Did you ever wonder about the history of #Bentalls in #Kingston? Come along to the #WestLondonLocalHistoryConference on Saturday 11 April and find out. Tickets £15 from www.ticketsource.co.uk

Early warning for #WestMiddlesexFHS members. Thurs 19 March is not just about using #AI in family history, it is our AGM. Your annual chance to hear how the society is faring, our challenges and how we are meeting them.check our website www.west-middlesex-fhs.org.uk for full details. See you there

Easter is not far off now! We have the perfect #EasterPresent for the shopaholic historian in your life. A ticket for the #WestLondonLocalHistoryConference who are presenting “Shopping Is Never Done” in Richmond on Saturday 11 April. Tickets from ticketsource.co.uk. But hurry!

This 1955 photo shows blacksmith George Tibbetts in his Merchant's Place forge, off Friar Street, Reading His family were smiths for generations, and the workshop itself dated back to the late 1500s. His son Tony was preparing to continue the family tradition 📸 Reading Museum, Chronicle Collection

I know I say this all the time but please support #LocalArchives and #NationalArchives - they often come off worst in the battle for public money. And they are vast #treasureshouses of knowledge.

My friend the climatologist tells me what worries him is the climate. My friend the epidemiologist tells me what worries them are infections. My friend the historian tells me what worries her are the people who aren’t worried.

Some fantastic photos of Pevensey #Roman fort (especially the harbour gate arch) in this thread by @forestcollectiv.bsky.social for #Romanfortthursday 🤩👇👇

Do you think your family history is worth paying for? Quite shocked to hear of someone who said it should all be free and then added they didn’t care about it anyway. I could say the same about computer games or exotic holidays ! Maybe they’ll learn one day

Take a peek inside these local Reading shops through the decades: 🖼️ Hawkes Ironmongers, High Street, 1945 🖼️ Heelas (now John Lewis), Broad street, Jan sales, 1956 🖼️ Reading department store, Jan sales, 1963 The final store isn't identified in our records - so if you recognise it, let us know!

#ICYMI: The Austen 250 programme during 2024-25 was a huge undertaking in Southampton, including our 'Placing Jane' conference. Find out more about its impact, here: www.balh.org.uk/news-austen-... #WeAreLocalHistory #LocalHistoryForAll

Huge news for Ceredigion & west Wales. Imperial #Roman lead mines on Cardigan Bay were under the control of Domitian by AD 87 as confirmed by the discovery of these lead pigs Only the 5th & 6th ingots ever found in Wales 😮 www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-n...

Green Market, Halifax, Nova Scotia posted in 1911 to Andover, Massachusetts Having a fine time. Lots going on here. Start for the country tomorrow. Had fine trip. #PostedInThePast

Part of a lost masterpiece for #MosaicMonday Fragment of #Roman floor depicting an arch found in #Canterbury Kent in 1758 during the construction of a cellar next to the King's Head inn Recorded in a watercolour held by the @antiquaries.bsky.social The fate of the mosaic is sadly unknown 🙁

No excuses. You have about 3 weeks to buy your #HistoryLoving #shopaholic mum a superb gift for #MothersDay. A ticket for #WestLondonLocalHistoryConference. 11 April #DukeStreetChurch Richmond. £15 so you can still afford the card, flowers and champagne!

The Romanesque 'Norman Tower', Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, was constructed during the tenure of Abbot Anselm (1121-48) and is now the detached bell tower of St Edmundsbury Cathedral (LH side of photo) #suffolk #architecture #history #heritage #norman #romanesque #bells #tower #photography #medieval

REALLY like this - fantastic idea! Hope it takes off, & encouraging all to submit their ideas for heritage artefacts found at mainline rail stations. Help record the less considered, but still important, items: more in the blog from Daniel Wright - thebeautyoftransport.com/2025/12/03/a...

#FindsFriday with this glorious hoard of staters at the Reading Museum, a mixture of Gallo-Belgic & Atrebatic coins, as well as this gorgeous torc catch our episode on the Hillforts of Hampshire / Wiltshire and just that whole area in general >>> www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-I1...

The interior stairwell at Clickimin Iron Age Broch on the outskirts of Lerwick in Shetland. 📸 My own. #StairwellSaturday #Prehistory #Archaeology #Shetland

How does genetic genealogy solve crimes + how is it used in crime fiction? Join @nathandylangoodwin.bsky.social for an online talk exploring investigative genetic genealogy and how it shapes the Venator Cold Case series. 📅 23 Feb 2026 | 19:30–20:30 | Online Book portal.sog.org.uk/Event/view/1...

#RomanSiteSaturday A traveller entering Vindolanda Roman fort on Hadrian's Wall along the main street, lined with workshops, cafes & accommodation. What an experience that must have been... 🎥 My own, last year 🌞

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more. Please sign and share this petition to help saving Archaeology at the Humboldt University in Berlin.

The WikiTree #OnePlaceStudies Project Research Party on Feb 5th was recorded and you can watch it on YouTube! Topics: ✦ What is a #OnePlaceStudy ✦ What makes a great OPS ✦ Why sign up with the OPS project and what Wikitree provides ✦ Participants’ ideas about OPS research ✦ Q & A #OnePlaceWednesday

In the doghouse for forgetting #ValentinesDay? You can still redeem yourself with your #historylover by booking tickets for “Shopping Is Never Done: High Streets down the decades” , the 2026 #WestLondonLocalHistoryConference 11 April in Richmond. Tickets available from ticketsource.co.uk

And they're in! Well - 1 of the final 2, at least. Hit a snag with the frame on the other, hopefully resolved today. If you're passing through #Petersfield station in #Hampshire, have a look out for more about local railway staff in the past - in the 'up' waiting room (London-bound). #Railway200

Do you wonder how we will do #familyhistory in the future? Join #WestMiddlesexFHS on Thurs 19 Feb to hear #NickBarratt on The Future of Family History in the Digital Age. Meeting is at #StJohnsCentre Isleworth and on Zoom. Doors open at 7.30 pm (UK time). Full details www.west-middlesex-fhs.org.uk

Tapestry, Brussels, mid 16th century, Woven in wool and silk on woollen warps. Has the arms and motto of a member of the Genoese Grimaldi family, On display at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge . #textiletuesday #tapestry

#MotteMonday with Halton Motte & Bailey, just north of Lancaster we caught this on our drive to scotland which you can catch here >>> www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzJR...

In 1926, Valentine’s Day fell on a Sunday. Bad news for forgetful partners - no Amazon, no rush to the supermarket for chocolates and roses, no hastily-concocted social media love-message, no chance of a last-minute romantic meal. Just the Look that says more than words ever could! 🙀

The 12th/13thC church of the 6thC #Welsh St Dubhán at Churchtown, Hook Head #Wexford this evening in 2024.

Great grandmother Catherine Seear was born 160 years ago today. Here is her #familyHistory story www.grannystales.co.uk/catherineseear

The latest #OnePlaceStudy to be registered with us is Ynysymaengwyn Estate, Tywyn One-Place Study. David Church is researching the families of a place with some fascinating history, which is now a caravan and camping park! #OnePlaceWednesday

Battling with Census Returns If you’ve ever traced a family through census records, you may have hit a confusing moment: the same household, the same street, but a different house number? Or the same house number and neighbours, but a completely different street name? Did the family move? Did the…

Looking for a birthday/Valentine present for the #historyaddict in your life? What about an event to look forward to? #WestLondonLocalHistoryConference has the answer. The 2026 theme is #ShoppingIsNeverDone - so true!11 April, Duke Street Church, Richmond - tickets from #Ticketsource £15.

This post, the dicussion arising from it, and the blog post it links to, are well worth a read on #OnePlaceWednesday!

Born #OnThisDay 1800 William Henry Fox Talbot. Best known as the pioneer of photography, he was also briefly MP for Chippenham, 1832-5, but stepped down to concentrate on his scientific interests. Read more about him here: victoriancommons.wordpress.com/2012/09/17/w...

*Violent Waters: Environmental Politics in Early Modern England* An important new book from @ellydezateux.bsky.social shows 'how environments were politically constructed and contested, and how environmental concerns inflected politics'. 🗃️ Cambridge UP: www.cambridge.org/core/books/v...

The Austen 250 programme during 2024-25 was a huge undertaking in Southampton, including our 'Placing Jane' conference. Find out more about its impact, here: www.balh.org.uk/news-austen-... #WeAreLocalHistory #LocalHistoryForAll

What was the equivalent of dating apps 100 years ago? It was the Lonely Hearts columns in newspapers! Take advantage (in a good way!) of #Findmypast offering free access to their digitised #newspapers until 16 Feb. You may find your perfect #familyhistory #Valentine

The old Forge building at Longford Middlesex had a fascinating history over two millenia, but it is under threat of demolition if the third runway is built at Heathrow. Read more about it at: www.wendytibbitts.info/a-%20legacy-... @westmiddlesexfh.bsky.social @hillingdonherald.bsky.social

#Shopping addict? Wonder how it was done in the past? The #WestLondonLocalHistoryConference theme this year is #ShoppingisNeverDone .Join us at #DukeStreetChurchRichmond on 11 April 2026. Tickets are available for £15 on Ticketsource but hurry , they are selling fast.

Networks are fantastic things. Three days ago an ex-colleague died. Most of her colleagues are now widely scattered but within those three days nearly all of them have heard the news. Don’t be afraid of #SocialMedia. Use it with caution but embrace it. #OnlyConnect

Hester Tradescant & her Stepchildren, John and Frances 1640s (Ashmolean Museum of Art & Archaeology) Hester Pookes married John Tradescant the Younger as his second wife in 1638. She is with her husband's children by his first marriage, John b. 1633, & Frances, born c.1628.

Great day “out” at the #EastSurreyFHS Virtual Family History Show! Visitors with some quite frankly daunting enquiries, a chance to visit our own favourite societies and a chance to gossip among ourselves. Hope you all had a great day!

This special roof tile, also on display at the Grosvenor museum in Chester, bears the marks of the 20th Legion and their symbol, a wild boar.

The next Scottish Indexes Conference takes place a week today, on Saturday 31 Jan 2026. Free, online, expert speakers, Q & A sessions, time-zone friendly, beginners welcome. #FamilyHistory

I hate it when a website insists I use their online form to make an enquiry. It may be effective to channel all enquiries but it is a pain. As I am often asking them to publicise a small independent #FHS or local history event, and find I can’t attach a flyer, I tend to give up.

Are we all getting so focussed on the benefits of using DNA and AI for #genealogy that we are forgetting about the benefits of traditional records for #LocalHistory and #FamilyHistory? I use all three but still gravitate towards the traditional records. Am I just old-fashioned?

18 January 1778, London: birth of George Bellas (Greenough from 1795), founding president of the Geological Society and compiler of the Society's 1820 geological map of England and Wales. In 1813 he visited Lyme Regis and purchased a fossil 'crocodile' from 'Mrs Anning's curiosity shop'. #MaryAnning

A memorial plaque in Dewsbury Minster to the Reverend Patrick Brontë BA, 1777-1861, father of the Brontë sisters who served as a perpetual curate at the Minster from 1809 to 1811. Born in County Down as Patrick Brunty to a poor family; he was befriended by a local clergyman who saw his potential /1

A winter sunset over Bolton Priory. The priory church and ruins of the Augustinian priory lie at the heart of the Bolton Abbey estate on land gifted to the Augustinian canons by Alice de Rumilly in 1154. Image Bolton Abbey Sunset Matt Smith CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons