Study days

The next OLHA study day will be in May 2025; details will be published in the spring.

OLHA study days take place in the spring and autumn. Each focuses on a particular aspect of Oxfordshire’s history, with two or three illustrated talks in the morning and a guided walk, tour or exhibition in the afternoon. Study days are open to anyone and the cost is around £12-14 per person. Previous study days have included (click on title for further details):

Mapledurham miller Corry Starling with OLHA/BLHA group, 18th May 2013

The Far Promised Land: a history of emigration from Oxfordshire, in Burford, November 2024

Oxfordshire protests!, in Chipping Norton, May 2024

A history of Oxfordshire shops and shopping, in Bicester, November 2023

The history of garden design in Oxfordshire, at Rycote Park near Thame, May 2023

Oxfordshire: World War Two at Home, in Bampton, May 2022

The Importance of Henley and the River Thames, in Henley on Thames, November 2021

[In May 2021 we held a study meeting (and our 2021 AGM) by Zoom, at which historian Malcolm Graham gave a talk on Removing nuisances and creating prospects: 250 years of the Paving Commission in Oxford. In November 2020 we held a study meeting (and our 2020 AGM) by Zoom, at which historian Stephen Barker gave a talk on Oxfordshire during the Second World War. Our May 2020 study day was cancelled.]

Using manorial documents for local and family history research, at New College, Oxford, November 2019

Wychwood, the forest then and now, in Shipton under Wychwood, May 2019

Wallingford and its Castle, in Wallingford, November 2018

Enclosure: Reform and Rebellion, in Islip, April 2018

Witney, Wool and Wesley, in Witney, November 2017

A Village in the Vale, in Stanford in the Vale, May 2017

Focus on Thame, in Thame, October 2016

Bodleian Library Resources for Oxfordshire Historians, at the Weston Library in Oxford, May 2016

The People of the Oxfordshire Canals, in Banbury, November 2015

Uffington in Fiction and Fact, in Uffington, May 2015

Oxfordshire in the First World War, in Woodstock, November 2014

Anglo-Saxon Oxfordshire, in Wantage, May 2014

The Romans in Oxfordshire, in Charlbury, November 2013

Water Power in Oxfordshire and Berkshire, held in conjunction with the Berkshire Local History Association (BLHA), at Mapledurham Mill and House, May 2013 (photo above)

Looking After the Poor: Crisis and Reform, and Did the Workhouse Work?, in Abingdon, November 2012

William Morris (Lord Nuffield) and the Development of the Car Industry in Oxfordshire, in Long Hanborough, April 2012

The Civil War in Oxfordshire, in Tadmarton and at Broughton Castle, November 2011

Garden History from the Tudors to the Victorians, in Middle Barton, April 2011

Celebrating 150 years of the Great Western Railway, in Didcot, September 2010

If you have ideas for study days – themes, venues or speakers – we would like to hear from you. Please contact: studydays@olha.org.uk

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