Tom Tiddler.

James Lucas, aka Mad Lucas, aka the Hermit of Hertfordshire was famous during Victorian times as being a pretty good weirdo. Born in 1813, he was generally known as a good natured but unique landlord. His weirdness was turned up a notch after his mother died in 1849.

Right after her death he holed up in the family home and refused visitors. He never allowed the will to be read and absolutely had nothing to do with any relatives. Period. The only room he occupied was the kitchen, trodding about covered in ashes from the stove wrapped only in a sooty blanket. Locals occasionally saw him at the window in this outfit. Must have been a bit unsettling.

To add to his popularity in the neighbourhood he stopped washing and cutting his hair. His diet became more and more basic until it was mainly bread, cheese, salt fish and gin. Eeew. No surprise the house had a rat problem. He also developed a fondness for guns and hired two armed guards.

He talked to visitors through an iron grill but did have visitors every now and again, the most famous being Charles Dickens. He died in 1874. When his body was removed there was a small fortune in cash with him in the middle of the mess.

Junie.

Octavia Estelle Butler, 1947-2006, was a rare person indeed. One of only a few African American FEMALE science fiction writers, she was quiet and stayed away from the public. No small potatoes but also a Hugo and Nebula award winner.

Raised by her mother and granny after her father passed away when she was an infant, she was an only child growing up in a strict Baptist home. Once in school she started reading and seemed to naturally gravitate to fantasy and science fiction.

Shy and reserved, she started writing and making up stories by age 10 to stave off boredom and loneliness. After watching Devil Girl from Mars, she, not surprisingly, thought she could do better. Her sci-fi career was launched.

After college and numerous writing courses she bumped into Harlen Ellison (who in turn introduced her to Samuel R. Delaney) she had been writing seriously and trying to get published. Not a bad couple of folks to hang with.

Best known for the novel series: Patternist and Lilith's Brood she wrote over a dozen novels and many short stories. Always a loner and rarely seen outside her home she died in 2006 after a bad fall.

Hello Tostig

Bartholomew of Farne was born in England of Scandinavian parents. He quickly changed his real name, Tostig, to William to keep from being made fun of. As a youth he travelled to Norway to study to become a priest. After 3 years he showed up back in England. He decided the monk life was for him, so sporting a new name, Bartholomew he went off to his studies.

It was during this time he had a vision of Christ with arms outstretched and head facing him. After his profession he got his papers and he decided to move to Inner Farne island. This island had sported another famous recluse, St. Cuthbert, who inspired even another saint, that being St. Godric of Finchale. They kept pretty tight these saints did. I believe somewhere on this blog is a post about him.

Being of the eremitical stripe, he did not need to or feel quite up to spending much time with others. A hermit already living there when he arrived left. Many years later another arrived and he moved away for a short time over a tiff about meals. He later returned and seemed to work out an agreeable schedule.

You can celebrate Saint Bartholomew of Farne day June 24.

Mayor.

Noah John Rondeau was a hermit living in the Adirondack mountains in upper New York state. He left home in his teens with little education but didn't take up the life of a recluse for a while yet. He travelled around the Adirondacks working fixing things, doing odd jobs, local guide and serving as handyman for more than one hotel. He learned his wood lore from several Canadian Natives of the Abenaki Tribe: Daniel Emmett, Sabael Benedict and Lewis Elijah.

Well versed in hunting and trapping he took to the woods full time around 1946. He chose a favourite spot, Cold River for his hermitage. Although known by the locals as the Cold River Hermit, he did receive visitors and seemed quite to enjoy occasional company.

An avid reader, despite little formal schooling, he had a collection of books. His special subject was astronomy. He played the violin and kept many journals. The vast majority of them were written in code. He developed letter substitution ciphers and constantly revised them. The end result of course is much of his writings were a blank book.

Because of his secrecy it was suspected, wrongfully, that he was a draft dodger. In actual fact he was near 60 when he could have been drafted. I think he just pissed off the local conservation officers with his hunting and trapping.

As self proclaimed mayor of Cold River City he set up a town hall building, (his house), a Hall of Records (where the ciphered journals were kept) and a small "city" of numerous tee pee shaped buildings used for fire wood to burn during the winter months. He cleverly notched the longer pieces so he could simply rap them on the ground and break off a fireplace sized log.

In an irony great enough to rival any, he gained his only fame outside of the Adirondacks by being invited by the Conservation Department to the National Sportsman Show in New York City. They actually flew him there where he was an instant hit.

Quick, hide the deer.

Godric of Finchale was a hermit. Though definitely reclusive his reasons were more holy than selfish. Born 1065 died in 1170. He was a saint to some though not officially canonized. He was born of humble parents and initially made his way in life at very ordinary jobs. He mainly sold things and probably was pretty good at it as he made his way round Europe and the Mediterranean and Northen Africa.

Along the way (around 1100AD) he had a pretty intense moment with the spirit of Saint Cuthbert and found the path to God. Thereafter he devoted himself to religious service.

Now he had been at sea for many, many years and its not surprising he wanted to be alone when he got back to England. He wasn't ready just yet to go all the way for solo living so he lived with Aelric the hermit,(not sute what that did for the hermit status but who's keeping score). Not much on this guy except he was a stone mason and probably also a designer or architect.

Aelric lived just a few more years and Godfric had his wish. But the sea beckoned again and off he went for one more tour of the Holy Land before settling back again in England at Finchale, in the shadow of Durham Cathedral.

That was it for the rest of his life. He rarely saw visitors and if he did they were approved by the Bishop of Durham. He became known in those parts as an animal lover and would be seen if at all caring for local animals.

Its my tunnel.

Just a bit of touch up for the post about Webeck Abbey. Got a chance to look up some pictures. It was a really big place. Seems the old abbott of Welbeck had some piastrs.

Here's a few statistics to mull over:

It contained an indoor riding house nearly 400 feet long and over 100 wide, lit by thousands of gas lamps.

There were several tunnels over a thousand feet long leading to, among other things, a riding school, and one tunnel, mentioned in yesterday's post, that was a mile and a half long wide enough for two carriages and led to a rail siding.

Underground rooms abounded. The Great Hall and sometimes picture gallery was 160 feet long. That's the picture gallery above.

And oh yeah, all the rooms were pink. The vast majority of the weird stuff, including the addition of lots of bathrooms, at least one toilet in every room, was the work of the Duke of Bentinck.

Abbey fine, how are you?

I am very, very tired but excited to tell you about a truly fine recluse. Don't know if I got the whole story in me tonight but I'll give it a crack. I give you Welbeck Abbey, home to the Portlands dukedom. In actual fact I'm interested in the 5th Duke of Portland, W.J.C Scott-Bentinct,as fine a hider away as you'll ever get.

Welbeck Abbey is a big joint. One of the biggest in the North Midlands. The duke definitely kept to himself. He kept small apartments for himself in one distant corner of the mansion and would only commuinicate through notes left in drop boxes fitted to the doors. His meals came on a miniature railway from the kitchen. The house rule was if a servant encountered him they were to pass as if he wasn't there. He himself would do the "I'm invisible". The punishment for having an interaction with the Duke? Skate until you drop on the Abbey's skating rink. What a brute.

To keep himself busy he built an entire other mansion under ground. The construction took thousands of builders and when completed was truly spectacular. It contained a 2000 seat ballroom and a library over 200 feet long. There were tunnels everywhere and they even extended out into the hills surrounding the Abbey. Don't know what he needed all the room for. He never had anyone over. If he travelled he took a carriage through one of these tunnels to a railway siding where he was secreted onto a closed rail car and whisked to London.

After his death in 1879, visitors found some real odd stuff: Most of the rooms were pink and in the only room in which the Duke lived were found hundred of green boxes with a single wig in each.

Kling Klang

Just a small post tonight to launch a new obsession- famous and little known recluses. A perfect fit for a history blog as all current recluses may be hard to find. My starting off point isn't a person but a group of people, and if the title didn't give it away, it's Kraftwerk.

Hailing from Dusseldorf, the electro / industrial / techno band was formed in 1970. Founding members Florian Schneider-Esleben and Ralf Hutter played together as a duo during school at the Düsseldorf Conservatory and brought their original uniquely German sound to the world's stage. Highly electronic sounding and sparse compositions featuring early synthesizers,computers and crude electronic gadgetry were the mainstays of their repertoire.

They built a studio called Kling Klang and began to record and experiment more and more. It was then ironically, in the mid 70's, when they began to be known that their reclusive behaviour started to emerge. Few people had their phone numbers, including staff at their record label. They never answered the phone and created convoluted schemes to relay messages. Their studio has no staff, mail is left unopened and are rarely photographed, except during live performances.

Despite infrequent live shows, and long spells between hits, Kraftwerk has released over a dozen albums and nearly 30 singles. Have fun with their website . . . http://www.kraftwerk.com/