Back Issue of Horse and Hound

[Chris Brown]

Hi All.

In the first few months of 1977 I wrote a letter which was published in Horse and Hound. It was the first letter in the issue and predicted Red Rum’s third victory in the Grand National. I lost my copy of this issue many years ago, but I would love to get hold of a photocopy of that letters page if anyone happens to have the relevant back issue.

I would guess it would have been in one of the March, or possibly February, issues of 1977. A long shot would be the first issue in April of that year.

If anyone has this and would be willing to supply me with a photocopy I would be eternally grateful

Many thanks,

Chris Brown

 

[Skib]

I was going to offer to go to the British Library and photocopy your letter. However the BL catalogue suffered a cyber attack and since I have not needed to consult a book there since Covid lock down, I am not sure what the situation is.
I cannot get the BL catalogue to show whether or not that issue of H&H 1977 is available or whether it needs to be ordered in.
Some books and periiodicals are kept on the British Library site in London but a lot is now stored in Boston, Yorkshire, and needs to be requested in advance. It could be that it is not available at all.

But it looks as if one cannot make an enquiry to the BL by phone (as one could before) and needs to email them.

I have not been to the BL since before lockdown and need to renew my reader's ticket. I am therefore willing to go there on Friday, both to sort out my ticket and to enquire about H&H for 1977.

Horse and Hound is classified as a periodical and I suspect one needs to read it in the Newspaper library which is now in the same building as the main book library. But thanks to the cyber attack, some periodicals are in red on the on line cataligue as unavailable. That seems to include H&H.

You can phone or email the BL yourself and find out what the situation is. If it is available, I can order it in in advance but unless I go this Friday, I cant find a day when I can go there before 15 May.

I am going to post this now and look at a different website for journals, just to see.

 

[SilverLinings]

It might cost you a few pounds but there are loads of back copies of H&H for sale on ebay. If you contact sellers with the issues you think the letter might be in then they may be willing to check for you so that you only have to buy the correct one. I have pre-war issues but nothing from the 1970s unfortunately.

Alternatively, you could always ask H&H as if they've digitised their archive it may be very straightforward for them to email you a copy of the page.

Good luck, I hope you manage to track it down.

 

[Rumtytum]

I bought copies from Ebay for certain months I wanted of H&H from 1973, took a little while but they did eventually turn up for sale. Good luck!

 

[Skib]

I dont think it is digitised that far back. I couldnt find it.

 

[Chris Brown]

Thank you so much to all of you for your replies. Skib, don’t worry about the BL for the moment. I will try the other suggestions first, in particular EBay and the possible digitisation of past editions. If I draw a blank I’ll get back to you or, it occurs to me, an ILL from my local library could be a possibility. Thank you again to all of you.

 

[Skib]

It would be no worry as I need to renew my BL reader's card. And it is good for me to get out and about and be walking. Think of me as an old horse.
If I am physically in the BL, I will ask about the H&H, as there is nothing like asking a real person.
But my late father used ILL a lot, so it will be great if you can get it that way.

 

[Chris Brown]

This is incredibly kind of you. My wife is now very disabled so getting into town to the library is not easy. If you have any luck (whenever that is) let me know, and I will do the same if I have success. Thank you again. Chris

 

[Skib]

I am sorry about your wife. I am I am very lucky still to be riding in my 80s and fit, but the sadness is that so many of our friends in our age group are either ill or suffering from alzheimers.

This cyber attack is wider than I thought. I graduated from Cambridge and have a friend there who goes to the uni library a lot. I was going to get her to get the pic for you. However, I couldnt get the Cambidgre UL on line catalogue to work either. Even if I fail at the BL tomorrow, all is not lost, I have a grand daughter and her husband both researching in Oxford.

I am pretty expert at tracking down academic journals but Horse and Hound is commercial and I dont know how the system works.

 

[Chris Brown]

I envy you still riding. Sadly I haven’t been on a horse in nearly 50 years. Circumstances dictated that my ambition to be a jockey did not come to fruition. When your father’s a professor and your mother a teacher they tend to have other ideas!

I should say that what I’m looking for is a letter rather than a picture. It was the first on the letters page of the issue. I’ve assumed it was published some time in March or late February, but there is the possibility of the first issue in April 1977.

I look forward to hearing how you get on.

 

[Skib]

I realise it is a letter. But if I find it, I will take a picture jpg of it with my smart phone.
You will need to pm me your email so I can then send it to you.
I have decided not to cart my lap top up to London with me. (Old age) and I wont be retyping your letter.

 

[Chris Brown]

My e-mail address is chianti75@hotmail.co.uk. Good hunting!

 

[Skib]

I went to the BL. They still cant access their paper copies of H &H. And their search showed no copies in other libraries.

 

[Skib]

Newspapers and books are usually deposited but commercial magazines seem to fall into a gap. I would write to the archivist at H& H and enquire.

 

[Chris Brown]

Thank you so much for all your efforts on my behalf. It is hugely appreciated. I will try the H&H archivist as you suggest. Many thanks again.

 

[Skib]

From my point of view as a historian, it is troubling that copies dont seem to survive. One of my uni friends later researched women's magazines in the 19th century. And the history of riding and horsemanship is now in itself a subject of academic research.
If you want to take the search further, the librarian kindly told me that the website he was using to search was called library hub.

 

[Chris Brown]

Having checked out Library Hub it would appear that the issues may be available from Cambridge University. They are not permitted to be loaned, but it should be possible to request, via ILL, photocopies of the letters page of all the issues in which my letter may have been printed.

 

[Northern Hare]

Hi Chris, I don't know if you have already found a copy of your article, but just in case you haven't, there's an article in H&H yesterday to say they've now got a digital online archive of 120 years of the magazine (access from £2.99/day). Here's the link to yesterday's article - hopefully it will help reunite you with your article!

Read +120 years of Horse & Hound in new online magazine archive - Horse & Hound

Horse & Hound has partnered with digital archive specialists Archive Digital to make decades of the magazine’s back catalogue available to subscribe to online. Issues from the magazine’s launch in 1884, until September 2012, are available to read at The Magazine Archive with a subscription to...

www.horseandhound.co.uk

 

[Skib]

I am delighted to see this. Although my experience reading other publications is that it can work out expensive is one wants to read many issues.

 

[Caski]

Good morning, I wonder if you might search the online bookshops and Ebay for the appropriate H&H Year Book? I have bought a few recently (pre- 1960 mostly) very inexpensive. A google search with a clear thread might find one for sale, I paid just under £5 for 1957 pt 2.

Good luck