Chapter 1

Introduction.

I joined the Hull Geological Society in 1979 and was elected to the Committee in 1983 as the “young member”. I became the Vice President for a year, but was really the trainee Secretary and I took on that role in March 1985. With the role came the archives and the editorship of the Humberside Geologist journal. The archives fascinated me and through them I came to know some of the characters from the past and the history behind the study of local geology. I have published a history of the first 100 years of the Society and given talks about prominent past members, such as J W Stather and Thomas Sheppard (he really was a character!).

Now I have been the Secretary of the Society for 40 years and until very recently am still the “young member” on the Committee. A recent health scare forced me to re-evaluate my research and I decided to publish a number of incomplete works. So I think that my 40^th anniversary is an appropriate time to reflect upon the past, document the changes we have been through and celebrate the Society’s achievements.

In these chapters and appendices I have tried to be objective. The various themes in our history interact but I have tried to contain them within chapters. Adding links to other Society archives is an advantage in publishing this work online. I hope you enjoy reading it and I hope that it and the associated archives will be an interesting resource in the future. Any mistakes and omissions are all my own. I thank the editorial team of Humberside Geologist for agreeing to publish this volume of the journal and for their active editing of the text.

Note – It is not really clear where the Society’s year starts and ends. The financial year ends at the end of February. The Annual General Meeting is held in March when the new Officers and Committee are elected to be in office for the following 12 months. Until recently the start of the Winter Programme in October marked the beginning of the year for subscriptions. In the appendices to this history the financial and funding information is based on the financial year but the extracts from the archives are based on a calendar year. The main Committee meeting is held either in January or December, so there might be two in one year and none in the next.

Mike Horne, May 2025.

Abbreviations used -

AGM - Annual General Meeting held in March

BGS - British Geological Survey

EYRIGSGp - East Yorkshire RIGS Group

GA - Geologists' Association

HGS - Hull Geological Society

KLS - Kingston Lapidary Society

RIGS - Regionally important geological and geomorphological sites

UKRIGS – the national umbrella organisation for RIGS Groups; now called GeoConservation UK

YGM - Yorkshire Geology Month