Talks
Programme 2023-2024
All talks
start at 2:30 pm.
Entry to the
talks is free for members (a donation
towards the costs would be appreciated).
Non members are
most welcome to attend any talk, there
is a charge of £3 for each visitor.
2023
Date: September 22nd 2023
Subject: Tudor
Farnham
Presenter:
Pat
Heather
Location: The Garden Gallery
Pat will talk about life in Farnham
town in the 16th century as seen
through the eyes of one family,
covering some aspects of the social,
religious and economic background of
the period.
Date: October 20th 2023
Subject: The
Art & Craft of Farnham: Why We are
a World Craft Town
Presenter: Graham
Mollart
Location: The Garden Gallery
Presenting what should be an
aesthetic smorgasbord for your
delight Graham Mollart, who has for
the last ten years been a member of
our Craft Town Committee, celebrates
our unique visual history. His focus
will be on the last 150 years in
which we have had both a School of
Art and a Pottery marking public
milestones while delving behind
local doors to discover the
individuals and groups involved.
Date: November 17th 2023
Subject:
The life and times of Bishop Charles
Sumner (1790-1874)
Presenter: Rt Revd
Dr Christopher Herbert
Location:
The Garden Gallery
When invited to speak Chris
wrote ‘ I am currently writing a
book about him as a forty-year
resident of Farnham Castle’. Bishop
Sumner led a long and influential
life and I am sure that Dr. Herbert
will present an interesting and
lively talk on his life and his
forty years in the Town.
Date: December 8th 2023
Subject:
Readings from George Sturt’s work
Presenter: Rosemary Wisbey
Location:
The Garden Gallery
“To the memory of George Sturt who wrote with understanding and
distinction of the wheelwright's
craft and English peasant life".
These words, engraved by Eric Gill,
on a simple tablet in St Andrew's
Church, Farnham, commemorate the
writer and craftsman. Rosemary will
use Sturt’s words to bring back to
life 19th Century Farnham.
2024
Date: 26th
January 2024
Subject:
Scattered Squalor
Presenter:
Dr. Geoffrey Mead
Location:
The Garden Gallery
Although
retired, Dr. Geoffrey Mead is still
part of the Geography team at the
University of Sussex.
He has
specialised in the landscape of the
South East and completed his
doctorate in the suburban growth of
the interwar period. Between the
wars there was an enormous growth in
suburban housing but not all was
Tudorbethan. Much was what is now
termed ‘plotlands’.
Dr. Mead
will look at the origins, growth and
demise of this largely ignored
aspect of our housing history with
special reference to Surrey.
Date: 23rd
February 2024
Subject:
WAAC’s
in the 1st World War
Presenter:
Bianca
Taubert-Bailey
Location:
The Garden Gallery
Women
being recruited in London for the
WAAC.
Bianca
Taubert-Bailey, Curator of the AGC
Museum in Winchester, was due to
give this talk in February 2023 but
unfortunately had to cancel due to
catching Covid. We have another
opportunity to welcome her and learn
the background to how and why the
Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps was
created.
Date: 8th
March 2024
Subject:
Obsession, Enterprise and Death; The
Industrial Revolution
and 3 Men’s Lives
Presenter:
Dr.
Frances Hurd
Location:
The Garden Gallery
Economic success during the
Industrial Revolution came at a high
price for individuals – even those
who appeared to profit from it.
Dr.
Hurd will tell how three men caught
up in the Industrial Revolution were
affected by it.
Dr.
Hurd has a PhD in History and is
often the invited speaker for
conferences held by the Imperial War
Museum.
Date: 19th
April 2024
Subject:
John
Luard (1790-1875)
Presenter:
Gill
Picken
Location:
The Garden Gallery
John
Luard was an army officer who
started his career in the Royal Navy
as a midshipman but changed to the
army. He fought in the Peninsular
Wars and at Waterloo and as his
career progressed became a talented
war artist. In 1852 he wrote and
illustrated “History of the Dress
of the British Soldier” which is a
classic book on the subject still
referred to today.
On his
retirement from the Army he moved to
Castle Street , Farnham, became
founder of the Farnham Art School
and a sculptor of church fonts
(including one in Gill’s home parish
of Tongham, which he carved in 1871
when he was aged 83)
The talk will
be followed by the AGM.
