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All our talks begin promptly at 2.30pm except where shown. After the talk we hold a raffle and we serve tea, coffee and biscuits. We'll usually finish by 4.00pm. We make a small charge to cover our costs. This is £3.00 for PANT members and £4.00 for others. There is no need to book for our talks - just turn up (and feel free to bring your friends). The talks usually take place at one of two venues:
We sometimes leave some past talks on this page to give an idea of the range of topics that we cover. | ||
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Thursday 20 November Wareham |
Peter Sills will tell us about ‘Purbeck’s best kept secret – The Purbeck Mining Museum.’ Railway enthusiast Peter has been involved with the Museum as variously founder, Chair, Trustee and Director since its inception in 2002. His illustrated Talk will touch on key geological, historical and social aspects of this major industry that continues largely unnoticed in the Purbeck landscape. It will also include descriptions of the various ways in which Dorset clay was transported from the mines dotted about the Purbeck landscape to local processing works and then onward by rail and ship around the world. A fascinating underground history revealed! |
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Thursday 22 January Wareham
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Jonathan Easterbrooke has a passion for making bowls from local clay so he has called his Talk ‘From Beach to Bowl’. While beach-combing at Worbarrow Bay he picked up some red clay, took it home and made a ceramic bowl out of it. He has since used local clay for all his work. He is going to bring his potter’s wheel to illustrate the processes of shaping the clay, and demonstrating the various stages of creating a bowl. A wonderful ‘hands-on’ start to the year! |
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Thursday 19 February Wareham |
Brigadier Jeff Little OBE held several senior positions in the security industry after retiring from the army. He brings us the story of The Portland Spy Ring, a fascinating glimpse into the world of secrecy and spies that was unfolding in the decades after WWII just along the coast from Purbeck. Subsequently dubbed the ‘Portland Spy Ring’, they were a group involved in active espionage. They obtained classified documents from Admiralty Underwater Weapons Establishment and passed them to the Soviet Union. Jeff will trace the actions of the Portland Spies and MI5 who tracked them down. A real-life thriller on our doorstep! |
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Tuesday 17 March Swanage |
Audrey Pembroke’s Talk How past local events inspire historical novels is about her successful books about the people she grew up among, and the stone, farming and fishing industries. She is very much a Purbeckian, from a large local family and with stonemasons among her ancestors. They, and her Swanage school teachers, sparked her interest and feel for the past. Having begun to write in her forties, she has used her knowledge of the lives of ordinary nineteenth century folk - based on her own family - to create extraordinary stories of life and love in a landscape both beautiful and harsh. An example of how fact becomes fiction. Audrey will have copies of her books for sale at a special reduced price on the day |
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Tuesday 15 September Swanage |
David Beardsley will talk about John Ralph Bankes (1937-1996). He was the heir who didn't succeed, and didn't inherit the estate which included Kingston Lacy and Corfe Castle. |
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Thursday 22 October Wareham |
Lilian Ladle well known as the voice of Wareham's history and pre-history, will talk about Pits, Pots & History - some results from local archaeology. |
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Tuesday 17 November Swanage |
Author Neil McLocklin will talk about the impact of The Civil War on local people and places, as described in his books A Nation Beheaded and A Nation in Ruins. |
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