Basically, this means that the site is on hiatus until I have more free-time. Or if anyone else would like to volunteer to make updated – if you do, drop me a line using the contact page and we’ll sort it out.

Otherwise, the best source for Dan Snow news is probably his own twitter account.

Let’s all take over the White Cliffs of Dover;
Help us to protect the sight that has said ‘home’ to returning travellers over the centuries

Landscape can be totemic. The Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls and Table Mountain have all come to symbolise the spirit of their nations. The UK is blessed with several features that, to the romantically inclined observer, seem to reflect back something about ourselves, our history and character. We have the Giant’s Causeway, the Great Glen and Cadair Idris, but few places loom as large in our collective consciousness as the White Cliffs of Dover. The brilliant white chalk has served for generations as a canvas on which we project our national story.

When I was a child on a wave-tossed ferry reeking of diesel, the cliffs meant home and release from the tyranny of seasickness. Before the aged of aircraft, huge numbers of travellers arriving in Britain were greeted by the cliffs. They were recognised by the crews of the millions of ships that have used Europe’s busiest shipping lanes for millennia. In the First World War British soldiers returning from the Western Front yearned to see them, as confirmation that they were truly leaving hell behind them and would see their homes once more. Bomber crews in the Second World War glimpsed them on moonlit nights, a ribbon of silver marking the start of territory that remained free of the Nazi yoke. In 1940 a shattered Army carried in frigates, ferries, barges, paddle steamers and tenders from the cauldron of Dunkirk saw the cliffs and knew they would live to fight again.

The cliffs welcome and reassure but they have also roared defiance. Despots such as Bonaparte and Hitler have gazed across the narrows. The only sight of their implacable enemy was the line of cliffs like bared teeth on the horizon – the manifestation of a stubborn island nation that would not be beaten into submission. From the cartoons of Gillray to the paintings of Turner and Dame Vera Lynn’s Second World War anthem the White Cliffs are an instantly recognisable metaphor for Britishness.

The cliffs were playing this role long before the wars of the past two centuries. Julius Caesar commented on them in De Bello Gallico, the first eye-witness account of Britain in literature. His first impression was of a wild island with giant natural fortification. In 55BC his expedition was met by “armed forces of the enemy on all the cliffs”. They rained javelins down on any ship that approached the shore. Disinclined to assault such a position, Caesar sailed north to a more open beach. The Britons had tracked his forces and met his legionaries as they staggered out of the shallows, making this first recorded invasion the only opposed one in our history.

Many travellers, conquerors and tourists have followed in Caesar’s footsteps. Henry II enlarged Dover Castle to create one of the world’s supreme medieval strongholds, taking full advantage of the precipitous cliffs. Twice the invading French were unable to penetrate its walls and seize “the key to England”. Monarchs such as Henry VIII and his daughter Elizabeth stayed there and for the nervous foreign princess Henrietta Maria the cliffs and castle were the first taste of a country that she would preside over as Queen.

A walk along the cliffs today is a walk through the layers of our history: mighty ramparts older than the name of Britain itself; a towering Roman lighthouse; the castle; Second World War radar masts, the world’s first, which allowed the RAF to meet German raids head on with Spitfires and Hurricanes; the world’s first electric lighthouse on South Foreland, where Marconi made the first international radio transmission.

There is nowhere better on this island to ponder our past, with its contradictory mix of co-operation and defiance, of Englishness, Britishness and European-ness, than the meadows atop the White Cliffs. That is why I am involved with a National Trust campaign to take advantage of an opportunity to acquire a key section of the White Cliffs, and not just the actual cliffs but also the stunning land on top of them. This will ensure that they are a place we can all visit, lie among the wildflowers and stare out to sea.

Access will be guaranteed and conservation implemented. The National Trust is creating a truly public space on top of this national icon. We must seize this chance to secure them for future generations to enjoy. We have a chance to shape the destiny of the cliffs, as profoundly as the Plantagenet kings, the Victorian Army or the wartime engineers. This year we can take them into our own hands and protect them, in the words of the Trust’s motto, “for everyone, for ever”.

Dan Snow is a broadcaster, television presenter and historian nationaltrust.org.uk/whitecliffsappeal

The cliffs welcome and reassure, but they also roar defiance

More information about the appeal.

Growing up as a Snow, a Suchet or a Fox, who could resist following in the family footsteps? Five London dynasties talk to Hannah Nathanson about working with their nearest and dearest

Dan Snow, 32
I grew up thinking that everyone’s dad was on telly. As early as I can remember I used to say goodnight to my dad on television when he was doing Newsnight. Both Dad and his cousin Jon are very good at treating young people like adults. If you wanted to talk to them, you had to talk about what they were interested in, which was politics. I remember when I was five they asked me what I thought about Margaret Thatcher and the coalmining strikes, and Dad would take me to demonstrations in London and the House of Commons in session so I got the bug quite early on. Being in front of a camera in our family was quite normal. We always did piece-to-cameras for our family videos. It was what he and Mum, who works for Canadian news channel CBC, did for a living.

There are loads of fun anecdotes from working with Dad. We were sailing dinghies to show how the Spanish Armada was defeated by the English and the boom kept crashing into him. I am constantly looking after Dad because he refuses to listen to what anybody else says; when the crew are setting, he’ll be wandering through a minefield to see if there’s a better angle. You can always tell when Jon was in the house because he and Dad start yelling at each other. Jon loves huge bold statements and Dad likes interviewing him and knocking him down. Dad and I have a habit of arguing even when we agree with each other. We always know what we’re going to say next so I’ll be about to say something and he’ll say, ‘Can I just remind you…’ and I’ll say, ‘I know what you’re about to say and you don’t have to say that.’ It’s never personal: we disagree about things like how many First World War casualties there were on a battlefield.

Jon Snow, 63
I enjoy watching Peter and Dan on television now, it’s a very clever format because they are exactly as they are in real life- that’s what I’ve had to live with. Dan is a generational leader. He stands apart, not just because of his height but he’s a great historian. Peter and I might represent a work in progress but Dan is it, he’s the bee’s knees. There’s something that he’s got that neither of us have. I think it’s clarity and boundless integrity. When ITN offered me a job in the 1970s I refused initially. I didn’t want to work at the same station as Peter because it would have been hopeless; I mean the Dimblebys have tried that. But within a few months the editor sent me a note saying, ‘Just send me a paragraph saying you’ll work for us and the job is yours’ so I went there as a reporter in 1975. Peter was a formidable force in news reporting way before I went into it. We only got a television when I was 15 because Peter was reading the news on it. He had fantastic focus and was a very clear reporter. We argued like donkeys, especially about politics. He thought I was a complete extremist and I thought he was an old fuddy-duddy, but he was always right. He always had reason on his side and I always had emotion on my side.

Peter Snow, 73
Whenever I’ve had a career change I’ve asked my son Dan for his opinion first. He has a very decisive judgement and it’s always right. We first started working together when I was finishing on Tomorrow’s World. Dan was at Oxford University and got into the rowing 1st VIII; someone noticed him doing a recording about how to row a boat and came to me saying that he’d be rather good on the telly and why don’t we work together. ‘You must be joking!’ I said but they still wanted to try it, so we did a programme on the Battle of El Alamein in 2002 where Dan told the story of the man on the front line and I explained the strategy. It worked very well telling a dual story like that. People used to come up to me and say, ‘Are you Peter Snow?’ Now they come up to me and say, ‘Are you Dan Snow’s father?’ It’s quite fun. I’m immensely proud of the guy.

Jon is a superb journalist. He immediately established himself as someone with a great curiosity and a drive to find out what was really going on- rather like me, except he has the advantage of being ten years younger. When I joined ITN in 1962 I really wanted to be a trainee director and get into drama, but within a week of writing news stories I became a journalist and there was no looking back. Jon and I have both covered election nights at the same time. It’s been great fun watching the recording of Jon doing his bit afterwards. We’ve had slightly different roles: he has been the anchor, the Dimbleby figure of ITN, and I’ve explained the facts and figures. I didn’t give Jon a leg up into the industry, I simply told him who to ring. He found his way into radio and then television on his own merits. Within minutes of Jon broadcasting on LBC, my news editor said to me, ‘That Snow, is he related to you? How do I get hold of him?’ I gave him the number and Jon came to ITN.

The rest of the article is about other families and not included here.

From here:

Sunday, 03/02/12, 11:00 on BBC Radio 5 live

This week Al Murray is joined by Andy Zaltzman, Rebecca Front and Dan Snow to pull apart and take a lighter look at the weekend’s news. On the agenda this week, amongst other things will be the ‘deknightation’ of Fred Goodwin.

From here:

TV historian Dan Snow travels across the old Kingdom of Mercia unravelling the secrets of one of Britian’s most significant discoveries – the Staffordshire Hoard. The Hoard offers 1500 new clues into the Dark Ages and Dan pieces together the lives of the people living in these long-forgotten kingdoms.

Video clip: Saxon hoard: Staffordshire’s golden discovery

Dan’s featured in an underwater photo exhibition doing what he does, but underwater!

The exhibition is in aid of the Shipwrecked Mariners Society and more details can be found here.

From bbc.co.uk:

Father and son team Dan and Peter Snow go head to head with experts Charlie Ross and Charles Hanson on the hunt to find the best antique deals as they travel through Hampshire and along the south coast ending up at an auction in Billingshurst, Sussex.

Further detail from HistoricDockyard.co.uk:

The National Museum of the Royal Navy (NMRN) and Antiques Storehouse at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard were taken over this summer by father and son team, Peter and Dan Snow, as they recorded an episode of Celebrity Antiques Road Trip. The episode will be screened on BBC Two on Friday 4th November at 7pm.

Each programme will see a different pair of celebrities put their wit and bargaining skills to the test as they set out to find hidden gems along the road and auction them off, hopefully at a profit, at the end of their trip. All money made throughout the series will be donated to Children in Need.

One of Britain’s best known journalists and presenters, Peter Snow, partnered with antique expert Charlie Ross, competed against his son, TV historian/presenter Dan Snow, and expert Charles Hanson as the would-be bargain hunters travelled an antiques trail in classic vintage cars. The teams were each given a starting budget of £400 before starting their engines for the cross-country challenge in which they were tasked to make the biggest profit buying and selling antiques.

Whilst on their trip to Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, Peter and Charlie couldn’t resist a visit to the National Museum of the Royal Navy where Head of Collections, Matthew Sheldon, showed them a fascinating collection relating to Admiral Lord Nelson.

However, Dan and Charles were hot on their heels and soon caught up with them to find some last minute bargains at the Antiques Storehouse before the big reveal of items collected for auction.

Find out more about Children in Need here.
Photo from AboutMyArea.co.uk

From here:

Anova Books imprint Conway has acquired the official tie-in to forthcoming BBC series “Dig WWII” fronted by historian Dan Snow.

Publisher John Lee acquired world rights through agent Luigi Bonomi on behalf of documentary makers 360 Production.

The book and series will focus on the new discipline of military archaology, investigating little-known stories from the Second World War through excavations and dives. The historians uncover the remains of a crashed Spitfire in a Somerset graveyard, dive to a sunken U-boat and British Armed Merchant Ship in the North Sea, and explore German D-Day tunnels and bunkers off Juno Beach.

Lee said: “We are very excited to be teaming up with experienced history documentary makers 360 Production, who previously filmed ‘Dig 1940′ for BBC1. That series was popularly received, achieving ratings of nearly 5 million viewers for the opening episode. I’m also delighted to be working on another project involving Dan Snow, who is the perfect presenter for such an innovative hands-on approach to military history.”

Military and naval historian Jean Hood will write the book, which will be published in March next year priced £20. The series is lined up for spring 2012.

From the website:

Battle Castle brings to life mighty medieval fortifications and the epic sieges they resist: clashes that defy the limits of military technology, turn empires to dust, and transform mortals into legends.

Link roundup:
Website: http://www.battlecastle.tv
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/battlecastle
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/battlecastle/
Wreckamovie: http://www.wreckamovie.com/battlecastle
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/battlecastle
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/battlecastle