Swansea Branch Programme
All enquiries to Liz McSloy FHA, Branch Secretary historyliz1565@yahoo.com 07810 304616
All meetings take place at the National Waterfront Museum, Oystermouth Road, Swansea, SA1 3RD at 11am.
The museum does not have a car park but there are a number of pay and display car parks within easy walking distance of the museum:
NCP, York Street, Swansea, SA1 3LZ
COPR Bay South, Oystermouth Road, Swansea, SA1 3BX
Civic Centre East, Oystermouth Road, Swansea, SA1 3SN
East Burrows Road, Swansea, SA1 1RR
St David’s Multi-Storey, St David’s Place, Swansea, SA1 3LQ
Cost of associate branch membership £10 per year. Retired/student/unwaged £5 per year. Household £15 per year. All talks are free to attend
The branch year starts at the beginning of March
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Swansea Branch Programme 2025- 2026
16th August 2025
Dr Eleanor Barnett – The history of food waste and preservation
A third of all the food we produce goes to waste globally, and if all this needlessly discarded food were a country it would be the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world after China and the US! How did we become such a wasteful society? What can we learn about building a sustainable food future by looking at the past? Based on the speaker’s newly-published book Leftovers: A history of food waste and preservation, this talk will explore the many ingenious ways our ancestors in Britain sought to avoid food waste through preservation, recycling or otherwise disposing of food scraps. Beginning in the Tudor kitchen, it’s a delicious and disgusting story that takes us to medieval streets lined with butchers’ offal, that explores the world-changing inventions in preservation of the Industrial Revolution, the hidden history of Victorian street-food scavengers, the thrifty recipes of the World Wars, right through to the AI restaurants of the future. Through our leftovers, we learn a lot more about our culture and our shared history, from poverty and inequality to globalisation. If we are what we eat, we are equally defined by what we don’t eat!
Eleanor Barnett is a historian of food and religion with a PhD from the University of Cambridge. She is currently a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Cardiff University in Wales, where her research used food as a unique lens through which to view the daily lives, beliefs, and identities of ordinary people in the past. Her first book, Leftovers, A History of Food Waste and Preservation was published in 2024. Her other area of expertise focuses on the links between food and religion in the early modern world, exploring shared meals to break down traditional Christian-centric notions of major themes from the Reformation to Colonisation. As @historyeats on Instagram, Eleanor posts daily food history facts, stories, and art to a large international following. She is a regular contributor to public-facing media, including TV, podcasts, and radio, and writes the monthly food history column for BBC History Magazine.
20th September 2025
The Chairman’s Lecture
Colin Wheldon James FHA – Gerald of Wales, A Natural Historian
Gerald of Wales was a medieval man of many roles: priest, scholar and reformer; author and traveller; courtier and diplomat; and Welsh patriot. Over and above all these things, he was also a man with an insatiable curiosity about the world around him. His interpretation of ‘natural history’ was wide: it included not only the habits of birds and beasts and the properties of hills, lakes and standing stones, but also miracles, omens and wonders, the scheming of demons and the vengeance of saints. He described the behaviour of poltergeists in the same matter-of-fact way that he wrote about that of beavers, while expressing the same wonder at both, because in Gerald’s world both were equally marvellous. For him, the natural, the apparently unnatural and the supernatural were all part of the same scheme, all demonstrations of the working of God’s will.
Colin Wheldon James is a history graduate of the University of Wales Swansea, where he also gained a Diploma in Local History, and until recently lectured on Medieval European History at Swansea University’s Department of Adult Continuing Education. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Historical Association, and holds membership of the Royal Historical Society, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, and the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors. He is the author of the books A Study Based on the Clerk’s Report Book of the Swansea Local Board of Health 1855-1866, The Story of Swansea Castle, and The Norman Experience in South Wales, 1090-1320, as well as various articles relating to medieval and 19th Century history. Colin is also the editor of East Side Story, a collection of memories of the people of Swansea’s St. Thomas district.
18th October 2025
The Branch Anniversary Lecture
Peter Rees – The Role of Women in Agriculture in 19th Century Wales
During the nineteenth century, South Wales was a country of small tenant farms. To pay their rent and turn a profit called for every member of the farming family to make their contribution to the enterprise. The role of women became broadly standardised. The roles of the farmer’s wife and her female servants are examined to reveal the value of the female contribution to the conditions of the time.
Peter Rees was born, raised and educated in Swansea, and spent his entire working life with the American multinational Signode Corporation. Transferring to the International Division of the company in 1979, Peter’s work in the Human Resource Department took him to over 30 countries in Asia, Africa, Europe and North America.
On retirement, he was free to develop his life-long interest in history, and in July 2013, graduated with an Honours degree in history from Swansea University.
In 2017, he gained a Master of Arts degree in Local History at the Carmarthen campus of the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. Peter is the author of Sanitising Swansea: Water Supply and Sewage Disposal in Nineteenth-Century Swansea (Swansea, 2021).
8th November 2025
Ray Collier – ‘Germanophobia’ – Anti-German Sentiment in Swansea during WW1
Between 1891 and 1914 Swansea welcomed German immigration and manufacturing investment. However, with the outbreak of the First World war the subsequent internment and repatriation of enemy aliens dramatically changed the lives of Swansea’s German residents. While Swansea did not succumb to the levels of anti-German violence and hostility experienced elsewhere, animosity towards Germany and the town’s German residents grew as the war progressed and culminated in 1918 when Sir Alfred Mond, the M.P. for Swansea Town, was brutally maligned for his German Jewish parentage and accused of being pro-German and a traitor.
Further Reading: Panikos Panayi, The Enemy in our Midst: Germans in Britain during the First World War (Oxford: Berg, 1991). Panikos Panayi, ‘Anti-German Riots in Britain during the First world War’, in Racial Violence in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, edited by Panikos Panayi (London, Leicester University Press, 1996). Paul Cohen-Portheim, Time Stood Still: My Internment in England 1941-1918 (Norwich, Boiler House Press, 2023)
Born and brought up in London, Ray Collier has lived in Neath for the last thirty years. After retiring from Careers Wales in 2015, Ray completed a part-time honours degree in History at Swansea University and in 2023, a M.A in modern history. In addition to being a committee member of the Historical Association, Ray is a committee member of the Neath Antiquarian Society and, as a member of the Friends of Hafod-Morfa Copperworks, gives tours of the copperworks site and speaks on the history of the Hafod-Morfa works.
13th December 2025
Steph Mastoris – Seasons Greetings: A History of the Christmas Card
An illustrated account of the origin and development of the Christmas card, together with a look at some of the changes in festive iconography over the last 180 years.
Steph Mastoris is an historian and former museum curator. He has worked in the museums of Nottingham, Leicestershire and latterly Amgueddfa Cymru-National Museum Wales. He has published on a variety of topics.
17th January 2026
John Richards – William Shakespeare and Stratford-upon-Avon
This talk will be a general look at Shakespeare's life; his childhood and family background in Stratford upon Avon, his courtship of Anne, marriage and his work in the theatre in London. The story will be told and illustrated using associated buildings that may be seen in Stratford today. This will also include other linked sites in the town
John Richards was born in Neath and educated at Neath Grammar School and Aberystwyth University. He worked for 20 years as a fireman in the London and West Glamorgan Fire Services. While completing a part-time degree in Ancient History and Classics at Swansea University he worked in museums and on archaeological digs.
He ran his own business for 20 years teaching history, archaeology and drama in local primary schools. Currently, he is employed as a guide in the Shakespeare houses in Stratford-upon-Avon. John is also a Vice President of the Skewen and District Historical Society, and is a Community Outreach Speaker with the Branch.
In 2024 John was awarded an Honorary Branch Fellowship.
21st February 2026
Dr Mary Thorley – The Rebecca Riots – A New Look
The talk will outline the history of the movement known as the Rebecca Riots with particular focus on the events of 1843. The motives and actions of the participants will be analysed and the talk will end with a story personal to the speaker’s family!
Suggested reading: Davies, J. A History of Wales (Penguin 2007) (pp. 367-371) This is a good summary of events. Jones, David J.V., Rebecca’s Children: A Study of Rural Society, Crime and Protest (Oxford 1989). Malloy, P., And They Blessed Rebecca (Gomer 1983)
Mary Thorley was born and brought up in Carmarthen and gained her degree in History and Politics at Swansea University in the 1970s. After her retirement from her career as a head teacher and head of teacher training at UWTSD she studied for her PhD in Welsh History at Aberystwyth University. Her doctoral thesis focused on the women of Carmarthen in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. She was appointed OBE for her services to education in 2000.
21st March 2026
Dr Jonathan Dunnage – Being a Man and Being a Woman in Fascist Italy
The talk examines gendered models of behaviour that were dominant during Italy’s fascist dictatorship. It draws on examples of fascist propaganda and education, alongside mainstream and cosmopolitan print media, to stress how in its efforts to impose models of masculinity and femininity the fascist regime competed with modern consumer culture. The talk then analyses a number of individual cases to illustrate how Italians experienced the fascist period as men and as women. The analysis underlines the differential treatment of male and female sexual behaviour and the ambiguities characterising fascist sexual morality. A key question underlying the talk is the extent to which the rise of fascism marked a distinct turn in gendered societal attitudes.
Jonathan Dunnage was formerly Associate Professor of Modern European History at Swansea University, where he is now an Honorary Research Associate. His books include Twentieth Century Italy: A Social History (Longman, 2002) and Mussolini’s Policemen: Behaviour, Ideology and Institutional Culture in Representation and Practice (Manchester University Press, 2012). He is currently researching representations of crime, gender, and sexuality in the Italian media during the fascist and early Cold War periods.
18th April 2026
Sid Wilkins – The History of Mumbles Lifeboat
This talk is about the start of The RNLI in 1824 and how it developed from then. It also looks at the history of the Mumbles Lifeboat through the ages from 1835 and the disasters with loss of 18 crew over a period of time.
Sidney worked for Ford Motor Company in Swansea and Bridgend as management for 27 years. After that time he took early retirement and came back home to Swansea, settling in Mumbles and joined the Lifeboat Station in 1998.
16th May 2026
Rhian Rees – The Status of Women in Medieval Wales
This talk considers the status of women in Wales, especially in the earlier part of the medieval period, as compared to women’s status in England and Scotland at that time. The Welsh lawbooks are the source of much of the information.
Rhian was born in the Welsh Marches back in the mists of time, and grew up on the north Wales coast. She studied for a Bachelor of Arts degree in English and Medieval Studies at the University of Wales Swansea, discovering a fascination with the Anglo-Saxon language. She later returned to her studies and took several courses in Welsh at Trinity College, Carmarthen, which gave her the confidence to speak the language at last. Rhian was one of the first four people to complete a new ‘Welsh for Adults’ course and was presented with the certificate in a ceremony at the National Eisteddfod in Ebbw Vale in 2010. Whilst working on this, she began a Master's degree in Celtic Studies with the University of Wales Trinity St David, in Lampeter, graduating with Merit in 2013. And in 2018, Rhian gained her second Master of Arts degree in Lampeter, with distinction, this time in Medieval Studies, and was able once again to study Anglo-Saxon literature.
20th June 2026
Gerald Gabb – Some Ideas on 20th Century History
This talk will take a look at how housing, transport & heavy industry in Swansea changed during the 20th Century.
Gerald was born and brought up in Swansea. Excellent teaching at sixth form and some brief MA research gave him an abiding joy in historical research and having not travelled it made sense to concentrate on Swansea.
Gerald previously worked as an Education Officer at the old Maritime and Industrial Museum as well as at Swansea Museum, a role he enjoyed. As well as being a council member for the RISW for over 40 years and editor of Swansea History Journal/Minerva since 2009 he is also a Branch Fellow of the Historical Association Swansea Branch.
18th July 2026
Professor John Alban FHA – A Danish Knight in Fifteenth Century England: Sir Andrew Ogard
Sir Andrew Ogard stands as a compelling, if, today, a lesser-known figure in the tapestry of late medieval England. From the 1420s to the 1440s, he forged for himself a prodigious martial reputation and amassed enormous wealth, serving in Henry VI’s armies in France and Normandy during the Hundred Years’ War, where he was closely associated with the Dukes of Bedford and York. After retiring from military service, he played a significant role as a member of the English gentry, in Norfolk and Hertfordshire. It is therefore perhaps surprising to discover that he was not English at all, having been born at Ågård in Denmark, as Anders Petersen Gyldenstjerne. A younger son of a noble Danish family from North Jutland, he had few prospects there, thus he left his native land to make his mark elsewhere. In so doing, he anglicised his name, also adopting a new surname based on his birthplace. Marrying into a prominent and wealthy knightly Norfolk family, he became a leading member of the gentry, building two fortified manors at enormous expense, one at The Rye in Hertfordshire, the other at Emneth in Norfolk. He served the crown in many administrative capacities, on numerous royal commissions, and became a Knight of the Shire for Norfolk in the Parliament of 1453-4. As Patron of Wymondham Priory, he used his influence with the king and Pope to have the priory elevated to abbey status. On his death in 1454, he was buried in the abbey, but his tomb is now lost, having been destroyed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
John Alban is Honorary Senior Lecturer in the School of History at the University of East Anglia and was formerly County Archivist of Norfolk, 1997-2013. Previously City Archivist of Swansea, 1974-96, he also taught courses in local history, medieval Latin and palaeography for many years at the Universities of Swansea and Cardiff. His PhD thesis (University of Liverpool, 1976) was on ‘National Defence in England, 1337-89’ and he has published extensively on aspects of Swansea’s history (including a seminal study, The Three Nights’ Blitz. Select Contemporary Reports relating to Swansea's Air Raids of February 1941, which has recently been republished by the West Glamorgan Archive Service), and on heraldry, archives and the Hundred Years’ War. He holds fellowships of the Society of Antiquaries, the Royal Historical Society and the Historical Association.
15th August 2026
The Sid Kidwell Memorial Lecture
Peter Rees – Queen Elizabeth I and the Origins of the Swansea Copper Industry
From the high point of producing over 70% of the world’s output of refined copper, the growth of the world’s leading producer is traced back to its starting point in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.
Peter Rees was born, raised and educated in Swansea, and spent his entire working life with the American multinational Signode Corporation. Transferring to the International Division of the company in 1979, Peter’s work in the Human Resource Department took him to over 30 countries in Asia, Africa, Europe and North America.
On retirement, he was free to develop his life-long interest in history, and in July 2013, graduated with an Honours degree in history from Swansea University.
In 2017, he gained a Master of Arts degree in Local History at the Carmarthen campus of the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. Peter is the author of Sanitising Swansea: Water Supply and Sewage Disposal in Nineteenth-Century Swansea (Swansea, 2021).