Past exhibitions at the Archives
Treasures of the Archives:
Celebrating 75 years of Archives in North Yorkshire
This exhibition showcased highlights from our collections that have been deposited with us over our 75 year history, from North Riding Record Office to North Yorkshire Archives.
It featured a wide range of records from our collections dating from the 12th – 20th centuries from across North Yorkshire.
The exhibition ran from 11th April 2025 to 27th June 2025.
Temperance versus the demon drink
Expanded from the display at Archives at Dusk 2024, this exhibition showcased a selection of records from our archive collections relating to the drinking of alcohol and the rise of the temperance movement.
The exhibition will ran from 13th January 2025 to 27th March 2025 at the Record Office
Click here to see the blog post to accompany the exhibition.
Lives Unravelled by 6 Ply
Textile artists group, 6 Ply, showed works inspired by research on the theme of women living in Ripon Workhouse informed from visits to the workhouse & documents held at the North Yorkshire County Record Office.
The exhibition ran from 22nd October to 20th December 2024 at the Record Office
This exhibition was accompanied by a Dye Crayon, Texture and Stitch Workshop
6 Ply artists Sarah Lowe and Mary Exelby and held a workshop to show how to use transfer and dye crayons embellished by hand stitching to create a colourful, textured textile sample to transform into a 3D festive gift or greetings card.
Wednesday 6th November 2024 at the Record Office
Quaker Records Unveiled: Exploring hidden stories of resilience and faith in North Yorkshire
This year, 2024, marks the 400th anniversary of the birth of George Fox (1624-1691), founder of the Religious Society of Friends, also known as the Quakers. Come and explore a selection of the wide-ranging records we hold for Guisborough and Richmond Monthly Meetings, spanning over 350 years.
Find out how Quakers organised themselves locally and nationally, with international connections, from as early as the mid-17th century.
Discover records reflecting key Quaker values influencing their daily life, activities, and commitments.
Gain insight into the persecution of Quakers and their resilience, through correspondence and Society recordings of Sufferings.
The exhibition ran from 5th August to 18th October 2024 at the Record Office
Read all about the items on display in the related online blog!
Treasures from the Parish Chest: exploring North Yorkshire’s church history from archives to architecture
Discover parish church history through 500 years of archives from Record Office collections, alongside a selection of modern photographs by Sophie Cawthorne.
The exhibition ran from 2nd April to 31st July 2024 at the Record Office
Explore all this & more in the online exhibition guide!
From the Record Office collections, see a contract for the building of Catterick, St Anne’s dating back to 1412, and learn how parish registers of baptisms, marriages and burials changed between 1538 and 1813. Discover how the church took care of the poor and why it was responsible for maintaining the roads. Find out why, in the 19th century, many churches were restored and rebuilt and see designs by Victorian architects.
From the Anglo-Saxon minster of Kirkdale, St Gregory to the 20th century murals at Helmsley, All Saints, Sophie (@churchoftheday on Instagram) illustrates over a thousand years of the heritage, architecture and artistry of a selection of North Yorkshire churches through her words, photographs and a short video.
Welcome to the railways of North Yorkshire!
This exhibition ran from
15th September to 30th November 2023
From the 1830s, railways had a huge impact, significantly improving travel and reducing journey times across the country. They allowed people to travel further than ever before for business, transporting goods, and for leisure, holidays and daytrips to the coast.
In this display, we are highlighting some of the railway records held in our collections at the Record Office. From a plan of the Whitby and Pickering railway, the first line to be opened in the North Riding in 1832, to a magazine celebrating the 150th anniversary of passenger railways in 1975, you can also meet a life-size image of Charles Henry Simpson, ticket collector at Harrogate Railway Station in the 1920s. In addition, we have historic photographs, railway maps, posters, timetables, plans and much more!
Follow this link to see some of the material featured in the exhibition!
The Lure of Antiquity: 200 years of travel to Italy
Journey with us to Italy through the eyes of 18th and 19th-century travellers to visit the ancient sites of Rome and the Bay of Naples in our new exhibition at the Record Office.
This exhibition ran from 25th May to 31st August 2023
See the earliest 17th-century guidebook to Italy, travel journals, diaries, sketches and correspondence; read contemporary accounts of visits to ancient sites: the Colosseum by moonlight, ancient sculpture by torchlight, Pompeii, Herculaneum and Paestum. Marvel at adventurous ascents of Mount Vesuvius to reach the fiery crater of the volcano.
See what a passport looked like in the 1800s and, in the days before planes, trains and automobiles, discover how tourists travelled, where they stayed, what they bought and who they met.
Treasures of the Archives event
Join North Yorkshire Archives as we celebrate 75 years of Archives in North Yorkshire with a fabulous showcase of treasures from our collections.
Thursday 22 May 2025
5pm to 8.30pm
Free entry – no need to book
North Yorkshire Archives, Malpas Road, Northallerton DL7 8TB
Join us as we invite everyone to see behind the scenes and sample the vast range of amazing material you can see at North Yorkshire Archives. Through a series of displays and interactive activities we aim to inspire old and new visitors of all ages to discover the fascinating heritage on their doorstep.
Journey through 800 years of history as we highlight some of the “treasures” of our collections giving you the chance to take a closer look at some of the unique records that have been collected and preserved by the Archives over the past 75 years.
Marvel at medieval manuscripts including charters from the twelfth century.
Explore the world of heraldry with hand drawn illuminated pedigrees and coats of arms featuring some of Yorkshire’s most influential families.
Encounter the grandeur of history through royal grants made by kings and queens to individuals and communities across North Yorkshire, dating back to the medieval era.
Peek inside the lives of one of the eighteenth century’s richest and most influential families with highlights from the Dundas family archive including bills from Thomas Chippendale.
Discover the work of talented amateur artists from the eighteenth to twentieth centuries with portraits and cartoons by Thomas Orde-Powlett, local landscapes by Henrietta Matilda Crompton (1793-1881), and the photographs of Louisa Kruckenberg (1885-1958).
Learn about the industrial history of lead mining and smelting in the Yorkshire Dales throughout the nineteenth century.
Delve into the story of shipbuilding in Selby with the Cochranes archive. Explore the vast variety of vessels built in Selby and join them on their journey from their initial design to launch on the Ouse to their life on the sea and beyond.
There will also be the opportunity to see conservation demonstrations and have a go at seal making.
Archives at Dusk 2024: Vice and Virtue
Thursday evening, 23rd May 2024, 6.00pm-8.30pm
Our annual Archives at Dusk evening is a rare and exciting chance to see behind the scenes at the Record Office and glimpse some of the wonderful and unique archival history on your doorstep.
This year, our theme will be ‘Vice and Virtue’ with displays throughout the building using material from our archive collections to explore expressions of faith through a variety of Anglican, Methodist and Quaker records, as well as acts of murder and wrongdoing through the North Riding Quarter Sessions, coroners, police and workhouse archives. Come and find out about these fascinating aspects of North Yorkshire’s past!
The evening will also feature special guests, including Professor Kate Giles from the University of York, who will talk about how parish records for Pickering can be used in conjunction with other historic sources, and the late medieval wall paintings at Pickering church.
Cristiane Kroebel, Curator for Abbey Collection, Whitby Museum will talk about Saint Hilda and a case of medieval adultery in Egton, 1357, while archivist Vicky Grindrod from the West Yorkshire Archive Service will bring documents about Fountains Abbey and explain their relevance to the National Trust’s Skell Valley project in Ripon and surrounding area.
There will also be the opportunity to look at arts and crafts in churches, and take part in glass engraving with Sandra Snaddon, whose work can be found in Masham church.
We’ll also be joined for the evening by Sophie Cawthorne (@churchoftheday on Instagram), who has collaborated with us on our ‘Treasures from the Parish Chest’ exhibition, and will also be giving the lunchtime lecture for us on Friday 24th May on ‘Archives and Altars: exploring North Yorkshire’s parish church heritage’.
Archives at Dusk 2023: Maps, Plans, Travel and Adventure
Thursday 25th May 2023
Join us for an evening of archive adventure ….
Through our fascinating archive collection, we’ll take you on the Grand Tour to 18th-century Italy, adventure through the Arctic with Thomas Blanky, enjoy the heyday of Harrogate’s Victorian spa, explore the British in India, and global trade to the Yorkshire coast.
Closer to home, we’ll be travelling Yorkshire’s highways by coach and horses, guided by early road maps and some of the first leisure guides produced. All this via a stunning collection of maps and plans which we’ll have on display throughout the building.
This year we will be joined by very special guests. Craven Museum and Gallery will transport us to Elbolton cave in the Yorkshire Dales with Neolithic archaeology & artefacts. We’ll learn about the strategic importance of the map in military history from experts from The Green Howards Museum and travel along the tracks with the Wensleydale Railway, with a chance to see original documents and artefacts and to meet some of the railway workers.
This is a rare and exciting chance to see behind the scenes at the Record Office and glimpse some of the wonderful and unique archival history on your doorstep.
Follow this link to see material that was on display for the evening
Past Lunchtime Talks
2025 Talks:
Talk: All Human Life: North Riding Quarter Sessions Records
Wednesday 28 May 2025
Celebrate the launch of the Heritage Hub at Northallerton Library with a talk by our Archivist Dan Sudron exploring stories from the North Riding Quarter Sessions Records from crime and punishment to bridges, riots and Hair Powder Duty.
Talk: Official launch of the North Yorkshire Archives tithe maps website
Friday 30 May 2025, 11.00am-12.00pm
Join us for the launch of our new tithe maps website, with a talk by our Archivist Mia Cox on the project to transcribe our collection of tithe apportionments with a demonstration of the website and its features.
Talk: Celebrating 75 years of Archives in North Yorkshire
Friday 27 June 2025, 11.00am-12.00pm
Join Archivist Tom Richardson for a journey through 800 years of history as he highlights “treasures” of our collections, taking a closer look at some of the unique records that have been collected and preserved by the Archives over the past 75 years.
2024 programme:
January 26th The building of Sion Hill, near Thirsk: a late Edwardian country house by Gail Falkingham
February 23rd Working-class lives in Edwardian Harrogate by Paul Jennings
April 26th The Knights Templar at Westerdale by Carol Wilson
May 24th Archives and Altars: exploring North Yorkshire’s parish church heritage by Sophie Cawthorne
June 28th Ingleby Greenhow Manor: its families through time by Geoff Taylor
July 5th Afternoon talk and play, 2-4pm, in association with Alice Thornton’s Books, the University of Edinburgh:
- Yorkshire gentlewoman Alice Thornton (1626-1707) by Prof. Cordelia Beattie (45 mins)
- The Remarkable Deliverances of Alice Thornton, one-woman performance by Debbie Cannon (1 hour)
September 27th The Lure of Antiquity: North Yorkshire and the Grand Tour by Gail Falkingham. See nycroblog.com/the-lure-of-antiquity/
October 25th Recall to record: writing the twentieth century history of a North Yorkshire parish by Kathryn Streatfield. The accompanying book Croft’s Crossing is available to purchase at the Record Office.
November 5th Physical Landscape Models from Past to Present by by Dr Gary Priestnall, Associate Professor within the School of Geography, the University of Nottingham
House History on tour!
If you missed our recent house history exhibition, there’s a second chance to view the display boards when they tour North Yorkshire’s libraries over the next few months. Come along for ideas, inspiration and practical advice on how to begin to research your own property.
The exhibition has visited libraries in Harrogate (May 2023), Ripon (June), Scarborough (July), Whitby (August), Great Ayton (September), Pickering (October), Northallerton (November), Derwent Valley Bridge Community Library (December), Stokesley (January 2024), Thirsk (February), Richmond (March), Catterick (April), Selby (May), Skipton (June), and South Craven (July).
Don’t forget to take a look at our accompanying online house history guide packed with information on how to get started on your research, the range of resources in our collections here and how to use them.
Past Pop-up Archives
We’ll be taking our pop-up archive to venues around the county this year. Each event is an opportunity to view a range of historic maps, photographs and other records relating to the local area.
Archive staff will be on hand to answer any questions you may have and to offer advice and guidance. Come along and let us know what you’re researching!
In May 2024, for Local and Community History Month, we visited:
Pickering library: Thursday 2nd May 2024
Selby library: Tuesday 7th May 2024
Settle community library: Tuesday 14th May 2024
Harrogate library: Wednesday 29th May 2024
Easingwold community library: Friday 31st May 2024
In May 2025 we visited:
Newby & Scalby Library: Monday 12th May 2025
North Yorkshire Archives Blog 