the areas we need to focus on for lower class London, but the street names don’t seem to match up with what was true for the time… probably they superimposed geographical location over a map that is out of sync chronologically. For example, the first murder, Mary Ann Nichols, according to Wikipedia takes place at a location call Buck’s Row, but the map shows it’s future name of Durward street…

BUT….

Our very own department of Epidemiology at the School of Public Health has an 1859 map up, sliced into quarter mile chunks, and I was able to
pinpoint this location on there… Heavy score… Buck’s Row, it’s just off the bottom left corner in the slice on the right. This map has great detail, and includes a lot of landmarks and building names that I think will really help us get the geography detail stellar.

I’m dropping an email to Prof. Ralph Frerichs, who headed the project for putting this map online to see if we can get access to the original digital map, uncut, so we can lay it in as a floorplan in Maya.

Good start, methinx.

-raza