16^th September 2024

AGM & This Week in History
Matthew Hathaway

The AGM will be followed by a talk from our newsletter and magazine editor, Matthew Hathaway, outlining events from this week across the years.

21^st October 2024

Bicester Shops & Shopping
Bob Hessian

Bob's talk, illustrated with old photos of Bicester town centre, will explain how shopping in the town has changed over the years and the challenges that retailers now face.

18^th November 2024

Trench Humour in the First World War
Stephen Barker

Soldiers often turned to humour to alleviate the stress of life in the trenches. Jokes, puns, and satirical songs were a part of the soldiers’ oral culture. Much of the humour was lost on those outside the soldiers’ group, but it resonated with the soldiers and allowed them to cope with the strain of service and combat. This presentation takes a light-hearted look at trench humour in slang and through tunes, cartoons, satirical journals, concert parties and in many other ways.

15^th December 2024

Christmas Music & Song Through the Ages
Ian Giles

20^th January 2025

Poverty, Pestilence & Public Health in Victorian Britain
Dr Simon Wenham

Britain may have been the ‘workshop of the world’ in the Victorian period, but the sceptre of poverty and pestilence loomed large over the lives of many of its citizens. A large proportion of people were not only close to the bread line, but repeated epidemics decimated whole swathes of the population. This talk explores the wealth and health of the British during the Victorian period and the State’s struggle to improve conditions.

17^th March 2025

The Message in the Map
Nick Millea

The message in the map: What is the cartographer telling us … and why? We shall look at a series of maps with a critical eye – what really is going on with the image presented to us, and are we missing something? Bicester will be central to our deliberations.

19^th May 2025

Garden Archaeology - a different kind of digging
Dr Stephen Wass

For the past decade landscape archaeologist Dr. Stephen Wass has been working, mainly for the National Trust, developing a better understanding of some of our greatest historic gardens. Investigating properties ranging from the medieval park at Baddesley Clinton, through seventeenth-century gardens at Hanwell and Packwood to the great landscape garden at Stowe, Stephen has used the techniques of archaeology to gain a better understanding of their construction and development and will be sharing some thoughts on how garden archaeology can support our understanding of some key moments in history.