Jon Topham

Snowman

The joy of having grandchildren!

Blue plaque at Leeds Uni refectory

Good place to have lunch

Sheep with trees behind, lost in the mist.

What a day!

The James Ford Lectures in British History The Language of Social Science in Everyday Life - Peter Mandler (Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge)

Looking for an intellectual treat? @petermandler.bsky.social 's Ford Lectures on 'The Language of Social Science in Everyday Life' begin Thursday 22 January and continue weekly through 26 February in Oxford. #Skystorians

Here's what it looked like on my return to work this morning - beautiful red brick gabled building of Girton's Hall, with a dusting of snow on the grass in front.

JOB ALERT!

3-year postdoc at @girtoncollege.bsky.social - research anything you like in History, Archaeology or Anthropology in a wonderful, welcoming scholarly community.

PLEASE SHARE! Closes 12 January

www.girton.cam.ac.uk/job-vacancie...

Sheep standing staring on cold hillside

Mood.

Funny weather in Leeds this morning. The Town Hall was momentarily golden and framed by a rainbow.

Grimwith Reservoir. NOT living up to its name.

Rather warmer today!

Finally, the recording has landed! If you missed @jontopham.bsky.social's inaugural lecture on "Science and religion from the ground up" back in April, you can now catch up online at mymedia.leeds.ac.uk/Mediasite/Pl.... @bshsnews.bsky.social @leedsprhs.bsky.social

Best history books 2025: BBC History Magazine’s Books of the Year In the roster of laudable history books published in 2025, authors tackled topics as diverse as Gaza, Indian partition, extinction, medieval and Stuart monarchs – even historians themselves. Here, a p...

BBC History Extra has chosen Vanished as one of its books of the year! Amazed and grateful that my roar has reached far further than I imagined.

I was also on a podcast for them earlier this year. Link here: historyextra.supportingcast.fm/listen/histo....

www.historyextra.com/magazine/his...

This is an exciting find: the remains of the building used by the House of Commons as its temporary chamber between 1835 and 1851. If you want to know what that building looked like, see our short article: historyofparliament.com/2025/09/25/t...

Snowy hillside on a sunny day.

Snowy village (Timble, North Yorkshire) on a sunny day.

Oh what a beautiful morning!

Roger Stevens Building, University of Leeds

Heron in pond by Roger Stevens building

So, our concrete jungle may be deemed architecturally significant, but I definitely get more out of the heron.

Join link on Teams: teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-joi...

Nominations are open for the BSHS Pickstone Prize 2026, recognising the best scholarly English-language book in the history of science.
📆 Deadline: 31 Jan 2026.
Anyone may nominate (self-nominations welcome).
Submit via our online form on the BSHS website www.bshs.org.uk/the-bshs-pic...

Don't miss out on this super talk about scientific printing by our own @edwinrose.bsky.social later today - join us either online or in person.

University of Bradford to benefit from JB Priestley royalties The author of An Inspector Calls and other plays and novels was born in Manningham in Bradford.

Bradford University to benefit from JB Priestley royalties. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Born #OnThisDay in 1914 was actress and inventor Hedy Lamarr. As well as acting in 30 films, during the Second World War she co-developed a frequency-hopping guidance system for American torpedoes, the principles of which are used in Bluetooth and WiFi technologies today. #WomenInSTEM

Bodleian Visiting Fellowships in Special Collections

ARCHIVAL FUNDING: Ann Ball Bodley Visiting Fellowship in Women’s History, to use Bodleian Libraries collections to advance scholarship in women’s history, of any geographical area and historical period. Deadline 28th Nov. www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/csb/fellowsh...

New book review:
Cornish on Rose, Edwin D.: _Reading the World: British Practice of Natural History, 1760-1820_. University of Pittsburgh Press, 2025. Published by H-Sci-Med-Tech.
Read here: networks.h-net.org/node/20129660

CFP: BAVS 2026 Conference Liverpool BAVS Liverpool 202627 – 29 July 2026 Keynote Speakers: Dr Alison Chapman (University of Victoria, BC), others to be confirmed. The Centre for Modern and Contemporary History (CMCH) at Liverpool Joh…

It’s lovely to see our BAVS CFP out. If you research/teach any aspect of the Victorian period (broadly defined) do consider joining us! You can submit a paper, roundtable, creative workshops/ pedagogical paper. We really are open to a wide range of talks! victorianist.wordpress.com/2025/10/20/c...

Screenshot of post of the ECR Prize 2025-26: available here https://www.histhum.com/early-career-prize-2025-26-history-of-the-human-sciences/

History of the Human Sciences announces its 2025-26 ECR Prize. All details (including previous winners) on our para-site histhum.com. Deadline: 30 January 2026.

Also! Follow the journal on Bluesky at @histhum.bsky.social www.histhum.com/early-career...

The official CFP is a few days off, but I can't wait that long to announce that #BAVS2026 will be held in Liverpool, 27-29 July. We hope that some of the @rs4vp.org crowd will be able to make the trip over from #RSVP2026 and join @bavs-uk.bsky.social for more Victorian stuff. Details to follow.

Lindisfarne, Holy Island, Northumberland, photo by Sarah Howard, landscape photographer.

Who knew that the British JAIL for History of Science was in the Leeds School of Philosophy? We'll keep you on the historiographical straight and narrow!

Renowned BBC Radio 4 programme In Our Time receives prestigious British Academy President’s Medal for 2025 The British Academy has awarded its prestigious President’s Medal to the long-running and beloved BBC Radio 4 programme In Our Time. Recognising its outstanding contribution to humanities and social s...

We are awarding our President's Medal to 'In Our Time' as it has done so much to showcase humanities & social sciences. We'd decided this before the news of Melvyn Bragg stepping down, but glad we got our timing right & had a chance to celebrate with him!
www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/news/renowne...

We're super excited to be hosting Prof. Alison Bashford at @globalaffairslu.bsky.social to hear her talk about her fascinating new book on the history of reading the hand. You can imagine why we'd be interested and we are sure you will be too. Please sign up for free tickets at the link below.

Print Networks Annual Conference: From ‘Provincial’ to ‘Regional’ Highlighting the connections of people, trade and distribution within and across regions and nations. In memory of Peter Issac & John Hinks.

Thanks to the generosity of the Bibliographical Society we still have two subsidised tickets for postgraduate attendance at the forthcoming Print Networks conference. Don't let the opportunity pass. www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/print-netw...

Huge congratulations to our own Dr Ellen Clarke on the publication of "The Units of Life: Kinds of Individual in Biology"! academic.oup.com/book/60068