The River Graveney through Tooting has formed a boundary since Anglo-Saxon times. It has also been an open drain, a peril to travellers, a flood-risk and an inspiration to poetry. Come and hear all about the River Graveney at the next meeting of the Tooting History Group on Tuesday 12^th April 2022 at 7.30pm. Philip Bradley (Chair, Tooting History Group) will be giving a short talk.

We look forward to seeing members and guests old and new at our first in-person meeting after lockdowns.

 We meet at the United Reformed Church in Rookstone Road, Tooting, SW17 9NQ.

Our May monthly meeting will be a talk by Nick Higham on his recently published book, “The Mercenary River“. He tells the story of the development of London’s water supply from the Middle Ages to the present day. For centuries London, one of the largest and richest cities in the world, struggled to supply its citizens with reliable, clean water. The book tells a tale of remarkable technological, scientific and organisational breakthroughs; but also a story of greed and complacency, high finance and low politics.

Nick Higham’s book uncovers the murky tale of how the most powerful steam engine in the world was first brought to London; the extraordinary story of how one Victorian London water company deliberately cut off 2,000 households, the details of a financial scandal which brought two of the water companies close to collapse in the 1870s; and asks whether today’s 21st century water companies are an improvement on their Victorian predecessors. Nick Higham is a retired BBC journalist and he will be signing copies of his book at the end of the talk.

The meeting is on Tuesday 10th May 2022, beginning at 7.30pm. We meet at our usual venue: United Reformed Church, Rookstone Road, SW17 9NQ.

Our next meeting is on Tuesday 14th June. We will be hearing from the Sugar & Spice Heritage Project, based in Tooting and also from John Brown , talking about the V1 Campaign in Streatham during the Second World War. We will also hold a brief 2022 AGM.

We look forward to seeing you on Tuesday 14th June.

The A24 is the main road through Tooting today. 2000 years ago, the route was laid out by the Roman invaders from Londinium to Noviomagus Reginorum (present day Chichester). It was named Stane Street by the Anglo-Saxons (Stone Street) and it’s route can still be traced from London to the Sussex Coast. Come and hear Robert Entwhistle (Author “Britannia Surveyed”) at our July monthly meeting.

We meet at the United Reformed Church, Rookstone Road, SW179NQ at 7.30pm on Tuesday 12th July 2022.

October is #BlackHistoryMonth. And Tooting History Group will be hearing about the experiences of members of the Windrush Generation from Juanita Cox. Juanita is a research fellow at the School of Advanced Studies at The University of London. Using Oral History techniques, she has undertaken detailed research on the experiences of The Windrush Generation who came to Britain from the Caribbean from the late 1940s onwards and the gap between the portrayal of Britain to potential migrants and the reality that they actually experienced.

The meeting is at The United Reformed Church, Rookstone Road, Tooting, SW179NQ on Tuesday 11th October starting at 7.30pm.

Our next monthly meeting on Tuesday November 8th is a talk about Caroline Ganley, a leading political figure in Battersea from the 1910s to the 1960s.

Come and hear Sue Demont (Battersea Society) speak about her life and times.

“Caroline Ganley (1879 – 1966) was the ultimate multi-tasker long before the term was invented.  A hard-up mother of three who left school aged 14, she went on to become one of the first female magistrates in Britain, the first female President of the London Co-operative Society, and Battersea’s first woman MP. Her achievements were acknowledged during her lifetime, but her remarkable story is strikingly absent from the history books of the 20th century.  Drawing on Ganley’s own unpublished memoir, this short book is a first step toward reclaiming that story. “

You can order Sue Demont’s book here.

The meeting is at our usual venue: United Reformed Church, Rookstone Road, Tooting, SW17 9NQ.