Lisa Horner Writer & Artist

If you have bought my book, 'Lost Basildon', you may have read a personal anecdote of mine on the last page.  I have done a tribute to my Nan, Amelia.  She certainly contributed to my interest in history, I remember so well her telling me stories of our family.  She had two sisters and six brothers, and worshipped Polly her mother.  She admired how she coped with all her children, somehow always getting a meal on the table.  She had a very colourful life in London and loved to tell us about it, bringing the past to life passionately and articulately.  She was brought up in Clerkenwell by a half-English half-Irish mother and an Italian father, most of her siblings looked Italian. Family was her main concern.  Nanny Milly, as I called her, was a listening ear and a loving heart to all of our family.  She was naturally an entertainer and comedienne, and when her and Grandad got together they could be a comedy duo and I needed them in my life as I wa...

You can see the online version of this article here . https://www.lisajhorner.com/

Vin Harrop has been the biggest inspiration in my local history author career (after this Arnold Wesker with his community play Beorhtel's Hill and Frances Clamp and also the Basildon Borough Heritage team).  He welcomed me to The Basildon Heritage Project Team with his usual enthusiasm and warmth and although I was sort of going along with his campaign at the time he planted a seed that has stayed in my mind.  This seed is the idea of a museum for Basildon. Take a look at this newspaper article about Vin and The Arts Centre and then you might appreciate why this man is such an inspiration: - https://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/16891794.the-rise-and-fall-of-basildons-groundbreaking-arts-centre/ My ideal museum would appeal to all ages and would be highly immersive, it would include virtual reality experiences where you could walk down Laindon High Road in the 1940's or 1950's, go into Parkinson' s for example and ask for something, it would be much like the fork ha...

I had the privilege of being on the Book Club at Phoenix 98FM last week, I was invited by Sylvia Kent, a prolific author who's been writing for a long time, she was also on the show with me talking about her latest book  'Brentwood in 50 Buildings.'   The host of the show was Michelle Ward and it was part of her  Eat My Brunch  weekday show. http://sylviakent.blogspot.com/2019/10/another-phoenix-book-club-with-new.html#links You can hear the recorded radio interview  here. Earlier, on 19th September 2019 Tom King, Roy Davis, Geraldine Evans and myself were on with Ros on Gateway 97.8 from 16:00 pm.  If you wanted to hear our lively show you have to go back to that time and date on Gateway 97.8fm's Listen Again page. Tom is a journalist and former chief feature writer for the Echo and still writes for them on a freelance basis.  He has a new joke book out this year too.  Geraldine Evan's family ran The Barge, Vange for seventy years and sh...

Hi, I'm Lisa Horner.  I have two books published by Amberley Publishing, the first book was published in 2014 and is called 'Basildon Through Time,' the second book published in August 2019 is called 'Lost Basildon.'  Both of these books are mainly pictorial with between 60 to 90 words on each page but sometimes more. Back in 2007 I was a researcher for the 'Basildon Heritage Trail' and I composed a blog with a lot of my research for the project.  The blog is called  Basildon's Heritage Trail .  Part of my research also contributed to Basildon, Our Heritage  by Frances Clamp. Basildon Through Time From the Stone Age to the exciting era of post-war architectural experimentation, Basildon is a town brimming with exciting historical gems just waiting to be explored. Beorhtel’s Dun, as Basildon was originally called, got its name from a Saxon man who owned the hilly country to the north of Holy Cross church. While agriculture was the town’s main i...