Andrew is a well-known and respected student and researcher of Ilkeston’s history, and you will have noticed that he has already made several welcome contributions to the Old Ilkeston site.
His ancestral roots in Ilkeston have been very firmly established for hundreds of years, with his Knighton ancestors moving to live in Cotmanhay in the late 1600s — I suspect quite likely in one of the squatters’ cottages on the Duke of Rutland’s land — having previously lived in Shipley and Smalley.
A pupil at Hallcroft School in the 1970s, a few years later Andrew joined the Ilkeston & District Local History Society and has been a member ever since — serving as its treasurer for 16 of those years.
He has maintained an interest in local history for over 40 years and during that time has built up an extensive and impressive archive of material which he has used to support several publications …. one such was Frank Underwood’s Ilkeston (published in May 2002), a very inventive view of Ilkeston and its neighbourhood via a collection of postcards sent by an ‘outsider’ to Ilkeston, with comments attached.
Other publications include: …….
Old Ilson No. 1 (co-author Eddie King)
Old Ilson No. 2 (co-author Eddie King)
Bygone Langley Mill (co-author Bryan Wright)
Bygone Stanton (co-author Danny Corns)
Various calendars in the mid to late 1990s for Ilkeston and Alfreton
Andrew has also supplied images for most of the Ilkeston and District Local History Society’s publications since the late 1980s and in addition, all of the images for the Ilkeston’s Past in Pictures DVD and similar DVDs for Stanton Ironworks, Heanor and Long Eaton.
Tentative plans for a future publication – ‘probably years away’ – include a book on the Edwardian postcards published by Edward and Annie Turner of Ilkeston. At present he is helping the acting editor of that IDLHS’s newsletter with a few interesting contributions.
Andrew is always on the go !!
