Kirklees and Calderdale Brontë Group Alert and more

Two communications from Imelda Marsden, Life member of the Brontë Society:

I was invited to the Morgan Library and Museum in New York on the 6th October 2016 to the Brontë 200 reception The Brontë exhibition which Sarah Laycock from the Brontë Parsonage Museum had gone over to set up, it was superb. I went over with new Brontë Society members Alan Titterington and his wife. Alan's ancestors had connections with Branwell Bontë being next year the 200th anniversary of Branwell's birth. Alan has written a book about his ancestors connection to Branwell, called St John in the Wilderness after one of Branwells paintings. It is a good read.
Whilst in New York, I went over to Long Island to view the staircase that had gone over from Blake Hall, Mirfield, in the 1950s, where Anne Brontë had been a governess.The last time I viewed the staircase was when I was seven years old and I attended a charity event at the Hall. In the 1950s. I have kept in contact with the Ingham descendants who owned the Hall and who employed Anne Brontë. It was a great joy to see the staircase on Long Island. I met up with Barbara from the Quogue historical society thanks to an American friend who contacted her four years ago. I was shown around the house and the village by Edward. We in Mirfield are looking at twining up with Quogue with the connection to Anne Brontë, which Quogue are interested in.
Also, with the Brontë descendants of Sarah Brontë (descendants of the Brontës' cousins) we are making a film/dvd to raise funds for Holly Bank School in Mirfield (formerly Roe Head school where Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë attended). The school now caters for resident young disabled, some with learning difficulties, from all over the country. The staff are superb; they educate and care for the young residents. I have fundraised for them for 50 years and it's been a joy being a general trained nurse myself. I hope members of the Brontë Society will purchase the DVD when it goes on sale. It is about Brontë descendants following in Charlotte Brontë's footsteps in Haworth, Thornton. North Kirklees (Mirfield, Spen Valley, the Shirley country, Birstall,  Oakwell Hall, Red House, Gomersal, Dewsbury and at the end White Chapel church, Clerkheaton, where the Brontës' cousin's descendant Rose Ann Heslip and her daughter are buried, descended from their aunt Sarah Brontë. 

The Kirklees and Calderdale Brontë group are meeting on Thursday 1st December 2016 at 2pm in Mirfield, at Fausto's coffee shop (top of Tesco car park, next to the bike shop).
Next year we will be celebrating the 200th anniversary of the birth of Branwell Brontë as well as discussing the girls' school friends Ellen Nussey and Mary Taylor, from their days at Roe Head School in Mirfield.
We will also talk about Imelda Marsden's visit to the Brontë reception at the Morgan Library and Museum in New York in October. And her visit to Long Island and the village of Quogue where the staircase from Blake Hall is and which Anne Brontë would have used whilst a governess to the Ingham family.
You don't have to be a member of the Brontë Society, just come along if you are interested in social history, literature, art and music.