Humberside Geologist no 18

A History of the Hull Geological Society from 1984 to 2025

by Mike Horne FGS

A long abstract.

(on website only)

In some ways the history of the past 40 years of the Society has been bookended by the deaths of significant members. Vice President Kenneth Fenton passed away in October 1985 after chairing the first meeting of the Winter Programme, on the evening that Mike Horne really took on the role of Secretary. Mike had joined the Committee a few years before as the “young person”. Ken’s passing was a shock to the membership who looked to Ken to keep the meetings running smoothly. President Stuart Jones passed away a month before the 2025 Annual General Meeting. Stuart had been the driving force behind our regular Roadshows at Hornsea and Flamborough, and recent conservation visits at Rifle Butts SSSI, as well as being a keen participant in our research projects.

The Centenary in 1988 focused our minds on our heritage and legacy. This was the start of collaborative research projects with the detailed stratigraphic Centenary Chalk Project and the informal reforming of the East Riding Boulder Committee as a form of citizen science. Some short research projects came upon us suddenly when we had the opportunity to record the geology before major developments such as the brief exposure of the ‘buried cliff’ at Hessle Railway Station, these could be called ‘rescue geology’. The Society slowly introduced meetings that were aimed at members of the public such as walks on beaches, in the city centre and in cemeteries, eventually leading to the foundation of Yorkshire Geology Month in 2005. And the new Secretary started to delve into the archives and publish previous work by past members.

The Society has always had a close relationship with Hull Museums and the University of Hull. The slow running down of Museum staffing caused a decline in collaboration and ended their hosting of Roadshows and public lectures. The closure of the Geology Department at the University in 1988 forced the Society to become more self-reliant and to take on the joint hosting of regional Yorkshire Geological Society meetings. There had also been a close relationship with the Adult Education Department at the University dating back to 1960. Their alumni often joined the Society and our members enjoyed the wider scientific education that their geology courses provided. The closure of the Centre for LifeLong Learning (as Adult Education had become known) in 2013 seems to coincide with a slow decline in HGS membership numbers. Although running geology courses would have been outside the remit and practicalities of the HGS some of our meetings continued some aspects of adult education such as ‘geological practical work’ in the form of Microscopy Evenings and Club Nights, and with new research project groups studying the Quaternary deposits of Skipsea, Flamborough Head and the Holderness cliffs.

It was partly through the Museum that the Society started to take an interest in Geoconservation. The Museum became the designated local centre for the National Scheme for Geological Site Documentation in 1987 and later was the hub for the East Yorkshire RIGS Group which was formed in 1992 to designate and monitor Regionally Important Geological and Geomorphological Sites. Although the RIGS Group was independent of the Society, the majority of the active members of the Group were from the HGS and eventually the two organisations merged in 2016.  In 1987 the Nature Conservancy Council asked the Society to ‘adopt’ Rifle Butts SSSI following the creation of a new geological exposure at the site; regular visits to clean the exposure have continued since then.

Other changes have slowly crept in mainly due to advances in technology in the digital world. In 1985 our winter lectures were illustrated with slide projectors and writing on blackboards with chalk. Later there were acetate sheets on an overhead projector, writing on whiteboards and we could show videos with sound. Now talks are dominated by slide shows using Microsoft PowerPoint which can include videos.

The quality of our publishing has changed from being duplicated from stencils to photocopying, and then to colour printing as technology improved and costs reduced. We were early adopters of the World Wide Web with a website to reach a wider audience. Then we started to make back numbers of our journal freely available to everyone online.  As the internet became faster and hosting space increased we were able to add quality colour images and bigger files. Now our journal is almost totally online and members don’t seem to be interested in printed copies.

The 2020-2021 Covid pandemic and lockdowns forced some changes upon the Society because we were unable to hold indoor meetings. That was when we started to increase our use of social media and introduce live streaming to keep the Society running. This allows distant members to contribute to meetings and view recordings at a time that is more convenient for them. We have continued to run a blended programme of events since.

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