Free Republic

But maybe don't drink it.In the mid-1930s, British beermaker Greene King brewed and bottled a special ale to commemorate the coronation of King Edward VIII. The only problem? That king was never crowned. In 1936, Edward surrendered his chance to wear the crown, abdicating the throne only 325 days into his unofficial reign so that he could marry American socialite Wallis Simpson. His coronation — which had been scheduled for May 1937 — was called off, his younger brother George VI became king, and all 2,000 bottles of that Coronation Ale were put into storage. Remarkably, that beer stash wasn’t...

My father is Black, and my mother is Puerto Rican. As a biracial woman, I'm very familiar with questions like, "What are you?" "But what do you consider yourself?" and insinuations of "But is she really Black?" And as much as I wish I could say this type of thinking was unique to my childhood or some less-progressive era long ago, it's something I still deal with today. Yup, in 2018. For some people, regardless of their race (and sometimes even my own friends and family) it's apparently very difficult to understand the concept that a person can proudly embrace...

The royal princes plodded slowly and sadly behind the coffin of their father, George V, as it was hauled through the streets of London to lie in state in Westminster Hall. In the silent crowd, Bloomsbury artist Vanessa Bell looked on the gun carriage draped with the royal standard and surmounted by the Imperial Crown and thought it 'unexpectedly lovely'. But then she caught sight of the new King, Edward VIII. What struck her was not just that he looked utterly miserable and very small, but that he was 'disreputable, patchy and debauched'. She was not impressed.

In times of conflict, the quest for cheering news becomes more urgent by the day. What is required is a prime slice of international gossip, and none is more succulent and sustaining than that dished up, over the centuries, by the British Royal Family. This time, as if by popular demand, the Firm as the Windsor clan is sometimes known, lending it a heavy-browed influence on which Tony Soprano would hesitate to trespass has surpassed itself. Documents released by the Public Record Office on January 30th shed a fresh and delectable light on the abdication crisis of 1936, when King...