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Sheffield Adult Schools 1850 – 2010

by Richard Hoare

The Adult School movement was founded by evangelical Quakers in mid-Victorian times
and grew to over one hundred thousand scholars nationwide in its Edwardian heyday.
Sheffield was an early and important player in this story.

Richard Hoare describes the Sheffield Adult School from Victorian times until the present day,
tracing their transformation from basic literacy and bible classes with temperance work,
through phases of evangelical growth, social and recreational provision and gradual secularisation,
to modern self-run study and discussion groups.

There are local accounts from Hartshead, Heeley, Burngreave and Woodseats; a comprehensive
gazetteer of over 50 locations with dates, key workers and detail of classes, and full general index.