{"id":25073,"date":"2026-04-08T12:33:42","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T11:33:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.brh.org.uk\/site\/?p=25073"},"modified":"2026-04-08T12:35:35","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T11:35:35","slug":"they-inspired-us-3-living-easton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brh.org.uk\/site\/2026\/04\/they-inspired-us-3-living-easton\/","title":{"rendered":"They inspired us #3 \u2013 Living Easton"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

In the 1990s my sports club the Easton Cowboys<\/strong> (now Easton Cowfolk) often hosted delegations of young trade unionists from Germany and Portugal through the SW TUC education programme. They would stay with us, sampling the delights of football and parties in the Plough, as well as attending workshops on sport, music and culture, before heading off to Glastonbury festival to work for the Workers Beer Company.<\/p>\n

Someone had the idea of asking Living Easton<\/strong>, the local history group, to do a history walk around the area for the visitors. This was when we got to know Jim McNeil<\/strong> and Mike Baker<\/a><\/strong>, stalwarts of the group who did a brilliant job in outlining hidden histories, from Eastonite and founder of the Transport and General Workers Union, Ben Tillett<\/strong> to the locations of Easton colliery and Eastville Workhouse. Jim was an excellent orator, from explaining the complexities of the economics of slavery and its relation to Easton, to getting us to all cheer ‘For the Republic’, when describing the English revolution of the 1640s-50s.<\/p>\n

\"Mike
Mike Baker\u2019s plaque on Bannerman Road in Easton, Bristol, which forms part of the Easton Sign Trail..<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The fantastic Easton time-signs trail<\/strong>, a series of beautiful plaques fashioned by historian, artist and craftsman Mike Baker, illuminated the history walks. In the Plough afterwards, Mike explained to me that Living Easton were celebrating working class people (‘those who weren’t born with a silver spoon in their mouth’) from opera singers like Ruby Helder<\/strong> to footballer Eddie Hapgood<\/strong> who played for Arsenal and England.<\/p>\n

Living Easton<\/strong> did a whole lot more than just walks. They educated the nascent BRHG about how to do a lot of things, including how to make history walks\u00a0inspiring and fun. We follow their path to this very day.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Mike with the Eastville Workhouse plaque in 2016<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the 1990s my sports club the Easton Cowboys (now Easton Cowfolk) often hosted delegations of young trade unionists from Germany and Portugal through the SW TUC education programme. They would stay with us, sampling the delights of football and parties in the Plough, as well as attending workshops on sport, music and culture, before […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":25074,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[188],"tags":[251,2272,2271,465,313,1300,333],"class_list":["post-25073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history-theory-practice","tag-ben-tillett","tag-hapgood","tag-helder","tag-history-walks","tag-jim-mcneill","tag-living-easton","tag-mike-baker"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThey inspired us #3 \u2013 Living Easton - Bristol Radical History Group<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.brh.org.uk\/site\/2026\/04\/they-inspired-us-3-living-easton\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"They inspired us #3 \u2013 Living Easton - Bristol Radical History Group\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In the 1990s my sports club the Easton Cowboys (now Easton Cowfolk) often hosted delegations of young trade unionists from Germany and Portugal through the SW TUC education programme. They would stay with us, sampling the delights of football and parties in the Plough, as well as attending workshops on sport, music and culture, before […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.brh.org.uk\/site\/2026\/04\/they-inspired-us-3-living-easton\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Bristol Radical History Group\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/groups\/126960655805\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-04-08T11:33:42+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-04-08T11:35:35+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.brh.org.uk\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Eddie-Hapgood-2003-lo-res.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2400\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Roger\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@BrisRadHis\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@BrisRadHis\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Roger\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"They inspired us #3 \u2013 Living Easton - Bristol Radical History Group","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.brh.org.uk\/site\/2026\/04\/they-inspired-us-3-living-easton\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"They inspired us #3 \u2013 Living Easton - Bristol Radical History Group","og_description":"In the 1990s my sports club the Easton Cowboys (now Easton Cowfolk) often hosted delegations of young trade unionists from Germany and Portugal through the SW TUC education programme. 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