Lectures from previous years may be found on the Past Lectures page in the Archive section.

Programme of Lectures 2025

Lectures usually start at 7.45 for 8.00pm. 

Lectures are held in the in the Drawing Room, Avenue House (also known as Stephen’s House) , 17 East End Road, Finchley N3 3QE. Buses 13, 143, 326 & 460 pass close by, and it is five to ten minutes walk from Finchley Central Station (Northern Line) where the Super Loop SL10 express bus from North Finchley to Harrow also stops.  Tea/coffee and biscuits follow the talk.

Lectures will be free for Members of the Society and the fee for visitors is £2.

Tuesday February 11th 2025

Nick Peacey “The Highgate Wood Roman kiln reconstruction.”

Tuesday March 11th 2025

Robert Stephenson “London’s most curious stones and bones.”

London possesses many unusual and out-of-place stones as well as several curious bones and burial places, all of which have fascinating tales to tell.

Tuesday April 8th 2025

Hugh Petrie (Heritage Development Officer at Hendon Library) “Mapping the Kingdom.”

The colourful maps of the first County Series, was one of the greatest feats of the Victorian period. This lecture is the story of the first large scale survey of England made in the 1860s at “1:2500 OR 25.344 INCHES TO THE MILE.” The lecture looks at how and why the survey was carried out, the people who made it happen from the labourers, through to the sappers and officers of the Royal Engineers, and how the maps can be used to tell us about local history, using maps from the local studies collection of the London Borough of Barnet.

Tuesday May 13th 2025

Les Capon (AOC Archaeology) – A community /HLF excavation at Cranford, Hillingdon

A community /HLF excavation at Cranford, Hillingdon with trenching over 4 seasons that discovered Romano British round houses, Saxon houses, medieval and Tudor and post-medieval remains and intact cellars. Encompassing the Bronze Age to the 19th century.

Tuesday June 10th 2025

Annual General Meeting followed by lecture – TBC