Approaches to Local History

London: Longmans, Green and Co. Very Good/Very Good. 1977. Second Edition Revised. Hard Cover. 8vo 0582485088 Dust jacket complete. Red cloth boards with bright gilt titling on spine. A few spots to page tips. xvii, 265 pages clean and tight. In recent years the study of local history has become an increasingly popular pursuit, and in this stimulating and practical book Alan Rogers explains how to go about it. Dr Rogers sees the past in terms of people rather than places, and he outlines here the different kinds of questions that can be asked about local communities, the sources that can help to answer them, and how these sources can be used. He gives up-to-date examples of studies made in various parts of the country, and reproduces a wide variety of material from major nineteenth-century sources. Approaches to Local History, which is fully illustrated with maps, diagrams, and plates, was originally written to accompany a 1972 BBC radio series This Was Their World, and the first edition was published under that title. Its usefulness immediately won it independent recognition, and there has been a continuing demand for its re-issue. For this second. edition (which has been redesigned and reset) Dr Rogers has revised, updated and supplemented his original text, and rewritten and expanded the substantial section of notes. W G Hoskins, the doyen of British local historians, has contributed a Preface to the new edition, and in it he writes: This is a book which should be read by all who are engaged in any form of local history, for it deals with the local community in the round. Every local historian will find some new information, some new insight in these far-reaching pages ' .