Talks Archive
Programme 2012 - 2013
Merchandise, Merriment and Middens: an odyssey through the 18th century streets of Sherborne
by George Tatham
Date: Wednesday 25 September 2024
This talk will consider aspects of the cultural, social and economic experience of living in 18th century Sherborne with its market, industries, shops, inns and two provincial newspapers.
Alan Turing - Bletchley Park Codebreaker
by Dr Mark Baldwin
Date: Wednesday 9 October 2024
2012 is the centenary of the birth of Alan Turing. Using an unrivalled collection of slides, Dr Baldwin will explain the workings of the Enigma machine. The presentation will be followed by a demonstration of a rare 1944 4-rotor Enigma machine.
Empires of the Sea: the Mediterranean in the Sixteenth Century
by Roger Crowley
Date: Wednesday 23 October 2024
In the sixteenth century the Mediterranean became the battleground for an epic maritime struggle between the Ottoman Empire and Christian Europe. This illustrated talk will explore a contest for the Middle Sea that was at the same time imperial, religious and economic.
The Brookes of Sarawak and the British North Borneo Company
by Adrian Thorpe
Date: Wednesday 13 November 2024
For 100 years Sarawak, a part of Borneo the size of England, was ruled as an independent state by an English family – the White Rajahs of Sarawak. Adrian Thorpe knows Sarawak well and in his illustrated lecture will tell the story of this unique country
Commander Ian Fleming – Naval Intelligence
by Kathy McNally
Date: Wednesday 27 November 2024
Ian Fleming’s role in WW2’s secret operations was ‘equal to the most fantastic inventions of romance and melodrama’ according to Winston Churchill. Kathy McNally tells of Fleming’s role.
Court Life in 13th Century England
by Dr Ben Wild
Date: Wednesday 11 December 2024
The talk will seek to offer some new interpretations on Henry III's reign by focusing on the politics of the royal court.
Lady Butler: Battles Artist
by Felicity Herring
Date: Wednesday 10 January 2024
In 1874, this genteel Victorian Lady sent a painting of the Crimean War to the Royal Academy where it was an outstanding success. From then on she almost exclusively painted battle scenes from Waterloo to Afghanistan and WW1
The Representation of the People Act (1918) and the coming of Democracy to Britain
by Professor Andrew Thorpe
Date: Wednesday 24 January 2024
The landmark '1918 Representation of the People Act' brought mass democracy to Britain for the first time. This lecture will explain why this Act was passed in 1918 and will also set it into the longer-run context of Parliamentary Reform Acts from 1832 onwards.
Plant hunters and pioneers
by Caradoc Doy
Date: Wednesday 7 February 2024
The Story of the Veitch Nurseries of Exeter & Chelsea. They were the first commercial nursery in Britain to sponsor their own plant collectors. This illustrated talk highlights some of the well-known and interesting plants introduced by this important firm
The Great Stink
by Dr Stephen Halliday
Date: Wednesday 21 February 2024
In the sweltering summer of 1858 the Great Stink of sewage from the polluted Thames drove MPs from the Chamber of the House of Commons. Parliament had to act - drastic measures were required to clean the Thames and improve London's primitive sewage system. The engineer entrusted with this task was Sir Joseph Bazalgette
The Exiled Collector
by Anne Sebba
Date: Thursday 7 March 2024
In her lecture Anne Sebba, biographer of William Bankes : 'the Exiled Collector’, will talk about William as a serious collector of Ancient Egyptian artefacts and Spanish paintings as well as some fine - and some less fine - Italian decorative art. She will also discuss the high price he paid for the Victorian morality which judged him.
The search for the Durotriges – Dorset and the West Country in the Late Iron Age
by Martin Papworth
Date: Thursday 21 March 2024
Who were these people, who, 2000 years ago, built great hillforts like Maiden Castle and Badbury Rings? How did they respond to the Roman Conquest and how did they adapt to Roman occupation? Were the Durotriges a united tribe or a series of differing communities that gradually banded together to form a confederacy?
