A 60-year saga
Thu, 29 Mar 2012 14:56:00 BST
Diamond Jubilee honour for history professor who will lecture on Britain and its queen
A LEADING historian with 46 books to his name will make history himself when he becomes the University of Huddersfield’s inaugural Diamond Jubilee Professor.
And he will deliver a public lecture exploring how Britain has changed during the 60 years that the Queen has been on the throne. “The monarchy has been the only consistent thread during this period,” says Professor Keith Laybourn (pictured below), who has taught and researched at the university since 1971, and was appointed professor of history in 1991.
He was offered the Diamond Jubilee Chair by the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Bob Cryan, who has devised a programme of events to mark the Royal Anniversary.
“I asked Keith Laybourn to be the first Diamond Jubilee Professor, in recognition of his being our longest serving professor and more importantly in recognition of the outstanding work he has done for the University during his career here,” said Professor Cryan.
On Tuesday 1 May, Professor Laybourn lectures on ‘60 Years in 60 Minutes’. He will deal in changes to politics, the economy, culture and leisure in the years since 1952, and it will draw on some of his personal experiences of the past six decades.
Professor Laybourn was brought up in Monk Bretton, a mining and agricultural area near Barnsley. His father and grandfather were both miners but after university study in Bradford, Lancaster and Manchester he became a leading historian of the labour movement and recent research interests have included working-class gambling, and the development of the police in Britain.
His latest book, co-authored with fellow University of Huddersfield professor, David Taylor, is a widely-praised examination of policing during the inter-war years. Now underway is a new book entitled ‘The Battle for Britain’s Roads, c.1900-1971: The Police, the Motorist and the Law’.
Historical research has long been one of the main strengths of the University of Huddersfield, said Professor Laybourn. He has had offers and opportunities to base himself elsewhere, but he is glad to have spent his career at the first place he applied for a post, in 1971.
“I suit Huddersfield and Huddersfield suits me!” he says.
In addition to the Diamond Jubilee Chair, there will be University funding for a PhD student to be supervised by Professor Laybourn. And his talk on 1 May will inaugurate a completely-refurbished and re-equipped facility to be known as the Diamond Jubilee Lecture Theatre, on the site of the existing Firth Street Lecture Theatre.
The University’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Cryan, wanted to ensure that in addition to a programme of 60 scholarships for both UK and Commonwealth students, plus a sequence of 60 lectures and special events, there would also be a lasting legacy in the shape of the new lecture theatre.
“We have had a considerable number of Royal visits in recent years, including Prince Charles and the Queen herself,” said Professor Cryan. “So we have actually been very well supported by the Royal Family and as this is the only Diamond Jubilee we are going to see in any of our lifetimes I wanted to do something that would give us a legacy.”
- The lecture “60 Years in 60 Minutes” on Tuesday 1 May begins at 6.15 pm. The event is free and open to all. At 6pm, the Lord Lieutenant of West Yorkshire, Dr Ingrid Roscoe, will open the Diamond Jubilee Lecture Theatre. Tickets can be booked at lecture.request@hud.ac.uk. For full details see http://www.hud.ac.uk/news/diamondjubilee/publiclectures/
