Richard Digance
​

I remember when the Youth Employment Officer came to our East End school and asked us what we wanted to be when we left school. Half the...

Our finest Sunday-best crockery that our mums only used on special occasions was made of porcelain and porcelain was invented in China,...

To rabbit on was a well-used cockney rhyming slang although very few people used it with as much success as cockney duo, Chas Hodges and...

Gold watch was a term used in pubs when a cockney fancied a nip of whisky. Let’s begin by getting the correct spelling as it seems to be...

During the wild 60s skins were cigarette papers, not annoying members of the family who had boyfriend problems. And then of course there...

It's an interesting cockney rhyming slang because from it came the term of going potty. Losing one’s temper in a way that could be...

So is the tie the most unnecessary item of clothing a man can wear? It may well be these days but it wasn’t in the 17th Century during...

For Eastenders travelling south it usually meant taking the Woolwich Ferry over to Kent for hop-picking, a time to get away from the...

Cauliflower yes and cheese yes, but I don’t think they ever thought about mixing the two together in the late 19th Century. I doubt if...

It’s interesting that small change through the years have been referred to as a copper, or a couple of coppers, but in 1860 and beyond,...

Back in 1184 BC The Greeks and The Trojans were fighting nineteen to the dozen until The Greeks presented The Trojans with a giant wooden...

To tell the story of the derivation of The Old Grey Whistle Test term we must travel west from The East End of London, into what is known...

Americans in particular were convinced he was a real character and they flocked to London’s Fleet Street in their droves to visit the...

So we come to Lah Di Dah, the cockney rhyming slang for cigar. A little outdated in this modern world where people are more concerned...

Having a child is a painful experience, physically so for the mum and mentally for the dad who patrols up and down outside the hospital...

The cockney rhyme is attributed to not anyone British but an American stripper and burlesque dancer by the name of Gypsy Rose Lee, born...

It’s strange because hot cross buns were around when they started working out those earlier cockney rhymes, as they date back to the 14th...

I remember how my mum slung chicken bones into a saucepan of boiling water and stunk the kitchen out for hours. It was a sure sign soup...

Helter Skelter may also seem familiar as a Beatles track on their White Album, but the first kids’ attraction was built, not in Liverpool...

Its composer, Bob Weston, certainly knew how to come up with ridiculous song titles and What a Mouth was nowhere near the worst. There...