Author: Bradford Libraries

Trace your Family Tree

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Have you ever wondered how to get started with researching your Family Tree and using the array of records available?

Or have you already started your quest and reached a point where you need a helping hand?

Wherever you are on your journey into your past, the friendly helpful experts from Bradford Family History Society will be on hand in Bradford Local Studies Library to give help and guidance with this fascinating and rewarding pastime.

Thursday 28th November.

Drop in anytime between 10.00am and 12 noon.

Christmas Day and the Keighley Stagecoach

Bradford Libraries 2 Comments

By the nineteenth century, stagecoaches in England had been a vital part of its
infrastructure for nearly two hundred years. Though the steam train, at least in the south, was replacing the need for coaches by the 1830’s, they still remained an important mode of transportation and mail in the north.

Through donation, the Keighley Local Studies library has been fortunate to obtain the
records for the Keighley stage coach covering the years for 1841-1843. Opening the ledger a curious researcher will find the lined and long dried inked pages remarkably preserved.  Within its leaves, a pink piece of blotting paper remains where the clerk left it when it was closed nearly two hundred years ago.

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The ledger for the stagecoach Invincible reveals that Keighley ran an active stagecoach
business running every day of the week, except Sundays, including Christmas Day.  One can imagine a jolly Dickensian coachman bundling his Keighley passengers into the Christmas coach and on to their holiday destinations. It is left to us today to wonder who they were, but there are clues in the ink:

25 December 1841 ‘Burnley, Wilde Ballet’…1842 ‘Leeds, Firth in’…1843 ’Blackburn, 1, Lady out.’

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A look at the William White’s History, Gazetteer, and Directory of the West-Riding of
Yorkshire, Vol. I reveals that in 1837, Keighley was running seven coaches: Union, Invincible, Airedale, Alexander, Tradesman, Wonder and Cars (690). All of these coaches had different departure points. The Union and Invincible, which the ledger is for, departed from the Devonshire Arms Inn.

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devonshire photo

In order to learn about one’s family history, or lay groundwork for a period drama or novel, one might check records such as birth certificates, marriage licenses, censuses, or diaries, but what about stagecoach records? The study of such a resource would give valuable historical information about who may have lived and traveled through an area, where they traveled to and from or even where they sent their mail. This opportunity is not often possible because very few have survived until the 21st century; however, this rare insight is available at the Keighley Local Studies Library.

A perusal of its leaves reveal names still familiar in Yorkshire, such as Hargreaves, Ibbotson, Firth and Laycock, and those not as locally known, as Lomax, Mulligan, Brookslaw, and Critchley. There are surnames that we associate with the Brontës – Nichols, Earnshaw, Taylor, Greenwood, and Heaton – and names with famous or infamous associations, such as Grimshaw, Turpin, Shuttleworth and Dickenson. And what Lister rode to Bingley on Saturday the 12th of November, 1842?

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The titles and labels of the passengers given by the ledger keeper are also of interest. The
‘Sheriff for Colne’ rode on 30th of June 1842. If the passenger was known, or perhaps
prominent, they might be titled, as Mr. Butterfield or Mrs. Hinchcliff were; but, if they were not, they might be labeled simply as ‘Lady’ , ‘Gent,’ ‘boy,’ or even ‘poor woman’ or ‘poor old man’.

The stagecoach places of originations or destinations to and from Keighley are impressive. These include the expected Yorkshire towns and villages, such as Cross Hills, Skipton, Harrogate and Wakefield, as well as Barrowford, Chorley, Colne and Preston in Lancashire.  Haworth is also mentioned (e.g. Monday 1st November 1841), but, alas, we are left to ponder who the passengers may have been. The places listed take in the cities of Leeds, York and Lancaster and extend as far west as Liverpool and east as far away as Scarborough. There is even a mystery destination called ‘Dolly’s’ the location of which is yet to be discovered (10 May, 23 June, 30 June 1842).

Keighley appears to have been quite a transportation hub in its day!

Miriam Adamson, Keighley Local Studies Library volunteer

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Secret Ilkley Book Launch

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Ilkley Library was the venue for the launch of a new book by local author and historian Mark Hunnebell.

Mark, of White Wells, gave a talk about his new book Secret Ilkley and also signed copies.

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Mark Hunnebell

Secret Ilkley goes behind the façades of the familiar to discover the lesser-known aspects of the Ilkley’s long and illustrious past.

The inspiration for this book originally came from an information card available for visitors to White Wells in the 1950’s. The card was produced by the Ilkley Gazette office and provided a useful guide to some of the prominent features that could be seen in the valley from White Wells on the moors above the town.

Mark writes in his introduction:

‘This book is a record of many of the developments and changes that occurred in Ilkley during the second half of the nineteenth and throughout the twentieth century, much of the information being sourced from efforts to compile an index of the Ilkley Gazette for my own interest in local history. Many of the articles referred to have not seen the light of day since their original publication and the details simply lost or forgotten. I am grateful that the Ilkley Library holds old copies of the local newspapers.”

In the book, Mark takes the reader on an enlightening and entertaining journey through the past, delving beneath the surface to reveal dark deeds and strange tales with long-forgotten facts and amusing stories. This book lifts the lid on the hidden secrets that even most local people don’t know.

Supporting Mark at the book launch were his parents Edwin and Margaret Hunnebell and his partner Joanne Everall. Also there was Sally Gunton who kindly supplied many images for the book.

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Frazer Irwin, Mark Hunnebell, Edwin Hunnebell, Margaret Hunnebell, Sally Gunton, Joanne Everall

Mark said: “It was very well attended and was a pleasure to talk about “Secret Ilkley” to so many familiar faces. And thanks to everyone who bought a copy too!”

Secret Ilkley by Mark Hunnebell: ISBN 9781445684475

Celebrating Louise Carnegie

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Thank you to Irene Lofthouse for her wonderful portrayal of Andrew Carnegie’s most trusted confident, his wife Louise Carnegie, in Keighley Local Studies library on Saturday 12th October, given to a packed audience. This event in our historic Carnegie library marked Libraries week and 100 years since the death of Andrew Carnegie in 1919.

Here are some photographs of the event and a short biography of Mrs Carnegie.

 

Louise Whitfield was born in Manhattan on March, 7, 1857. Her parents, John and Fannie, descended from families that emigrated from England in the 1600s… Louise’s father was a textile merchant. As he prospered he moved the family from Chelsea to Gramercy Park (where one of Louise’s playmates would be Teddy Roosevelt) and finally to a comfortable brownstone uptown on West 48 Street and Fifth Avenue—two blocks away from the Windsor Hotel. Andrew met John Whitfield through a mutual friend and enjoyed his company. He made frequent visits to the Whitfield home; during one of those visits, he met Louise.

Mrs Carnegie

Louise Carnegie

They shared a love of riding horses and he invited her often to Central Park. During these rides, she let it be known she didn’t want to marry someone who was already successful, but rather help a husband to succeed. He let it be known that he had no intention of holding on to his fortune, but rather wished to give it all away…

…Louise realized that Andrew would not marry while his mother was alive; four years after their meeting, the engagement was called off. But not the friendship. After nearly a year of corresponding, they decided to renew their engagement, but kept it a secret from Andrew’s mother.

Mr Carnegie

Andrew Carnegie

In the fall of 1886, Andrew contracted typhoid fever; inconceivably a week later, his brother Tom became ill with pneumonia. While Andrew’s condition fluctuated, Tom’s rapidly deteriorated and he died on October 19 at the age of 43, leaving behind a wife and nine children. Margaret, already ailing, could not bear the news of the illnesses of her two sons and died three weeks later on November 11 at the age of 77. She was not told of Tom’s death and Andrew was not told of his mother’s death for nearly three weeks until he was fully recovered.’ https://www.carnegiehall.org/Blog/2013

The couple married in 1887 and, unusual for the time, they signed a pre-nuptial agreement, in which Andrew stated that he wanted to give away the bulk of his fortune. They were married for 32 years, had one child named Margaret, and Louise was an influential member of the board of The Carnegie Corporation until her death in Manhattan on June 24, 1946, at the age of 89.

Outstanding community benefits for the time

Significantly, the Carnegie Institute in New York City hosted events and meetings for the American Women’s Suffrage Movement. Similarly the Carnegies’ libraries were accessible to both sexes, all classes and all ethnicities. In fact, the Carnegie Library in Washington was the first public building that was non segregational.

Keighley’s Carnegie Public Library

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Mrs Louise Carnegie was also ever present as a guiding hand with the arrangements undertaken with Sir Swire Smith for the gift of £10,000 for the building of Keighley Carnegie Public Library. This was the first library in the whole of England ever to be financed by Andrew Carnegie. The money was gifted to the people of Keighley by the Carnegie family because of the wonderful achievements of Keighley’s students, from all backgrounds, studying at Keighley’s Mechanics’ Institute. In the above photograph, Mrs Carnegie is seated with Andrew on her right and Sir Swire Smith, the champion of Keighley Mechanics’ Institute on her left. Mrs Louise Carnegie later attended the ceremony with her husband for the conferring of the Freedom of Keighley to Mr Carnegie and it was she who distributed the prizes to the students on that day, 25th September 1900.

Keighley Library view c1929corespondence 1899

The Carnegie Corporation of New York

Andrew Carnegie established this in 1911,

“to promote the advancement and diffusion of knowledge and understanding,” it is one of the oldest and most influential of American grant-making foundations

“The Corporation has devoted unremitting effort toward the two issues Andrew Carnegie considered of paramount importance: international peace and the advancement of education and knowledge.”  https://www.carnegie.org/about/our-history

The Carnegie UK Trust

Established in 1913 by Scottish-American philanthropist Andrew Carnegie:

“We have sought to deliver this mission in a number of ways over the past 100 years – investing in libraries, public space, further education, social work, children’s rights, rural development and many more…”

https://www.carnegieuktrust.org.uk

 

Gina Birdsall, Keighley Local Studies Library