1876 Victorian England Revisited (A Time Travel Adventure)

Elisabeth Prescott Ashton takes you back to a Victorian Middle class home. With the help of her family and staff, she escorts you through the house. She also goes into great detail about Victorian culture, etiquette, pursuits and even takes you on walking tours through London. There is also a large list of links and bibliography for the truly serious researcher. And once you have become an expert you can download your very own Honorary Victorian Certificate!

This is a fun site with an almost game like feel. (Kids would love it.) However the creator, Betty Malheiro, has taken great pains to be thorough and accurate on the Victorian era. You feel like you really have time traveled.

Click here to visit 1876 Victorian England

All Things Victorian

Victoriana Lady Lisa
(photo swiped from her website)

The All Things Victorian series is a study of Victorian as well as Edwardian culture and history. It is produced by Passion Projects, the brainchild of Lisa Griffiths and John Grant. Both are authors and Victorian history geeks. Victoriana Lady Lisa appears as a reenactor and lecturer with her traveling Victorian museum. She is also the author of International Steampunk Fashions. John’s passion is photographing old cemeteries full of Victorian statuary. They are now producing a delightful series called All Things Victorian for Cape Ann Television, a non-profit community access station in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Rather than making us all move to Gloucester, John has been kind enough to post the programs on YouTube so the entire world can watch.

Lisa’s knowledge of the era is phenomenal. She has been collecting antiques and reading on the period since she was a little kid. But rather than just showing off her own talent she also brings others onto the program to share their own collections and expertise. Each show narrows in on subject such as Victorian superstitions, fashions and accessories. She has already promised us more. I can’t wait!

John Grant’s YouTube channel featuring both All Things Victorian, as well as his cemetery photography

Lisa’s website: All Things Victorian 

International Steampunk Fashions by Victoriana Lady Lisa

Final Thoughts: Eternal Beauty in Stone by John Thomas Grant

Passing English of the Victorian era

I found a little gem: Passing English of the Victorian era: a dictionary of heterodox English, slang and phrase published in London in 1909 by James Redding Ware. Mr. Ware collected the slang of everyone from hoodlums to the upper crust while it was still fresh in everyone's memory. You can download it free and legally at the Internet Archive (a source I had mentioned in an earlier post.) Now your Steampunk stories can get steamier as you use Victorian slang with confidence.

The Salon

[Editor's note: This website and all of the links no longer work. They appear to have gone to that Great Internet In the Sky. If you know where I can reconnect, please let me know.]
I ran across a little treasure trove of Victorian culture. Sohie Lagace is an engineer by day and a role player by night. One her favorite games is Castle Falkenstein with its Steampunk setting. She has a webpage called "The Salon" that has links to all sorts of Victorian fashion, etiquette, culture, language and technology. Here are just a few of the links:

Victorian Slang Glossary Speech of the Lower Classes

How to Speak Proper Slang for the Upper Classes

The Library Victorian Science, technology, military history, etc.

The Salon is a labyrinth well worth exploring. (Don't worry, you won't get lost.)
  Link to the Salon webpage
[6-28-2014 update: The Salon seems to have vanished. The first three sites I mention are still there.]

Mostly Victorian

Moira Allen shares her vast collection of articles and illustrations from Victorian books and magazines. She has scanned them to pdfs for you to download and has divided them up into categories. Now instead of reading what modern people say about Victorians, you can read what the Victorians said of themselves.

Click here to visit Mostly Victorian

The Victorian School

Just one of their free photos

Started by Stephen and Irene Clark in Somerset, England, the Victorian School website was setup to educate educators how to educate children about the Victorian Age. Stephen and Irene actually have a business visiting schools in the UK, but they are sharing all they know for teachers and homeschoolers around the world so they can do their own Victorian Day. They have articles, projects, free ebooks and pdf printouts, video links, lists of Victorian museums in the UK...well, you’ll just have to go and check it out, won’t you?

Although geared toward kids and educators, there is plenty here for a writer doing research, especially if you need to know anything about Victorian schooling. And the Clarks are constantly adding to their website.

Oh, and you Steampunkers, check out their online store for costumes and accessories.

Click here to go to their webiste: The Victorian School

Victorian Days

I stumbled across a site called "Victorian Days." It is an offshoot of www.AngelPig.net. Apparently it started out as a Barbecue site, that branched out into Southern culture and then got into Victorian society. Rather than the meandering endeavor this might imply, I'm thinking it's a genius with too much in their brain to stay focused on just one subject.

The Victorian sideline is more extensive than most folks would attempt as a mainline. The site map shows dozens of subjects on Victorian culture and etiquette. Each has at the bottom of its page more detailed articles on the topic. I'm not sure how many items there are, but you could spend all day reading. They are well written and appear to be well researched.

Here is the link: Victorian Days site map