Have you heard the one about the woman who lived on a tram?

Few virtual postbags can be quite as varied as our regular slew of email enquiries - this one's a belter.  Val Howels of Devon has written to ask if we have any information on "the indomitable Miss Florence Sharpe".  Val asks for the best and noblest of reasons - she is writing a children's book.  The book …

The Record Office is Accredited!

We're celebrating here because Derbyshire Record Office is now officially an Accredited Archive Service.  If you are an archive user (and if you read this blog, then you are) then you may not be very aware of the Archive Service Accreditation  Standard.  It's a relatively new standard and archive services that hold public records (like hospital …

Discovering Ilkeston

Yesterday morning I visited Ilkeston Library to deliver a new workshop  introducing people to the various sources available for researching the history a Derbyshire building. It was a quiet session, with only two in attendance - though one had travelled all the way from Aston on Trent which took me quite by surprise! With the …

Joseph Waterfall – Poet of the Peak with ability

Do you ever get side-tracked by a subject while researching another? Most of us have at some point! This is probably one of the strangest and most interesting 'distractions' I have encountered. As part of a future exhibition about cycling, I have been searching through the Record Office for interesting bicycle-related items. During a thorough search of the …

Commissioned Officers… or Conscientious Objectors?

A First World War era photograph from our collections has thrown up an intriguing question... is this a group photograph of conscientious objectors in Breaston? The photograph comes from collection D4978 'Breaston and Long Eaton Historical Notes'.  Our catalogue entry for this photograph reads simply: '"COs" Group', c.1910, and when the photograph was put onto the Picture …

Nothing but Nuns!

Following hot on the heels of the Record Office appearance at Derbyshire County Council's International Women's Day is a female-focused addition to the Local Studies Collection. It's a searchable Index of Nuns from the Catholic Family History Society on CD. It lists records of approximately 14,000 nuns who professed later than 1795, with information about their parents, birth, religious name, …

Fantastic females

First of all may I wish you a very happy International Women's Day!  As I write I am taking part in an event celebrating women at Derbyshire Council Council's headquarters here in Matlock. The line up for the afternoon features talks on women, by women, on subjects such as life and work.  We'll be joined …