History Alumni News

UK Association of Preservation Trusts   

Historians make good building-conservation specialists. As a career  it generally requires a postgraduate qualification added to a first degree in the way that teachers and lawyers 'convert' but their grasp of historical context is the secure foundation.  James Moir, the director of the UK Association of Preservation Trusts,  recently recalled some of his formative influences as an undergraduate in History  at Keele in the late 1970s for the professional journal, Context. 'Colin Richmond taught me that dung was as valid a topic of history as great deeds.' For those in the know the comment related to a famous Keele history lecture which dealt with the importance of dung in medieval agriculture. James wasn't aware that Colin had published the lecture in a volume of essays, all but that one based on elaborate spoofs. 'Dung ABC' appears as part of The Penket Papers (Sutton Publishing, 1986)

Medical History

Keele History has been offering courses in medical history for over a decade, and now offers special-study modules to medical students here. One of our graduates, Caroline Griffiths (English and History graduated 1998: now Caroline Rance), is now both a novelist and the author of a celebrated literary-medical blog. Her novel Kill-Grief  is an historical mystery set in a 1750s hospital, whilst her blog, the Quack Doctor, was nominated in the Best Literary Medical Blog category of the Medgadget Awards.

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