For some the 1970s meant punk rock and political unrest. For others it was a time of ABBA and affluence. The decade’s dual identity was as striking in Norwich as it was nationally. While once-familiar streets were demolished, new buildings sprang up. Different brand names appeared in the city centre and with them came a new era of shopping and eating out. For those who remember the steakhouses and nightclubs, the football and the fashions of the 1970s, this talk is a fascinating flashback to a different Norwich. Following his incredibly popular Norwich in the 1960s talk for The Norwich Society in November 2025, Pete Goodrum’s look at the 1970s shines a light on another decade in the city’s history. From the ‘old’ Odeon to the Garlands fire, from Bonds to the ‘Berni’, this is how we lived in Norwich in the 1970s.

Following on from her talks, Thomas Fowell Buxton and the Abolition of Slavery in the British Empire, and the Norfolk Women of Abolition, Alison Dow will explore the connections between Norfolk and South Africa in the 18^th 19^th Centuries. Starting with the fight for freedom for enslaved Africans which took up many years of Thomas Fowell Buxton's life, she will uncover another struggle for freedom he supported - this time played out in the Southern tip of Africa. Alison will also talk about the little known but fascinating historical connections with Norfolk and South Africa.

Daniel Defoe described a charmingly pastoral city during his tour of Britain, 1724-26. “The walls of this city are reckoned three miles in circumference, taking in more ground than the city of London; but much of the ground lying open in pasture-fields and gardens.”

We might not have so many “pasture fields” now but Norwich is still an exceptionally green city. This talk is an exploration of the many green spaces in our city from public parks to hidden gems, wildlife spaces to therapeutic gardens.

This is the first memorial lecture commemorating the work of Fred Dustin, a photographer and Norwich Society member who passed away in 2023 having recorded so many Norwich landmarks for our centenary celebrations in that same year.

The English Civil War was a time of great disturbance both to civic and religious life. The city was rocked by the largest explosion of the century – involving roughly three times the amount of gunpowder as The Gunpowder Plot! The cathedral was ransacked and left nearly derelict, its bishop roughly evicted, cathedral furniture and valuables were burned in the marketplace, and a proposal was even made to demolish the building.

Join us on this specialist tour to learn about the history of ill-feeling which led to this turmoil, and the events of those violent years.

Norwich: a turbulent city.

In the last two thousand years, many languages and language varieties have been spoken and written in Norwich and the surrounding area. In this lecture, Professor Christopher Joby takes us on a journey from the language of Boudica to the many languages spoken in Norwich today. For much of this period, English in its many forms has been the dominant language in the city. However, invaders and migrants have brought new languages to Norwich including Old Norse, Norman French, Hebrew, Dutch, and, more recently, languages as diverse as Polish and Cantonese. Professor Joby examines who spoke these languages, to whom, and with what consequences.

Decline in religious observance and ignorance of Christian morals were widely perceived to be the cause of a surge in vice and immorality in Georgian England. Campaigns for the ‘Reformation of Manners’ failed to turn the tide and concern reached a climax with the Royal Proclamation for the Encouragement of Piety and Virtue and for the Preventing and Punishing of Vice, Profaneness and Immorality issued on 1 June 1787.

In Norwich no one could ignore the evidence of empty pews in parish churches, failure to observe the Sabbath, drunkenness and blasphemous language in alehouses and the prostitutes on the streets. On the instructions of the magistrates, local constables did their best to stem the tide. More shocking examples of vices such as domestic violence and sexual harassment occurred behind closed doors or otherwise out of sight but some were brought to light by victims’ depositions to the mayor’s court.