A Perspective on Pendley

What's George Washington's connection with an obscure English manor house? This is one of the many questions answered in this book.

Pendley has accumulated over 1,700 years of history – from:

Ancient Britons and Romans, who settled this area at least some 1,700 years ago, to England’s last great heathen King, the warlike and impressively vigorous, Penda, who seems to have given his name to this area, sired a child when he was aged 77 and died, in battle, aged 80;

The Anglo-Saxon nun, Eddeva, via William the Conqueror’s half-brother, Robert, to Sir Robert Whittingham, who demolished mediaeval Pendley and built the first manor house in its place;

The Verneys and the sixteenth century’s changeable politics to the Andersons, who facilitated the initially illicit union which was to produce US President, George Washington;

The Harcourts who, in the end, didn’t care about Pendley and let the old manor house be destroyed, and the trade-wealthy Grouts with their illegitimate heir, Lawrence Williams, who secured his family’s fortune by marrying into his own family and then buying Pendley;

His son, JG – supervisor of the building of the new manor house, a successful agriculturalist who also shepherded his brother’s children and, so, secured the future of Pendley for a century – to Dorian, the last of the Williams’ line at Pendley;

The short-term ownership of David Evans and the Grass Roots Partnership to the current owner, Vinu Bhattessa, who’s turned the place into a hotel and conference centre.

Along the way, Pendley Manor acquired some peacocks, a famous Shakespeare Festival, a couple of ghosts and a host of stories. Many of these are unrecorded but some, at least, have come down to us through the ages – and these are told within this book.

Bob (aka Robert) Little has pursued a number of parallel careers. Bob is best known as a writer and business-to-business public relations practitioner. In particular, he's spent the last twenty years or so writing and commentating on learning technologies - especially corporate e-learning. His work in this area is published around the world, including the UK, Continental Europe, the USA and Australia. Since 2010, he has published annual lists of the "top ten movers and shakers" in the corporate e-learning world, covering "the World", "Europe", "the UK" and "Asia-Pacific". Bob says: "As with many things in life, it was by accident that I became involved with corporate e-learning. I was asked to edit a magazine called Training Technology and had to get up to speed quickly on what was then known as computer-based training. I came across The Association for Computer Based Training (TACT) - which later became the eLearning Network (eLN) - and not only learned a lot about the issues involved in using learning technologies but also met and got to know many of the sector's key players. Perspectives on Learning Technologies is a repository of many of the key things I've learned about learning technologies over the years. While times and technologies change, people remain human - so, sooner or later, those involved in any way with learning technologies will face the same issues and challenges that others have faced. Hopefully, this book can act as a reference and guide to help readers to avoid at least some of the most obvious pitfalls."