WE PRESERVE AND SHARE
Alongside the invite to this week’s Zoom meeting, members should also have received a PDF copy of our relaunched newsletter. Now running to 12 pages, with news, articles, interviews and dates for your diary. If you are a paid-up member, look out for it in your inbox.
If you want to become a paid-up member of the History Society, and to receive the newsletter every three months and get access to our online meetings, click here for details.
Our next guest speaker meeting on Zoom is scheduled for Wednesday 9th June. This month’s speaker is respected family historian and researcher Sylvia Valentine, giving a talk entitled ‘Vaccination Records for Family History’. Sylvia will cover the records which were created as a result of the compulsory smallpox vaccination legislation from 1840 and will discuss the anti-vaccinators who were able to “take over” the board of guardians in Keighley.
This meeting is exclusively for members who have paid to join the History Society. Members will receive an email invite in the next few days – remember to look out for it. If you would like to become a member please click here.
The ‘doors’ will open at 7pm but the talk won’t start until around 7.30pm. This is to give people the chance to log in to the meeting and for updates on Society news.
This month’s online Zoom talk is a History of St John’s Church in Ingrow, given by Tim Neal. The talk is happening on Wednesday 12th May from 7pm. Usually our meetings are members-only but this one is open to all.
If you are interested in coming along, please message the Society or add a comment below. The Society’s vice-chairperson, Steve Bown, will be in touch with details on how to join the meeting. Please express your interest before the day itself because we will be busy setting the meeting up on the day. Paid-up members of the Society will receive their email invitations as usual.
‘Doors’ open at 7pm so we can check everything is working, then there is a History Society update at 7.15pm before the presentation starts at 7.30pm. We look forward to seeing you there.
History Society member Colin Kirkham has recently donated some copies of The Keighlian school magazine from the 1960s. This was the school magazine of Keighley Boys’ Grammar School. One edition donated by Colin covers the school’s transition from its location on North Street to a purpose-built site at Oakbank. This edition from the summer of 1964 included several photos taken or supplied by William Speight which compared the old and new schools. These are those photographs showing the school building, the assembly hall, the workshops and the corridors. Our thanks to Colin for his generosity.
Earlier this year, History Society member Jenny Traveller took on the challenge of finding and photographing the sixty Commonwealth War Graves in Utley Cemetery (not as straightforward as it might seem!). She has shared her photographs with the History Society and they are now available to view on our Flickr site. Our thanks to Jenny.
A reminder that our next Zoom talk is this Wednesday (14th April): ‘Criminal Lunacy – From Dock to Asylum in 19th Century Yorkshire’ to be given by archivologist, genealogist, social historian and author David Scrimgeour. This meeting is exclusively for members who have paid to join the History Society. Members should have already received their invite to the meeting by email.
The ‘doors’ will open at 7pm but the meeting won’t start until around 7.30pm. This is to give people the chance to log in to the meeting and to make sure everything is working ok.
Following last week’s talk on Zoom given by Graham Mitchell, we have the next few months lined up. On 14th April, David Scrimgeour will be giving us his talk on ‘Criminal Lunacy – From Dock to Asylum in 19th Century Yorkshire’. On 12th May, Tim Neal will be recounting ‘A History of St John’s Church Ingrow’. On 9th June, Sylvia Valentine will be talking about ‘Vaccination Records for Family History’. And on 14th July, Steve Bown will be telling us about ‘Keighley MPs: Millmen, Offcumdens and Swing’.
Details on all the talks can be found on our website or on our Facebook page. All the talks take place online using Zoom. The meeting starts at 7pm so people can ‘settle in’, then there is an update on History Society business, before the talks start at 7.30pm. Most meeting are only open to paid-up members of the History Society (how to join can be found here). Tim Neal’s talk is an open event and anyone can attend but you need to register your interest.
While we undertook our first proper Zoom Speaker’s Meeting in February with a little trepidation, unsure of how people would respond, I think after the second we can say they are successful.
We have to thank Graham Mitchell for bravely and very successfully taking on his very first Zoom meeting, where he was in control of the screen.
Graham told us all about the dealings of the early attempts at bringing Train-lines to the District, some successful and some not. Along with his narrative on the wheeler’s and dealer’s , he showed us the step-changes that the Railways brought to the Villages, Towns and people in general. Graham presented the narrative along with many detailed maps and rare old photographs, as part of his very smooth presentation.
We were glad to see so many of our regular’s and pleased to welcome many new faces. There were 24 people attending in all, two of these actually joined the Society during the presentation.
We are now building up the a programme for the Zoom Speaker’s Meetings for the rest of the year, so keep an eye on the calendar for details.
We have been asked if it would be possible to view the meetings at other times? While we are looking into this, it will probably not be possible when we have outside Speaker’s.
Many thanks to all involved.
Joyce Newton – Chair
A reminder that this month’s History Society talk is Graham Mitchell explaining “Why Stanbury Never Got a Railway Station”. It is being held on Wednesday 10th March, and ‘doors’ open at 7 pm. The talk is happening online via Zoom and you have to be a paid-up History Society member to join the meeting (for details on how to join the History Society click here). If you are a member you should have had your email with details on how to join the meeting. Please let us know if you have not received it.
Next month’s talk is David Scrimgeour on “Criminal Lunacy – From Dock to Asylum in 19th Century Yorkshire”. Forthcoming talks include a history of St. John’s Church in Ingrow, and a talk on how the town has been represented in Parliament. Keep an eye on the event-listings on Facebook and on our website for more details. Most of these are members-only talks so do join up.
As the move to vaccinate the country against the coronavirus continues, we came across this photograph recently. It shows Annie Chapman, works nurse at Keighley firm Dean Smith & Grace Ltd., supervising the vaccinations of employees in the company’s surgery in the 1960s.
The photograph is one of a set of photographs taken by the firm’s Photographic Department that have been uploaded onto the History Society’s Flickr page in the past week.
