 | Lady Members of the Leeds Library 1768-1914. by Janet Douglas
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 | A Strangers Guide to Leeds in 1830
This lecture was first shown at a joint Zoom meeting with the Leeds Civic Trust on the 15th July 2020.
A visitor from London arrives in Leeds to gather information for a talk he is giving to his local Literary and Philosophical Society. During his stay he will meet some Leeds personalities and discuss the issues of the day. In this ‘Tardis-type tour through time’, using a profusion of contemporary illustrations Kevin Grady recreates Leeds and its buildings and streets in 1830.
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Dr. Kevin Grady ‘The Early Years of the Leeds Library’A lunchtime lecture on Wednesday November 4th, 2020
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Eveleigh Bradford ‘The Headingley Botanical Gardens’A lunchtime lecture on Wednesday November 11th, 2020
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 | Alderman Archie Scarr: Leeds radical ’Mayor of the masses’.
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Rev. Dr. Roy Yates ‘The Back-to-Back Housing Development on the Site of the Victoria Gate Shopping Complex’
A lunchtime lecture on Wednesday November 18th, 2020
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Steven Burt: ‘Hunslet and the Cholera Epidemics of the C19th.’
A lunchtime lecture on Wednesday November 25th, 2020
There is also a pre-recorded version of this lecture
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 | Book Launch for our 2020 Publication
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 | Members Evening January 18th 2021
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 | Book Launch for “Leeds – A Biographical Dictionary”
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 | Thomas Nunneley 1809-1870, Surgery, Audit and Politics.
Dr. John Turney talks on what surgery could and could not be done in the C19th and how it reflected on the dangerous lives of the working people. An evening lecture on Monday 25th February, 2021
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| Kevin Grady on Working Class Life in Hunslet, 1900-1939
Using a variety of contemporary reminiscences and sources, in this illustrated lecture Dr Grady will provide a fascinating glimpse into the realities of working-class life in Hunslet, Leeds’ most important industrial suburb, in the four decades before the Second World War. An evening lecture given on 15th March 2021.
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 | George Corson, Leeds Architect
A fascinating talk by Eveleigh Bradford about the architect who designed many well known buildings in Leeds. The first of the 2021 lunchtime lectures given on Wednesday 3rd November.
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 | Alice Cliff Scatcherd, Leeds Suffragist
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 | “Look at this – Did you see that”: Making Sense of the Leeds ‘Blitz’
This talk from Dr. Henry Irving explores the history of the city’s worst air raid, which took place on the night of 14 March 1941.
A fascinating lecture recorded on the 20th December, 2021.
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 | Henry Rowland Marsden: his life and legacy
, presented by Chris Hindle. The first Members Evening talk from January 17th, 2022
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 | The Leeds Preventorium 1925-1939: shielding children from tuberculosis, but •••
presented by David Cundall. The second Members Evening talk from January 17th, 2022
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 | Fawkes’ Fairfaxiana, c.1815-1825: JMW Turner’s Illustrations of the Past for the Future
, presented by Lucy Bailey.
The third Members Evening talk from January 17th, 2022
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 | The Leeds firm Burmantofts, 1880-1914,
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 | Family life in a ledger 1860-1877: The records of a regular visitor to Leeds -Frederick W. Sheppard, Schoolmaster & Parish Clerk of Bardsey,
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 | Brutal exhibition’ or ‘Noble Art of Self Defence’? – a short history of prize fighting in Leeds 1820-1860
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presented by Derek Martin. The third Members Evening talk from January 31st 2022
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 | ‘The Risk We Take’: LGBTQ Histories of Leeds.
Ross Horsley looks into the lives of local lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans gender people from the 1960s to the 1990s. Our lecture on Monday February 21st February
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 | Field Marshal Lord Nicholson (1845-1918): From LGS to CGS
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 | Alan Slomson talks about Joseph Ernest Morris and the Little Guides to Yorkshire.
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 | Before Windrush: Black People in Leeds and Bradford, 1708 — 1948
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 | Arthur France: The Driving Force of the Leeds Caribbeans, 1957 to Today
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 | The Leeds Jewish Community: Past and Present
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 | Northerners: A History, from the Ice Age to the Present Day
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 | The Italian Presence in Leeds from the Eighteenth Century to 1945
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 | Sandstone in my Blood
Teacher, actress and author Jane Bower spent her first nine years at Ashwood, the fascinating Headingley home of the Victorian Poet Laureate, Alfred Austin. The talk offers humorous and poignant portraits of both Austin and Ashwood, is illustrated throughout with photographs and lasts one hour. Our evening lecture on Monday December 19th, 2022
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 | Members Evening – Monday January 16th, 2023
1. Robert Demaine – The Voyage of the Burmantofts: A Forgotten Chapter in the History of Leeds as an Inland Port
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 | Members Evening
– Monday January 16th, 2023
2. Neil Ashcroft – Leeds Leylands’ Life
A talk about the now vanished Leylands area of north Leeds in the late Nineteenth Century, focussing upon the harshness of life there at that time and the struggles of its Jewish immigrant population to escape its confines.
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 | AIDS: The Crisis Years in Leeds and West Yorkshire
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 | Uncontrollable Women: Radicals, Reformers and Revolutionaries
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 | Michael Meadowcroft explores the many possible uses of Ephemera in the aid of Leeds research.
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Berenblum and the Bari bombs
Andy Wilson from Yorkshire Cancer Research delivers a talk exploring how tragic incidents in both World Wars and the work of a young researcher in Leeds, Isaac Berenblum, all contributed to the discovery of chemotherapy.
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The Irish in Leeds before 1914.
by Janet Douglas
The first of the 2023 lunchtime lectures on Wednesday 8th November
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From Laundries to Take Aways: The Chinese Presence in Leeds
by Janet Douglas
Lunchtime lecture on Wednesday 15th November, 2023
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Merchants, Lawyers and Explorers: The Oates family of Leeds 1700 – 1917
A fascinating talk by Steven Burt
Evening lecture on Thursday 21st December, 2023
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Cricket in Yorkshire: How did it all begin?
Drawing on two of his books, covering the period from the 1750s to the 1890s, Jeremy Lonsdale discusses how cricket emerged in Yorkshire and grew in popularity throughout the 19th century.
Lecture on Thursday 21st March, 2024
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‘Leeds’ First Town Hall’: The Moot Hall, Briggate (1600-1825)
For over two hundred years the centre of Briggate above Kirkgate was dominated by the Moot Hall and butchers’ shambles. Its remarkable history brings 17th century and Georgian Leeds to life. A lecture by Dr Kevin Grady.
Lecture on Thursday 12th September, 2024
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 | James Hole, Yorkshire Mechanics’ Institutes and National Policies for Technical Education in early Victorian England
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 | “The Leeds Approach”:
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 | “Treasures of the Thoresby Society Archives”: Some remarkable and some recent acquisitions.
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 | “The Story of Mabgate”: From medieval street to today’s creative industries.
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Alternative news and views – Leeds Other Paper remembered
Half a century has passed since the birth of Leeds Other Paper, an alternative local newspaper that uncovered many of the city’s less told stories. LOP lasted from 1974 to 1994, during which time it reported on social, political, economic and cultural life in Leeds from an alternative perspective. Run by a co-operative and existing on a shoestring, the paper gave a voice to many individuals and communities who felt ignored, patronised or even demonised by more mainstream media.
Our speaker, Tony Harcup, worked on the paper for many years. He is now an emeritus fellow of journalism studies at the University of Sheffield, and his books include the Oxford Dictionary of Journalism and What’s the Point of News? His talk will recount some of the highs and lows of Leeds Other Paper’s history and attempt to assess the paper’s impact and legacy.
Lecture on 21st November, 2024
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“A Hidden Gem Restored: The Coupland Estate Plan of 1817”: Revelations about the estate where Crown Point Retail Park is today.
by Steven Burt
Lunchtime lecture on 27th November, 2024
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Merchants, Lawyers and Explorers: The Oates family of Leeds 1700 – 1917 (Part 2)
The phenomenal success of the Oates family as cloth merchants in the eighteenth century left the next two generations with a fortune to spend. Some opted for the legal profession as a means of further increasing their wealth, while others left Leeds to become members of the landed gentry. This lecture, by Steven Burt, highlights the important role of women in shaping the future of the family whose children developed a passion for gardening, botany, painting and exploration.
Lecture on 12th December, 2024
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Victoria’s Last VC – A Leeds Loiner!
A talk about the bravery, honour and tragic later life of Charles Burley Ward, a Leeds lad from Hunslet – a Victoria Cross recipient whose story had by and large been lost in history. A lecture by Ronnie Walsh.
Lecture on Thursday 20th January, 2025
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Fuzzy Logic: The History of Wool Science in Yorkshire
Wool has been grown and crafted into cloth for millennia and a major trade commodity in Yorkshire for about 1000 years but is one of the last natural fibres to receive scientific investigation. Find out how traditional practices, new scientific instruments of analysis, and a sheep shortage during World War I prompted a collaboration between scientists at the University of Leeds, wool growers, and the British Government to create the field of wool science in the early twentieth century and how we can use that knowledge in the battle against climate change today.
Monica Stenzel, Postgraduate Researcher, Center for History & Philosophy of Science, University of Leeds.
Image by kind permission of Winpenny Photography, www.leodis.net.
Lecture on Thursday 20th February, 2025
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A Manchester Man Abroad: Richard Cobden and the West Riding of Yorkshire
Richard Cobden, the prominent Manchester radical and leader of the Anti-Corn Law League, occupied one of the two parliamentary seats for the West Riding of Yorkshire from 1847 until 1857, a substantial proportion of his active political career. This lecture explores Cobden’s relationship with West Riding politics, focusing in particular on the period from the foundation of the Anti-Corn Law League in 1839 to Cobden’s defeat at Huddersfield during the General Election of 1857. In the process it demonstrates the opportunities for further research on Cobden provided by the new open access database of Cobden’s letters (www.cobdenletters.org).
Professor Simon Morgan is Head of History at Leeds Beckett University. He is the Principal Investigator on the Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded ‘Letters of Richard Cobden Online: An exploration in Active Citizenship’. Along with Professor Anthony Howe, he was also co-editor of the four-volume selected edition of the Letters of Richard Cobden published by Oxford University Press in 2006-2015. His recent monograph, Celebrities, Heroes and Champions: Popular Politicians in the Age of Reform, 1810-1867, was runner up for the Social History Society book prize in 2023 and is now available in paperback.
Lecture on the 20th March, 2025
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The Fire King: Superintendent Henry Baker, fighting fires at Leeds in the final third of the nineteenth century
Greater urbanisation and industrialisation in the nineteenth century led to an increased fire risk. Chris Hindle looks at the huge increase in fire numbers during the final third of the century, and trace the development of the town’s professional fire service under the leadership of its charismatic superintendent, Henry Baker, who was appointed in 1871 and remained in office until 1899. Henry Baker’s scrap books have been preserved in the Leeds Local and Family History Library and present a fascinating picture of the period.
Lecture on the 17th April, 2025
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The Dissenting Atlantic: Archives and Unquiet Libraries
In this talk drawn from her recent book, Bridget Bennett discusses a historically situated set of transatlantic relationships, chiefly but not exclusively centred on antislavery communities of dissenters in Yorkshire, Newcastle and Pennsylvania. Focusing on quotidian and everyday antislavery work, as well as its more familiar public face, she brings together Black abolitionists, Quakers and others who were part of what she calls the dissenting Atlantic. Girls who attended Ackworth School in Pontefract sewed antislavery samplers and petitioned the school to teach them more about antislavery. Black abolitionist lecturers including Henry “Box” Brown, William Wells Brown, Ellen and William Craft, Frederick Douglass and Sarah Parker Remond all visited Leeds and addressed large audiences. Leeds’ theatres put on adaptations of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s best-selling novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Bennett seeks to restore some of the less familiar stories and figures from Leeds’ antislavery past, including by focusing on the work of Wilson Armistead, a member of the Leeds Library and a prolific antislavery writer and activist.
Lecture on 18th September 2025
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A Yorkshireman Abroad: Geology, Photography, Industry and World Travel in the Godfrey Bingley Archive
Godfrey Bingley was a prominent Yorkshire industrialist who took up geology, photography and global travel upon his retirement in the 1880s. His collection of almost 10,000 photographs is housed at the University of Leeds, where he worked as an assistant to Percy Kendall, its first Chair of Geology and one of the founders of the hatchling institution. Thanks to local records and diligent historians, we know something of Bingley’s life: he owned a foundry on Harper St, married into a wealthy family of doctors, was an active member of the Thoresby Society, the Yorkshire Geological Society, and the Leeds Photographic Society, and had aspirations as a politician. The details of his extensive trips abroad, however, remain a mystery. What drove Bingley to travel around Europe, the Americas, and Africa, taking his bulky photographic equipment with him? Who funded these expeditions and who accompanied Bingley on these grand adventures?
This lecture by Rebecca Jarman seeks to answer these questions by uncovering clues in Bingley’s photographic archive. Doing so, it offers a whistlestop tour of the world seen through the lens of the camera wielded by a nineteenth-century Englishman.
Lecture on 9th October, 2025
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 | Ralph and John Went To Church: Ralph Thoresby and John Lewis, the first recorded Black person in Leeds
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Ralph Thoresby : the roots and routes of his diary:
This talk by Peter Meredith explores the earliest examples of Thoresby’s diary and the manuscript that contains them. It will also look at the way he treats his journeys.
Lunchtime lecture on 12th November, 2025
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 | An unhappy engagement’, Ralph Thoresby and the business of rapeseed oil manufacture at Sheepscar, 1689-1701
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 | Richard Wainwright, Leeds and Liberalism
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 | William Boyne’s History of Leeds and the historiographical legacy of Ralph Thoresby
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 | Leeds and Mongolia: A unique relationship
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 | Leeds’ response to children at risk of tuberculosis 1898-1960; with particular insights from life at The Hollies 1924-1960 – by David Cundall
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 | https://youtu.be/_gC91bxkZgo
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