Calendar

This is a change of topic. The talk will be “Arming a Knight.” Jed Jaggard will give us a fascinating insight into how armour developed through the ages, with lots of artifacts and objects to see and handle.

The Salvation Army – Danny Wells.

Catherine Booth was fortified with the spirit and convictions of early 19th-century rural Methodism of the Midlands. Having met a kindred spirit in William Booth of Nottingham, they were to take their pre-industrial Methodist creed into the religious and political fulcrum of the East End of London in the second half of the century.

The response of the Booths to the poverty, hunger, squalor and ‘sin’ that they observed all around them, was to create the Salvation Army as a ‘Way out of Darkest England’.

It became the fastest-growing religious movement of late Victorian Britain and is still a religious and social service agency of international importance today.

Labour of Love: The Orton & Spooner Story

These days, there are not that many companies in the fairground game that manufacture rides and shows—and those that do are not exactly household names. But one company is just as famous now as it was in its heyday, in the first half of last century.

On 29 April, Elaine Pritchard offers her presentation on the local, world-renowned fairground company.

Alan Hiley  –  Ashby to Burton Light Railway    – A short history     A journey in photos along the old tramway route to see how it looked then and how it looks now.   The tramway opened in 1906 and the journey was was from the Town Hall in Burton-upon-Trent and journeyed through Swadlincote to Ashby-de-la-Zouch.

Karen Kreft shares some fascinating insights into the people involved in life ‘below stairs’ at Calke Abbey.

In 1981 when Charles Harpur-Crewe died, with inheritance tax due, drastic action was required to save Calke.  Bringing Calke Abbey to the National Trust was a complex process involving local councils, national heritage organisations, Parliament, HMRC and notable individuals, some with great leverage but quiet voices.  The journey from there to opening as an NT special place is traced in this presentation.

Discover the amazing rags-to-riches story of Sir Richard Arkwright in this fascinating talk by Mike Newbold

Kate Barnes takes us through a fly’s journey of finding, colonising, and developing on a dead body and the information they can provide to a forensic entomologist.

Kath Reynolds reflects on those “must-have” latest creations from K-Tel, Ronco, Pifco, etc., that you just had to have, but which were mostly pretty useless. Lots of kitchen gadgets to help you chop and pulverise, but don’t forget your Carmen rollers, girls!

Celia Sanger ‘s family’s 19th-century journey from rural Northamptonshire to the Birmingham Back to Backs, with the difficulties of surviving the harsh realities of early 20th-century life in the courtyards.

The markets and fairs we know today are mere shadows of their remarkable past. Paul Sturgess attempts to revive the noise, excitement, and even the filth of these important aspects of our economic history.

The Cold War was an ongoing political rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union, and their respective allies, that developed after World War II.  There was no direct military engagement between the United States and the Soviet Union. However, as Jed Jaggard reminds us, this period was anything but “cold”.

– Maria Picken – TBC