Our single-session talks, at All Saints Church Hall, are on Friday afternoons (14:30-15:30) followed by refreshments (tea/coffee/biscuits) and an opportunity to socialise. There is no charge for SUES members. Non-members considering joining the Society are welcome to attend one talk free of charge, as a ‘taster’.
Talk 1: Killing Queen Victoria – Bob Nicholson
Friday 18th September 2026
On a warm summer’s evening in June 1840, a large crowd gathered outside Buckingham Palace. They were hoping to witness one of the most exciting sights of London – a public appearance from the young Queen Victoria, as she went for one of her evening drives through the park. When she emerged, most members of the crowd would cheer and wave, but one man had a very different greeting in mind. Inside his coat pockets were a pair of loaded pistols. This talk reveals the remarkable story of what happened next.
Dr Bob Nicholson is a historian, writer, and broadcaster who loves to unearth surprising new stories about the Victoria Era. His hit BBC Sounds documentary series, Killing Victoria, was a top ten history podcast in more than fifty countries. He has written and presented historical stories for BBC Radio 4 and Radio 3, appeared in documentaries for Channel 4 and Channel 5, and is a regular contributor to BBC History Magazine, History Today, The Guardian and The Telegraph. He lectures at Edge Hill University where he is an Associate Head of the Department of History, Geography and Social Sciences.
Talk 2: From ‘Uncultivated Waste’ to Seaside Suburb: Thomas Weld Blundell and the 19th Century History of Birkdale – Kevin Murphy
Friday 16th October 2026
The nineteenth-century history of Birkdale is a story of ambition and transformation. After a legal battle in the 1840s, Thomas Weld Blundell developed his coastal land into ‘Birkdale Park’, a planned suburb of elegant villas shaped by Victorian ideas of landscape and living. With the arrival of the railway in 1848, the area began its gradual growth into a desirable seaside community. This talk explores that change through its streets, houses, and lost buildings.
Dr Kevin Murphy, a native of Liverpool, is an art historian who trained at the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London. He teaches at the University of New Haven (USA) and is Dean of its Tuscany Campus in Prato, Italy, a role he has held since the campus was founded in 2012. He brings over thirty years of experience in international education, teaching and public lectures, specialising in Italian art history and culture.
Talk 3: Anne Geddes Gilchrist: A Southport Historian and Collector of Folk Songs – Peter and Barbara Snape
Friday 20th November 2026
Anne Geddes Gilchrist, OBE, FSA (1863–1954) made a significant contribution to the preservation of English Folk Music, collecting songs and tunes, researching their history and writing extensively about them. With an incredible gift for memory and a seemingly endless bank of musical knowledge she became a beacon of the Folk Song and Dance movement in the first half of the 20th Century.
Born in Manchester to Scottish parents, Anne lived for many years in Southport, where she collected a number of folk songs. This talk is based on research undertaken by Peter and Barbara Snape. It celebrates her contribution to folk music in an entertaining afternoon of captivating story-telling and a selection of the songs she collected in Southport with a fascinating perspective on local social history.
Peter and Barbara Snape are a very popular English Traditional folk music duo, who have been acknowledged for the research they have undertaken on folk song in the North West and for championing the work of Anne Geddes Gilchrist. https://thesnapes.org.uk/
Talk 4: George Herbert: Public Orator, Priest and Poet – Hilary Benson
Friday 15th January 2027
Though dying a young man, in 1633, George Herbert’s life straddled the reigns of three English monarchs. Herbert moved easily in the spheres of high public office and academia, and entertained hopes of a career in the Jacobean court, until he relinquished worldly ambition and was ordained a priest. He became a country parson, writing some of the greatest lyric poetry in the English language. This talk will consider George Herbert’s poetry in his time and ours.
Hilary Benson studied Music and English at Manchester University, and for a PGCE at Cambridge University, before teaching in Brighton. After two years as Director of Music at a city centre church in Oxford, she added in Theology at Bristol and was ordained in 1994 with the first wave of women priests into the Church of England. She has subsequently held chaplaincy posts at Birmingham and Derby Universities.
Talk 5: Astronomy and Meteorology in Southport: A Tale of Millionaires, Ministers and Unionists – Bob Mount
Friday 19th February 2027
This talk covers the Hesketh Park astronomical observatory and the Thomas Cooke telescope that it contains, as well as the meteorological observatory that no longer exists. It will explain how, thanks to some of the most prominent families and people of Southport in the 19th century, these facilities came into the park. The building and equipping of the weather station, and its tragic demise, will be explained. Construction and operation of the telescope and its mount will be covered, as will the astronomical objects that it discovered. We will also hear about the decline of the astronomical observatory during the later part the last century and its restoration in recent years. Time permitting, the great eclipse of 1927 and the first recording of a transit of Venus in 1649 will be briefly covered (both were local events).
Bob Mount is an aeronautical engineer and a member of the Royal Aeronautical Society (SAS), with an MSc in Fluid Mechanics. He served 34 years as an engineering officer in the Corps of Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, retiring as a Colonel in 2005. He is a member of Southport Astronomical Society, manages the Baxendell Observatory in Southport on behalf of Sefton MBC, oversees observatory open days and demonstrates the telescope. He is Group Leader of Southport U3A Astro Group which he set up in 2017.
His outreach activities over the past 14 years include: lecturing Astrophysics to A-level students in Sefton schools; talks on astronomy to junior and high school pupils, including those with special needs; and presentations on astronomy to other astronomy societies, U3As, charities, and churches.
Talk 6: Merseyside’s Railways after Beeching: Reusing the Past to Create the Future – Wendy O’Neill
Friday 19th March 2027
Reuse of existing and abandoned infrastructure across Merseyside created the passenger and goods network in use today. This talk examines the development of the Merseyrail Electrics system in the 1970s and proposals which could complete a 70-year-old plan for a modern network across Merseyside as the Liverpool – Manchester line approaches its bicentennial in 2030. It will also explore the constantly changing and modernised freight service which uses new technologies and updated infrastructure, a fascinating part of Merseyside’s recent railway history.
Wendy O’Neill is a PhD researcher in Sociolinguistics at the University of Liverpool. Her research project examines archival material to consider the social and cultural influence of the railways on communities. She is supported in her research by the National Railway Museum and the North West Doctoral Training Partnership.
Talk 7: The Most Discussed Painter in England: Rediscovering John Maler Collier – Anna Maddison
Friday 16th April 2027
John Collier’s fame today rests upon his much-loved depiction of Lilith (1887), the femme fatale and mythical first wife of Adam – and the star of The Atkinson‘s collection (pictured, image credit: Atkinson Art Gallery). However, Collier was a popular and leading artist in his day, who produced a breadth of notable works. He delighted the gallery-going public with his society portraits of the rich and famous, the drama of his history paintings, and his much-discussed modern life subjects. This talk, which ties in with the forthcoming Atkinson Exhibition, discusses examples from across Collier’s career, addressing along the way his painting style and masterful technique.
Dr Anna Maddison is an Art Historian specialising in the Victorian era. She has over 20 years’ experience of designing and teaching courses in higher education, working for the University of Liverpool (Continuing Education), Liverpool John Moores University and as a freelance lecturer. Anna has taught at the Walker, Lady Lever and Tate Liverpool, and has had a long association with The Atkinson, researching and lecturing on their collection, and participating in curatorial projects.
Talk 8: Alchemy: The Science of Magic – Rick Tynan
Friday 16th July 2027
The Alchemy Lecture combines magic effects, science and science learning. It will be interactive and focus mainly on the scientific explanations for magic effects and stunts that are already in the public domain, many to be found in secondary school textbooks, that anyone can do safely after a few minutes’ instruction. If time permits, we could touch upon using illusions to teach science concepts, or the chemistry of ‘flash’ products, or the collaboration between scientists and magicians in order to do rigorous research into the paranormal.
Dr Rick Tynan was a biology and science teacher in Merseyside secondary schools for 27 years and has worked at Liverpool John Moores University as a teacher educator for 18 years. He is also a third-generation magical entertainer whose grandparents and parents were full-time professional entertainers in music hall, variety theatres, clubs and holiday complexes. Rick has always found ways of incorporating magic and illusion into his teaching at all levels.