Subscribe
Sign in
Home
Chat
✏️Subscribe
📕Donate a Book
🚶🏻Walking Tours
Angel Meadow
The Scuttlers
Archive
Leaderboard
About
3:31
Cooking my Nan's dinners: chicken soup
Watch me cook one of my favourite dinners growing up: my Nan's chicken soup
Feb 22
•
Dean Kirby
5
1
1
The Northern Quarter's gambling hells
Manchester's trendiest quarter was once awash with backstreet betting houses. When 400 police officers carried out a raid in 1885, it caused chaos.
Feb 13
•
Dean Kirby
14
1
The Earthquake Thieves
It's the early hours on 9 November 1852 and families across Manchester have the sensation that thieves are breaking into their homes
Feb 6
•
Dean Kirby
10
2
2
Most Popular
View all
Lost beneath the ice
Nov 22, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
32
8
2
The Manchester beer poisoning scandal
Aug 2, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
29
1
10
The Manchester History Club is in the top 20 rising history newsletters on Substack
Apr 10, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
25
12
5
How archaeologists unearthed my ancestor’s house
Apr 23, 2023
•
Dean Kirby
26
10
5
The Battle of Clifton Junction
Jan 25, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
21
4
7
Manchester history tour plans for next year
Nov 5, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
16
1
4
'People think it always rains in Manchester. Not true, though I admit it's the only town in the country with a lifeboat drill on the bus routes.' - Les Dawson
Subscribe
Recent posts
View all
Lost beneath the ice
It's the cold winter of 1813 and in Manchester the River Irwell has frozen over. A school teacher named Lavinia Robinson has gone missing. Will she be…
Nov 22, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
32
8
2
Manchester history tour plans for next year
If you came on my Angel Meadow tour this year, thank you. I have some big plans for next year.
Nov 5, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
16
1
4
5:06
Cooking my Nan’s dinners: Tater ash
Watch me cook my Nan’s tater ash and hear about the Norwegian origins of scouse
Sep 19, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
9
1
2
The killer of little mule spinners
Reaching over the machines to repair broken threads of cotton, the mule spinners of Manchester and Lancashire were falling victim to a silent killer
Aug 29, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
22
3
2
The Manchester beer poisoning scandal
Hundreds of people became sick and dozens died before deadly arsenic was found in the city's beer supply
Aug 2, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
29
1
10
Are the bones of Thomas Paine in your attic?
Rumours have swirled for 200 years that the father of the American Revolution's remains could be somewhere in Manchester
Jul 4, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
14
7
5
Finding Mr Engels: Part 4
The final part of my series on Friedrich Engels in Manchester and how I think we should really tell the city's story
Jun 27, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
11
3
2
Finding Mr Engels: Part 3
It's 1844 and a well-dressed man is walking through the streets of the world's first industrial city. The cotton looms are thumping like a heartbeat.
Jun 21, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
10
1
3
🚶🏻The Meander #2: Step across the Irwell into Salford's old Chapel Street
Just a few steps across the Irwell from Manchester's Exchange Square, Chapel Street in Salford awaits the developers
Jun 20, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
6
2
2
Finding Mr Engels: Part 2
Friedrich Engels, standing there with his arms folded in a concrete frockcoat, could not look more out of place
Jun 14, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
13
4
2
Finding Mr Engels: Part 1
How a journey to uncover my family history led me to an encouter with Friedrich Engels in slums of Victorian Manchester
Jun 6, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
15
3
4
The Dinner Hour
In Manchester, lunch has always been called dinner
Feb 16, 2025
•
Dean Kirby
36
68
4
See all
This site requires JavaScript to run correctly. Please
turn on JavaScript
or unblock scripts
