ABOUT US
We are an active society providing a series of talks on the history of Lightcliffe, Hipperholme and surrounding villages. To see details of our programme click on the link in the ‘EVENTS’ box above.
You can come along to enjoy our evening presentations or, if you are interested in researching your own topic, receive advice and assistance from one of our historians. Our extensive archive of images and features is available on this website.
JOIN US
We meet for presentations at Lightcliffe C of E Primary School at various times throughout the year. Doors open at 7 pm for a 7.30 pm start. Refreshments are served in the interval and meetings end at about 9 pm. The annual membership subscription is £10; non-members can pay £3 per meeting. There is parking in the school staff car park or on Knowle Top Road.
Our events calendar is available for your diary to help you plan spending an evening being informed about your local history.
We regularly post new information that will keep you up to date with our current activities.
OUR ORIGINS
Lightcliffe and District Local History Society held its first meeting in September 1997, a tentative move to ascertain what interest there might be in the formation of a permanent group. The response was sufficiently encouraging, with forty-five people in attendance, for a programme to be arranged for the following winter.
In the years since 1997 the society has continued to attract a large, discriminating audience to each of its five meetings a year, and members have learned much about the Lightcliffe area and beyond from a variety of speakers and from each other. They have heard accounts of the history of local schools, churches and sports clubs, recalled the shops of their childhood, delighted in the tale of how the Hipperholme Home Guard helped to win the war. They have followed the stories of the rhubarb fields of Priestley Green, the once mighty firm of Brookes Limited, internationally famous for its Nonslip stone. They have been fascinated by erudite accounts of the lives of such local characters as Anne Lister, Oliver Heywood, the woodcarver HP Jackson of Coley and philanthropist Evan Charles Sutherland-Walker; have wandered in their imaginations through the ancient houses of Crow Nest, Shibden Hall, Holme House, Hellewell Syke and Coley Hall. These successful and enjoyable evenings have been shared by a large group of villagers, each of whom has added his or her contribution to the pursuit of local social history in a spirit of rigorous inquiry tempered by friendliness, humour and a glass of wine.