Ms Alice Miggins

@greateranglia Hi, the entry side ticket gates at Ely are open all on red X again. This means you can't tap in with a smartcard season ticket or activate a ticket. It autofills with a time past the train dep. so will cause problems for delay repay as well as giving a hx of failure to tap in.

🚧 Engineering Works 🚧 📍Witham to Colchester (Late Night/Early Morning Only) 📅Monday, 11 May 2026 to Wednesday, 13 May 2026 Due to maintenance work, all lines between Witham and Colchester will be closed late-night Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. More info👇🏽

@Keir_Starmer 🤔

We must respond to the message that voters have sent us and break with the status quo once and for all. We must confront the big challenges the public face with real answers. That is how we will deliver the change that people are desperate for and build a stronger and fairer country. theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

@GNRailUK Unfortunately I need to be in London before dep CBG 2221 + Ely 2248 arr. I went for dep. Ely 2051. Delayed to "being cleaned specially". Had to get dep 2048 Ely to CBG+now a KGX stopper to ensure I get there in time. Journey time: 2h04 instead of 1h11. Can I claim delay repay?

@AliceMiggins The 21:51 is terminating at Cambridge at 22:10 where you can connect onto the 22:21 departure towards London Kings Cross. The 22:48 is expected to run in full. ^Max

Good afternoon all! It’s ^Max and ^Liv here for you until this evening 🌇 If you need any help, information or wish to provide feedback, then please don’t hesitate to get in contact 😊 Please be aware this is the only official Great Northern account. If in doubt you can see our website for a direct link. Live service updates can be found here 👇 greatnorthernrail.com/travel-informa…

@GNRailUK Could you advise on which services will actually run from Ely to CBG, and which Cbg to London are actually running please

Good evening. There is a 21:51 service however this will be terminating at Cambridge due to a shortage of train crew. You can change at Cambridge for an alternative service towards London Kings Cross. There is also a 22:48 from Ely to London Kings Cross which is showing as scheduled. ^Max

@LKBU__ @GNRailUK @nationalrailenq it's actually the 8th day! ontimetrains.co.uk/journeys/LET/K…

@GNRailUK “A problem in the depot”? And you’re getting rid of a peak service for a few weeks? What alternatives are you putting in place for the customers who pay through the nose for your services, which you already stupidly reduced? @nationalrailenq surely this isn’t allowed

This is the fourth day in a row that the 0708 from LET to KGX is cancelled. What on earth is going on @GNRailUK

@fugitiveink March 2018!

@fugitiveink I instinctively knew exactly which caravan you meant, even though I’d no idea of the name of the hill :D

It's a beautiful evening here. (Rather oddly, though, the pleasingly decrepit old caravan that has been up on Ruberry Hill since at least 2011 has vanished in the past 24 hours — I wonder who took it, and why?)

@catsareblessing Please credit the instagram account who owns this content instagram.com/sirarthurmeows/

Cat is fuming because owner woke up late 😂

@FerrexCS Yes they're sexist too theguardian.com/world/2017/sep…

i might just have had bad luck interacting with them but last few weeks these UK based cycling rags (cyclingnews & now cycling weekly) have been absolutely f'n terrible clickbait headlines, distasteful phrasing and bad faith articles. are they always this shit?

@andycomfort @vanjaughan “In addition, because the NHS number never changes, it is the most reliable way of identifying a patient, particularly in electronic systems.” From NHS England england.nhs.uk/long-read/the-…

@vanjaughan NHS number is not proof, they say.

@andycomfort @vanjaughan Usually only NHS numbers starting with the digit 7 are non-UK born. So they should be able to tell.

@EscapeCycling A very enjoyable read, thank you

Inside the greatest layering decision in professional cycling history escapecollective.com/inside-the-gre…

Woman of the Day is Dorothy the welder. I can’t tell you her full name, where or when she was born - or indeed, anything else about her - but she and her sister co-workers were vital to Britain’s war effort during WW2. It all started because I wanted to know the name of the first RAC patrolwoman. She was Edith Hayley of Bradford in the 1960s but other than the fact that her job brought her into contact with “lots of angry men”, I couldn’t find out any more about her. I tried the Automobile Association but as recently as 2017, it only had four patrolwomen so from there, I went looking for the first woman to qualify as a mechanic in the UK. Whoever she was, she remains invisible but the search led me to the Women’s Engineering Society website and that sent me down another journey of discovery that had nothing to do with cars and everything to do with Waterloo Bridge. That’s right. Waterloo Bridge. Did you know that it was built mainly by women? Although the contribution of women to the war effort in WW2 is documented, very little is known about their outstanding contribution to construction. In 1944, 25,000 women were working in the construction industry filling in labour gaps left by British men being sent to war. They were paid far less money than their male counterparts for doing the same work, of course. Waterloo Bridge was considered to be of vital importance to the British Army’s transport of men and materials but in 1939, it was judged to be dilapidated and unsafe. The architect Giles Gilbert Scott (Liverpool Cathedral, Battersea Power Station and the iconic red telephone box) designed a new bridge but the old one had to be dismantled and the new design built in record time. Few men were available for this important work and so the construction company Peter Lind & Co. compromised by asking for ‘green labour’ – those new to the industry. What it meant was ‘women’. It just couldn’t bring itself to say the word. Today, far too many retailers, media sources, councils, and the NHS have exactly the same problem, yet the word ‘women’ is Middle English so it has been around for over a thousand years and is still admirably fit for purpose. Everyone knows what a woman is, even if they are too frightened or too “kind and inclusive” to admit it. But I digress… It is thought that 65% of the construction workers responsible for building Waterloo Bridge were women. Even today, some Thames riverboat pilots call it ‘the Ladies' Bridge’ but for years, it was dismissed as an urban myth because no documentary or photographic evidence could be found. Peter Lind & Co. went out of business in the 1980s and most of its records were lost. However, historian Professor Christine Wall found photographic evidence in the archives of The National Science and Media Museum of women demolition workers taking the old bridge down and women welders working on the new construction. A man whose father worked on the bridge came forward to say that there were 'two grades of ladies'. Most of the women wore dungarees while those in more senior roles, responsible for operating vehicles, wore all-in-one overalls similar to the one worn by the men. At the official opening in December 1945, Deputy Prime Minister Herbert Morrison proclaimed: "The men who built Waterloo Bridge are fortunate men. They know that although their names may be forgotten, their work will be a pride and use to London for many generations to come." He clearly misread his speech and should have gone to Specsavers. What he obviously meant to say was: "The women and men who built Waterloo Bridge are fortunate. They know that although the men’s names may be forgotten and the women’s will never be known, their work will be a pride and use to London for many generations to come." I’m happy to set the record straight.

Okay brace yourself because this is BIG! It's Monday night and it's 5pm so it's time for EPISODE SEVEN of 'How light is it in #Orkney at 5pm this week?' OH MY THE STREETLIGHTS ARE OFF AND IT'S LITERALLY THIS LIGHT! 💡

@GNRailUK Can I take a taxi to Ely and claim the fare back. Staff at Cambridge don't know when the line will reopen

@AliceMiggins Hi Alice, we are working on organising replacement buses at the moment but don't currently have an estimate for their arrival yet I'm afraid. We'll provide an update on this as soon as possible. ^Van

⚠️ Due to a points failure between Ely and King's Lynn, some lines are blocked. 👉 You may need to use an alternative route to complete your journey and allow extra time to arrive at your destination. ℹ️ More information to follow...

@GNRailUK Currently stuck outside Cambridge on what would have been the 1615 to Kings Lynn. Presumably there's no platform available. Are buses and taxis being sorted?

@AliceMiggins Hi Alice, at the moment we don't have trains running between these stations I'm afraid. Are you currently at Cambridge? ^Van

@GNRailUK Are there any trains running from Cambridge to Ely please?

@AliceMiggins Hi Alice, I'm afraid this train is terminating at Cambridge. We're working on alternative journey options for Ely, please keep an eye out for updates on our thread or website. ^Van

@GNRailUK Hullo, will the Cambridge 1615 (1524 from Kings Cross) continue to Ely please? No announcements on board to say if it's cancelled at Cambridge.

🔀 Great Northern services that normally run to King's Lynn will terminate and restart at Cambridge. The following stations are currently without service: 📍Littleport 📍Downham Market 📍 Watlington 📍 King's Lynn 🟢 If you are travelling from/to one of the stations listed, please speak to station staff or press the green emergency button on a help point for further assistance.

Woman of the Day microbiologist Alice Catherine Evans born OTD 1881 in Pennsylvania, the first woman scientist to hold a permanent position as a bacteriologist at the US Department of Agriculture. She identified the organism that causes brucellosis and demonstrated that drinking unpasteurised cow's milk could transmit the disease to humans, but in a classic Miss Triggs moment, it took nearly twenty years for male scientists to acknowledge that she was right. After surviving scarlet fever at the age of five, the young Alice attended a one-room schoolhouse where she earned outstanding grades, and then Susquehanna Collegiate Institute where she played in one of the first all-women’s basketball teams in the country. Have you any idea how shocking that was? So unladylike. The scandalised townspeople looked askance at the team’s uniform of black knitted polo-necked long-sleeved sweaters and baggy bloomers made of wool flannel and “wondered why nice girls would show their legs and parade themselves so.” The players were aware of their disapproval but enjoyed basketball and practised diligently. During one game, a disapproving doctor refused to treat Alice’s dislocated finger. In her memoirs, Alice writes that she became a teacher because it was the only profession open to women, but she found teaching boring and took classes at Cornell University offered free to rural teachers. She supported herself during her studies by working as a housekeeper and doing clerical work in the alumni library and became the first woman to receive a bacteriology scholarship, qualifying with both bachelor and masters degrees. However, financial strain prevented her from taking up an offer of a chemistry scholarship. Alice needed to work to live. She was offered a position with the US Department of Agriculture where she investigated the sources of bacterial contamination in milk and cheese products. Alice identified the relationship between brucellosis - which affects the central nervous system - and unpasteurised milk. It was a significant discovery. She advocated for routine pasteurisation…and it caused conniptions. A woman? A woman with no PhD? Distinguished male scientists cast doubt on her ability and her integrity. Investors in the dairy industry suggested she had made deals with the manufacturers of pasteurisation equipment. Alice was asked repeatedly to explain why, if her findings were true, no one else (what they meant was “no man”) had discovered them. In private, Alice wrote in her diary “In the poverty of your imagination, it is easier to believe that the printed word is gospel truth. I went beyond the realms of your perceptions”, but in public, she held her tongue, calmly presented the information over and over and over again, and encouraged doubters to carry out the same study she had to see if they got the same results. Her most vocal critic was fellow bacteriologist Theobald Smith. In 1918, Alice left USDA and worked for the US Hygienic Laboratory, making valuable contributions in the field of infectious illnesses such as meningitis and streptococcal infections. Still, she endured derision for her earlier findings, even though she herself contracted chronic brucellosis in 1922 as a direct result of her research. She suffered for years, going through periods of illness and remission, because the disease never left her system. Even after her election in 1928 as the first woman President of the Society of American Bacteriologists, (now the American Society for Microbiology), Alice’s findings were repeatedly dismissed until the mounting weight of evidence brought other scientists around the world to the same conclusion and her views prevailed. She was responsible for the routine pasteurisation of milk in the US, with the result that brucellosis was significantly reduced. After her retirement in 1945, Alice lectured widely to women about career development, encouraging women to pursue scientific careers. She died in 1975 at the age of 94. “I am sorry this chapter may be painful to friends of one of the most eminent bacteriologists. Among great scientists Theobald Smith is not alone, however, in his resistance to a new scientific idea. Scientists are probably the most objective of researchers. Unfortunately, they can be influenced by their social system. I was a newcomer in the field where he was regarded as an authority…and he was not accustomed to considering a scientific idea proposed by a woman.”