Earlier this week, Dr Vic Clarke delivered a lively talk on Joshua Hobson, his radical publishing, and his work on the Northern Star at the University of Huddersfield for the annual Luddite Memorial Lecture.
Vic Clarke focused on Hobson’s life as a publisher and politician, charting his journey from teenage handloom weaver to a radical publisher of the unstamped press, through to his entry into municipal government. Her lecture followed his life through the pages of the newspapers he worked on, as well as those who later followed in his footsteps.
Clarke’s doctoral thesis explored the role of the Northern Star newspaper as a tool for community building in the Chartist movement. She is currently working on a book-length study of the topic, and continues to research Victorian radical and working-class writing and activism.
Clarke notes:
“As a historian of Chartism and the radical press, I first ‘met’ Joshua Hobson as the man behind the scenes of the Northern Star newspaper. He was instrumental in its founding, but it took a keen eye to spot his influence over the paper in the early articles. Hobson is a fascinating example of the Victorian ‘self-made gentleman’, in the words of Samuel Smiles.
His lifetime of political activity was keenly shaped by the networks of comradeship – from illegally publishing news for the poor from behind bars in the early 1830s, to literally shaping the environs of his native Huddersfield through his job as ‘Clerk of Works’ in the 1850s. Hobson’s voice is present and persistent throughout the radical history of the West Riding in the Victorian period.”
The event was a great success, with more than eighty attendees. The lecture is the twelfth in a series by Huddersfield Local History Society and the University of Huddersfield on the history of radicalism in the Huddersfield district and beyond. David Griffiths, Co-Chair of Huddersfield Local History Society, emphasised that “Hobson was a larger-than-life figure” in Huddersfield’s politics, journalism, and civic life between the 1830s and 1870s.
For those interested in Hobson, there is more to whet your appetite. In a linked event, at 4.30pm on Friday, May 8 – the date of Hobson’s death in 1876 – there will be a gathering at Hobson’s obelisk in Edgerton Cemetery (the monument is just to the left of the lodge on Cemetery Road) to reveal the relettering of the faded monumental inscription.
The informal ceremony will feature contributions from Dr Clarke, alongside fellow historians Alan Brooke and David Griffiths on different aspects of Hobson’s career.
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