(Picture credit: Nottingham City Council)

Nottingham Industrial Museum is pleased to announce the launch of a new exhibition by researcher Richard Upton detailing the history of the well-loved, but long demolished Black Boy Hotel.

Open at weekends (including Bank Holiday Monday) throughout August, the exhibition will give a detailed history including architects plans, photographs and a carefully reconstructed scale model of Fothergill’s glorious building.

Located on Long Row in the City Centre, the Black Boy Hotel was rebuilt on the site of a 17th century inn in the late 1880s by renowned local architect Watson Fothergill. Credited as having had a great impact on the architecture of Nottingham, Fothergill designed over a hundred buildings in the city, from offices, banks and warehouses, to churches and private dwelling houses. His easily recognisable style includes the use of contrasting horizontal bands of red and blue brick, dark timber eaves and balconies, and elaborate turrets and stone carving.

A volume containing newly-discovered drawings by caricaturist and illustrator John Leech is on display at the University of Leicester’s Special Collections in the University Library until 31 July.

This volume sheds light on the early life and work of the artist, known for his contributions to Punch and classic Charles Dickens novels including A Christmas Carol.

The images in the exhibition provide examples of Leech’s earlier works, as well as images from his later career.

Dr Simon Dixon from  Special Collections said: “The discovery of these previously unknown sketches by John Leech is down to some superb detective work by Margaret Maclean from the University Library’s Archives and Special Collections team. The drawings add to our knowledge of Leech’s early years and they are great fun to see.”

The display will be running until 31 July 2017 in the David Wilson Library, University of Leicester.

Michael Jackson, sadly passed away on 4th June 2017 at King’s Mill Hospital aged 89 years.The funeral service took place on Monday 19th June at Mansfield Crematorium at 1.45 p.m. By request there were family flowers only but if desired donations made payable to Parkinson’s Disease Society will be gratefully received.

He was a member of the Thoroton Society and past Chairman and honorary President of NOTTINGHAMSHIRE LOCAL HISTORY ASSOCIATION and  a founder member, and subsequently President, of the Worksop Archaelogical and Local Historical Society. 

 Michael was born in Brigg Lincs in 1927 and then lived in Gainsborough before moving to South Parade Worksop where his father managed  F G Welhams shop next to the Gaiety cinema in Bridge St. He attended Retford Grammar school, where he became editor of The Retfordian, and later qualified as a teacher after attending Borough Road college Isleworth. His teaching career saw him at Edwinstowe Junior school reaching the position of headmaster before retirement. He was also a Lay Preacher attached to  Mansfield Methodist church. Mike went on to publish several books mainly on the history of Worksop. He was working on his last book Worksop and Nottinghamshire Windsor Chairs during the final weeks of his life

During his life Michael made a large number of friends throughout Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire and was a highly respected researcher.

He will be greatly missed

The town of Newark has been an important place, ever since medieval times when it became a major centre for wool and cloth production. The town grew around its once-impressive castle, built in the eleventh and twelfth centuries but later destroyed in 1646 following the town’s surrender to attacking Parliamentary forces during the Civil War. In Victorian times, the town grew and developed and a number of new industries were established, among them sugar refining, which is still in evidence today.

In Lost Newark, local authors Jillian Campbell and Mike Cox step back in time and rediscover Newark’s lost buildings and remember the forgotten architectural heritage that once embellished this attractive East Midlands market town.

• Publication: 15th July 2017
• Price: £12.99
• ISBN: 978-1-4456-6802-4
• Size: 235 x 165mm
• Binding: Paperback
• Extent: 96 pages
• Illustrations: 160 illustrations
• Also available in Kindle, Kobo and iBook formats.

Room Guides are the first point of contact for our visitors and are key in helping people engage with the property’s past and present. There is no typical day for a Room Guide as the experience is as varied as our visitors, making it a rewarding and interesting role. If you would like to know more about volunteering at The Workhouse please contact Emma Seymour House Manager emma.seymour@nationaltrust.org.uk or 01636 817263.

What is a Room Guide?

Room Guides help supporters/visitors to enjoy and learn more about the Trust property they are visiting – so playing a key role in making visits inspiring experiences.

At The Workhouse, Room Guides are the first point of contact for our visitors and as such are key in helping people to engage with the property’s past and present. They enable visitors to understand the visitor route and the various interpretive tools, such as the audio and written guides. There is no typical day for a Room Guide as the experience is as varied as our visitors, making it a rewarding and interesting role.

Volunteer Room Guides also help to protect the health and safety of visitors, and play a part in safeguarding the property and its collection.

What’s in it for you?

• Becoming part of a friendly and dedicated team
• Meeting people from all walks of life and making new friends
• Improving your communication skills
• Enjoying new experiences and giving pleasure to audiences young and old.

What’s involved?

• Provide a friendly and informed welcome to all visitors
• Uphold the National Trust Service Promise
• Help visitors to discover more about the place they are visiting by assisting with the provision of interpretation – e.g. answering questions, giving short talks, children’s quizzes and trails, leaflets, room guides and so on
• Be an advocate for the work of the National Trust
• Maintain an awareness of relevant health and safety procedures
• Be responsible for the safe and calm evacuation of visitors in an emergency
• Uphold the Trust’s preventive conservation approach: leading by example to help encourage visitors to do the same
• Support security procedures in order to prevent theft and malicious damage
• Attend training and workshop days relevant to the Room Guide role
• Develop knowledge of the property as a whole

About the National Trust

As Europe’s largest conservation charity, we help everyone across England, Wales and Northern Ireland enjoy all sorts of very special places for ever, for everyone.  Become part of our fascinating story – volunteer.

 About The Workhouse

The Workhouse was built in 1824 as a place of last resort for the poor and needy. The creation of Reverend J T Becher, its architecture, influenced by prison design and its harsh regime became a blueprint for workhouses throughout the country.

KEYWORTH AND DISTRICT LOCAL HISTORY SOCIETY

Tinsley’s Barn was open to the public for the first time, after recent restoration:

KDLHS & CAAG displayed “Our Listed Buildings” in the newly restored Tinsley’s Barn on Sunday 4^th June 2017 at the NGS Open Gardens event.

Welcoming the visitors to the displays of architect’s drawings, the Swifts Project, and Our Listed Buildings

Over 80 people came into Tinsley’s Barn as part of the Open Gardens event to see the exhibitions of the architect’s drawings, the Swift project and the CAAG “Our Listed Buildings” display.  A 16 page booklet “Our Listed Buildings” produced by KDLHS & CAAG was for sale at £2.00 for the first time at the Open Gardens event on 4^th June, at Home Farm; we were able to donate £12.00 to NGS (25% of the sales of  ”Our Listed Buildings” booklet); produced by KDLHS & CAAG; this is now available at Society meetings for £2.00; production costs were met for the first run of 100 copies, by K&DLHS.  Proceeds will be divided between KDLHS and CAAG).

Dave Clarke, archivist, has put pictures and an item about Home Farm on the K&DLHS facebook page……https://www.facebook.com/KeyworthHistory/

The Midland History Essay Prize worth £400 is offered in 2017 for the best essay submitted on an historical subject relating to midland England. Candidates must not, at the date of submission, have published a book or an article in a major journal. The essay must be a genuine work of original research, not hitherto published or accepted for publication, and must reach the required standard. The text should not exceed 8,000 words. Candidates must consult the style sheet of Midland History, available from the Editor and must submit their choice of subject to the editor for approval before sending their essays. Essays must reach the Editor of Midland History by 31 October 2017. The winning essay, and others judged meritorious, will be published in Midland History.

The Editor Midland History Department of History University of Birmingham, B15 2TT United Kingdom Email: R.P.Cust@bham.ac.uk

The aim of Midland History is to publish articles on local issues relating to the history of the midland counties which throw light on general historical developments and problems.

Midland History Postgraduate Day Conference, Saturday 11 November 2017 at The University of Worcester, Worcester, WR2 6AJ

Proposals are invited from postgraduate and early career research students on any aspect of the history of the counties of Bedfordshire, Derbyshire, Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Rutland, Shropshire, Staffordshire, Warwickshire and Worcestershire.

Papers will be 20 minutes in length. Please supply a title and 100-word abstract to the organiser Professor Richard Cust R.P.Cust@bham.ac.uk

The closing date for this call is 31 August 2017

The conference is sponsored by the journal Midland History. All postgraduates and others researching the history of the Midlands are welcome to attend. Lunch and refreshments will be provided and there will be no charge.

27 May to 10 September 2017 at Nottingham Castle Museum & Art Gallery, Lenton Road, Nottingham, NG1 6EL. Tel: 0115 8761400

The portrait has continued to be one of the most recognised, revisited, and arguably the most celebrated art forms throughout history. Exclusive to Nottingham Castle, this exhibition demonstrates how classical and traditional figurative portraiture continues to inspire artists today, and remains relevant within contemporary artistic discourse.

Reportrait presents thirteen artists who have reimagined historical sources, altered or disrupted typical notions of how the portrait is defined, or used an image or reproduction as a starting point to create something new.

Consisting of new commissions made in direct response to Nottingham City Museums & Galleries collections, alongside loans, and works straight from the artist’s studios, the exhibition showcases painting, photography, installation, digital art, sculpture, video and drawing, many of which have never been seen in public before.

Glenn Brown, Matthieu Leger and Jake Wood-Evans explicitly use iconography of past nobility, aristocracy, government dignitaries and forgotten figures within their paintings, reworking, glitching and interfering with historic artworks in unique ways that leave deceptive hints of the original source intact.
Julie Cockburn and Samin Ahmadzedah use photographic weaving and embroidery techniques to intervene with family archives or found images, presented alongside collection items or as a large-scale wall-based installation.
James E Smith and Jasleen Kaur have both subverted traditional ideas of figurative sculpture.  Smith documents an uncomfortable and highly intimate relationship between artist and sitter through film and 3D printing, whereas Kaur has cast a trio of busts in hand-marbled plastic, drawing on parallels between Indian devotional sculpture and traditional Western portrait busts.
Antony Micallef distorts his own image to the extreme by manipulating and pushing thickly applied (impasto) paint upon the canvas surface. The result is a collection of fleshy, sculptural and beautifully grotesque self-portraits.
Paul Stephenson paints directly upon 18^th century paintings bought from auction, making palimpsests which comment on the way we consume imagery second-hand through the lens or the shiny screen of mobile devices.
Sasha Bowles removes all human features from Old Master paintings and replaces them with strange growths and alien forms.  Her mischievous interventions are presented within a mobile ‘museum’ based on the Castle’s Long Gallery, inviting the viewer into a more intimate setting to view art.
Maisie Broadhead and Annie Kevans both use portraiture to draw our attention to overlooked female artists, salvaged from the archives of patriarchal art history, or to how we consider the role of women in history and in contemporary society.
Philip Gurrey samples, borrows and plays homage to painters and paintings by creating new, often surreal faces that have been constructed from various elements and time periods.

Monday 19 – Tuesday 20 June 2017 at 8pm at Nottingham Playhouse. Main House – Tickets: £18 – £12. Age 12. Running time: 80 minutes (no interval)

Marking the 30th anniversary of the end of the 1984/85 British Miners’ strike, award-winning choreographer Gary Clarke proudly presents COAL, a riveting dance theatre show which takes a nostalgic look at the hard-hitting realities of life at the coal face.

Strong, powerful and emotive, COAL explores the darker underbelly of the mining industry unearthing the true nature and body wrecking demands of a working class industry now almost forgotten.

Bringing together Clarke’s striking physical language performed by a company of 7 stunning professional dancers, a local community cast of women and a live brass band, COAL is an emotional, moving and ever-relevant exploration of community, solidarity and survival.

Based on years of personal research by Gary Clarke, including interviews with Anne Scargill, former wife of NUM president Arthur Scargill, and Betty Cook, the founders of Women Against Pit Closures.

“The tour is dedicated to the survival and resilience of a man that understands what’s it’s like to fight for his life like many others. This man is my Dad” – Gary Clarke

Gary Clarke also spent time with Chris Skidmore of the National Union of Mineworkers, Bruce Wilson, author of Yorkshire’s Flying Pickets, Barnsley historian and author Brian Elliott and Paul Winter of the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign.

“COAL is a direct response to my upbringing in the working class mining village of Grimethorpe, South Yorkshire. It’s about trying to capture a time in British history that is too easily forgotten. It is an attempt at keeping the memories of the mining industry alive, an industry that I believe shaped the fabric of our society and how we live our lives today. These communities are at the heart of COAL.” Gary Clarke

To watch a trailer, please click here.

Community roadshow offer

To accompany the performances of COAL at Nottingham Playhouse on Monday 19th and Tuesday 20th June we are looking to organise a roadshow for members of ex-mining communities on the evening of Wednesday 14th June in Nottinghamshire (exact time and venue TBC) in association with David Amos, Mining Heritage.

Roadshows are completely free to attend and last around two hours, providing communities with an opportunity to connect with COAL and the extensive research undertaken by Gary Clarke on a deeper level by offering a chance to meet Gary, to hear about the deeply personal process he went through when making the show and to reconnect to their own memories of a life lived at the coal face. All those in attendance at the event will be offered discounted tickets to see COAL at Nottingham Playhouse.

If you would be interested to attend this event, please let David know by return email david.amos99@ntlworld.com no later than Friday 2nd June.