Welcome to Poppyland Publishing - East Anglian Specialists
Whether you're living in Norfolk or Suffolk, Cambridgeshire or Essex, planning a visit, interested in local history, tracking down your family history or love the natural history of East Anglia, we hope we'll have some titles - books and DVDs - to interest you.
You can use your credit or debit card to make direct purchases from the site. In addition to Poppyland's own titles, we have the full range of titles in print from the prestigious Centre of East Anglian Studies. To use the 'Product Search' facility above, you only need to enter one word of interest - you don't, for instance, need to use the whole title of a book.
Try the buttons on the left for the different categories of titles we publish. And explore our 'Support and Resource' pages. These are all free - and always growing.
On the right you'll find short presentations about some of our products. To buy, click on the appropriate button in the left column. Ordering from this site is a First Class Royal Mail service direct from the publisher.
Crabs and Shannocks - The Longshore Fishermen of North Norfolk is a DVD which tells the story of today's daily hunt for crabs and lobsters from the beaches in and around the towns of Cromer and Sheringham. At the end of the nineteenth century over a hundred boats worked from Sheringham beach and the many more from Cromer. We can pick up evidence of the fishing from Saxon times, with many men venturing far available, as well as the specialisation of the fisheries on the north Norfolk chalk ridge. From ancient documents to the photography of the Victorain age, through historic film and the written record, a story of over a thousand years of maritime history are told in this DVD.
The Crabs and Shannocks DVD runs for 67 minutes and you can click to view a trailer of the DVD. To order your copy online, click for the 'DVDs and Videos' section.
With 272 pages and 249 illustrations, many in colour, Maritime Norfolk is a comprehensive coverage of the coast of Norfolk from the ports of Wisbech and Kings Lynn round to Winterton and Caister on Sea. It also includes a chapter on the inland waterways and the port of Norwich. A second volume, dealing specifically with the maritime history of Yarmouth, will be published in 2013. Robert Malster is the doyen of East Anglian writers on maritime topics and he has both written many other books himself and has encouraged others who have followed up with studies of their own areas of interest. He brings his life-long interest in local history and all matters maritime to this title, a must for anyone with an interest in local maritime history. A click on Robert Malster will enable you to hear briefly from the author and Maritime Norfolk to order your copy online; it's also available through all good East Anglian bookshops.
Looking back along the pier towards the town at Cromer is one of the most satisfying views of north Norfolk today. Robert Marten clearly thought much the same as he drew his sketch from Cromer jetty in September 1825. Some of the buildings he saw are markedly changed, others are surprisingly familiar.
Much the same can be said of the other pictures he drew in Norfolk as he and his family made a journey of 24 days. It took him, his wife and daughter from London by steamer to Great Yarmouth, by river steamer to Norwich and by coach to Cromer. The pencil sketches are additions to the many pictures in words which open up the county of 1825 to us. With the many notes that editor Elizabeth Larby provides to give us background detailed, it is a charming and very informative read. You can click to hear editor Elizabeth Larby describe how she became interested in the journal and pictures, and you can click Mr Marten's Travels in East Anglia to order your copy online.
Overstrand - Tide and Time is a new DVD for this Norfolk coastal village, following on from the enormous popularity of the first DVD Overstrand - Our Village. Whether you're a villager, a visitor or have family connections with the village, sure sure to find more to interest you here. There's a little less hisotry thatn the first disc - though still plenty of stories from the past - but plenty about more recent events and in particular coverage of some of the annual events. You can buy a coy from this web site by going to the DVD section.
Author Jackie Stuart has spent many years interviewing airman who served as fliers or ground crew in the USAAF in England in the Second World War. Beneath the Clouds brings together their words. It is this framework which makes it such an essential read for those interested in that time of conflict.
The book seeks to complement those many books which tell of the flying adventures; it tells the story of that wartime life into which they were thrust - and from which they were equally rapidly withdrawn when the conflict in Europe ended.
The towns and villages of East Anglia have handed down many legends of wartime life. There remains a range of memorials and some physical evidence of the many airfields. This book brings us the stories direct from those who lived and worked on those bases - and sort to explore the country in which they found themselves. Click on author Jackie Stuart to hear her introduce the book and on Beneath the Clouds to order your copy online.
In the DVD Cromer in the Second World War memories of specific events remain as sharp as ever with some of those who have contributed. Their words are mixed with pictures and film from the war years, providing a picture of a town that was perhaps not of great strategic importance but was very much on the front line.
Veteran American journalist Norman Corwin, in 2011 a venerable 101 years of age and living in Los Angeles, has lent his memories to the project and pilot Flight Sergeant Jim Flint visited the town to recall how he ditched his aircraft just off the beach. Ramon and Beguna Arguelles tell of how their father's vessel, the Cantabria, was sunk by a Spanish nationalist gunboat just off Cromer and Jean Boden recountsf how she had the feeling that the bombers were following her round the town in the war years. Remarkable stories from a remarkable period of the town's history.
For a short introduction to the DVD, you can click on this linkor go to 'DVDs and Videos' to order your copy direct.
Attleborough, Aylsham, Diss, Downham Market, Dereham, Fakenham, Harleston, Holt, Loddon, North Walsham, Reepham and Swaffham are the twelve Norfolk settlements featured in Exploring the Norfolk Market Town. The book is an essential starting point for anyone interested in the detail of these towns but each chapter is also an exemplar of how to approach the study of local history. Through the author's information on the sourcing and use of local maps, the way to make us of documents in the local record office and the use of historic and contemporary photographs, it provides an exemplar of the way to study your own town and its people.
Christopher Barringer has lived and worked in Norfolk for 45 years, introducing individuals and local groups to the enjoyment and fascination of local studies and the book carries the benefit of those many years of experience. To order online click on Exploring the Norfolk Market Town; alternatively you can find it at any good bookshop in East Anglia. You can click for a video presentation by Christopher Barringer about the book.
There are few parishes in the British Isles which know as much of their own history as Sedgeford in west Norfolk. To the work of its own local history society can be added the annual excavation of sites in the parish which has been undertaken since 1996.
A unique hoard of coins, hundreds of human burials, detailed collections of shells and pollen, a golden torc, all these are amongst the finds on the site which help us understand over 150 generations of life in Sedgeford.
Sedgeford - Five Thousand Years is a DVD that tells the story of these years of excavation and the interpretation of what has been found. It also endeavours to illustrate the enthusiam of those who annually gather to 'dig' for the story. For a video preview click Sedgeford - Five Thousand Years and to order go to 'DVDs and Videos'.
Since Cromer's first guidebook was written in 1798, there have been two substantive histories written of the town, by Walter Rye and Alfred Savin. Cyril Crawford Holden contributed much to the research on the town and now local author Christopher Pipe draws on these and a great variety of other sources for A Dictionary of Cromer and Overstrand History.
With nearly 150 illustrations, a comprehensive index and listing of names associated with the town, it will be the key reference point for the years ahead for anyone interest in local and family history.
This title, published on 11th December 2010, is available in both paperback and hardback. Click A Dictionary of Cromer and Overstrand History to order your copy.
In 1838 the Upcher family of Sheringham gave the money for the building of Sheringham's first rowing lifeboat. Thus the Augusta was built, protecting passing shipping and the fishermen of the town in their daily occupation. A few year later the Royal National Lifeboat Institution also decided to provide a lifeboat at Sheirngham and so a remarkable story of determination, courage and commitment to livesaving at sea continued, through to the present day.
The tale of The Sheringham Lifeboats over the years has been brought together through the interviews, historic photographs and film on this one hour DVD. Coxswains past recall their boats, an historic lifeboat is rowed to explain the effort required in the days of wooden boats and iron men and Anglia Television's Bygones presenter Eddie Anderson narrates the story. For an introduction to the DVD, you can click on this linkClick The Sheringham Lifeboats to order your copy.
