This is the Angel and Royal in Grantham which lays claim to be the oldest inn in England and was the subject of my quiz. It claims to have had seven reigning monarchs as guests, well they wouldn’t have booked a Travelodge..
Also commemorated in the old market town is physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist and theologian Sir Isaac Newtown who is widely considered to be the greatest and most influential scientist who has ever lived. I took this shot of his memorial on a dull cold day on Thursday:
The statue is in front of a museum housed in a rather nice old building which was closed due to cutbacks some time ago but some local enthusiasts are trying to reopen it via lottery funding(!!!)
Newtown claimed to have been inspired to investigate the theory of gravitation by an apple falling from a tree at his childhood home of Woolsthorpe Manor near Grantham.
There is an account of the Lincolnshire town’s continuing homage to Newtown’s memory here
There are other references to Newtown in the town:
I can do no better to explain “The Orrery” above than to post a photo of the information plaque:
And even folks who don’t want to get involved in the finer points of astronomy will know the story of the apple:
Filed under: Quite Interesting Tagged: | grantham, sir isaac newtown, the angel and royal
Were you paying homage to ‘The Iron Lady’ ?
How could you fail to inform us Rab that the woman who had an effect on 1970′s boys like no other now resides in Grantham ? I refer of course to the pulchitrudinous Ayshea Brough.
I wonder if she was the lady who served me in Wetherspoons? She looked familiar……