Danny Lawrence

The UK's energy problems are now centre stage. Growing up with Gas puts them in perspective with a history of the gas industry from its revolutionary origins at the beginning of the 19th century, manufacturing coal gas, to the present, as a now handful of international companies gear up to move it from carbon-emitting natural gas to the clean gas hydrogen. En route, the fragmented industry was rationalised by nationalisation then returned to the vagaries of (now global) market forces by privatisation. Because the industry consisted of small companies for most of its 200 years, this national history is combined with a detailed case study. Focused on North Tyneside, it illustrates how local companies evolved and how their directors, shareholders, employees, and customers responded to national changes and local circumstances, including often fraught relationships with local Councils, competition from the electricity industry, and the huge impact of two world wars.

This first and ground-breaking biography of Arthur Jefferson, the father of Stan Laurel (the mastermind behind the legendary comedy partnership of Laurel and Hardy), reveals that he was a major influence on his son, a fine comic actor himself, a successful playwright, and an excellent example of the provincial theatrical lessees who provided Victorians and Edwardians with their main source of entertainment. It describes the ups and downs of his life, family and career and how, in middle age, he had to confront the challenge to the world of intimate, local, live theatre from the emerging global, silent and then sound cinema industry. Ironically, it was the success of films like those of Laurel and Hardy which all but destroyed the provincial theatrical world that Arthur loved.

As an adult, Stan Laurel (1890-1965) lived in the United States. As a boy, he lived in north-east England, the son of a prominent local theatrical figure. This ground-breaking biography examines Laurel's family background, his formative years and his struggle to establish a show business career. Stan retained the emotional bonds forged in his youth throughout his life and visited his boyhood homes during his UK tours with Oliver Hardy. Describing Stan Laurel's key roles in making his films with his partner Oliver Hardy so successful internationally, the book analyzes how Stan's boyhood experiences are often echoed in those films. It also notes his influence on successive generations of comic actors who, to this day, still pay fulsome tribute to him. Included is a selection of photographs relevant to Laurel's boyhood, some related to themes in the Laurel and Hardy comedies.