I have a new website.
I couldn’t think of a catchy title so I decided to just use my name. Most people can’t spell my surname but it’s easier to spell than ‘Trevithick’ and from now on I can use this as a base for all my work not just on Richard Trevithick in Latin America (which admittedly is most of it). All the old articles I have written over the last three years are still here but in a shiny new theme.
Some of you may have seen my appearance in the West Briton/The Cornishman alongside Ben Sumpter a couple of weeks ago. I was very pleased to have been sent the article whilst I was still in Costa Rica, but was most frustrated to read the article, as any mention of my own research was absent.
There are at least four errors in the information about Trevithick provided in the article but this is because I have yet to publish the book(s) I intended to write; the first one published last year admittedly does not contend with any of the questions I set forth to answer. This and some other frustrations were channeled into making a new website as as well as a Substack newsletter (How Not To Be A Historian) as I need to improve my online presence to make sure as many people as possible know what I’m doing.
Despite selling almost all of the books, I feel ever so slightly guilty because the majority of feedback I have received is something like “you have a very clear narrative style, but the book isn’t about Trevithick at all” to which I respond that ironically this was the point, it has just backfired.
If I was to create a Venn diagram of those who are interested in Trevithick (in Latin America) and those who understood the obvious influence of Hunter S. Thompson in my writing style, very few people fit into both categories. The subject matter and the style are almost irreconcilable and perhaps the next installment should sideline my own adventures and get into the nitty gritty of Trevithick in Peru and Costa Rica as well as a handful of other Cornishmen in each country I have stumbled upon.
After nearly three years I have looked for information in almost every conceivable place and can now say that the majority of the research is complete. I returned home from Costa Rica last week after my most successful trip to date and I now have enough to write a full historical account of Trevithick in Latin America.
There are loose ends which will inevitably continue to haunt me and my dreams but all existing information about his time in Peru and Costa Rica has been gathered. Part One (Peru) is the subject of my MRes thesis, and will be submitted for examination to the University of Exeter by January 2026. I also put together a first draft of Part Two (Costa Rica) while I was in San Jose and given the ease of finding information there, the second part has come together much quicker into a comprehensive reconstruction of his three and a half years in the country (1824-1827).
By the end of the year I will have a hefty manuscript of ‘The Lost Years of Richard Trevithick’ approaching completion (although I still haven’t thought of a catchier name) and if I find a suitable publisher it could be published next year.
If I have to wait any longer, I may lose my mind once and for all.
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