My CV
PROFESSIONAL ​EXPERIENCE
I have a PhD, MA with distinction and BA (first class), all in the history of science, technology and medicine. I have specialised in nineteenth and early-twentieth century British history. During my academic career I studied the history of the reproductive sciences, in particular physiology, endocrinology, embryology and animal breeding. From the last, I began researching the history of agriculture and from there moved into landscape history.
Alongside my historical research, I am an experienced archivist, having worked for the Museum of Science and Industry, Manchester; the Exmoor Society; the Dartmoor Preservation Association and Exmoor National Park Authority. I am happy to take on the cataloguing of your collection from scratch, or to build on your existing work.
History is a vast early warning system.
~Norman Cousins
Select CV
2014–2018​
Archivist, Exmoor Society
I began working for the Exmoor Society in March 2014. With the help of a team of volunteers, I transformed the Society's archive collection from a higgledy-piggledy free-for-all into an ordered resource centre. In addition to the archive duties, I undertook research, produced publications and liaised with the press. See the Portfolio page for more details.
2012
Freelance writer
My main project was writing the history of the Rolle family of Devon, commissioned by Clinton Devon Estates.
2007 and 2011
Archivist and research fellow
In 2007 I worked for the Centre for Rural Policy Research, Exeter University on a three-month, British Academy funded project to catalogue and archive the Centre's Farm Business Survey records which date back to the 1930s. In 2011, I returned to the CRPR to work on the archive as part of an ESRC-funded project into technological change in twentieth-century agriculture.
2001–2004
Wellcome Trust research fellow, Cambridge University
Three-year contract, researching the history of embryology, specifically the Cambridge school of animal morphology, 1875–1919, and the role of zoology in medical education.
Education
1997–2001​
Manchester University
PhD entitled, ‘Women, savages and other animals: The comparative physiology of reproduction, 1850–1914’, Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine.
1996–1997​
Manchester University
MA (econ.) with distinction in the History and Social Anthropology of Science, Technology and Medicine, CHSTM and the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, and the Department of Social Anthropology.
Leeds University
1991–1994
Joint honours BA in History and the History and Philosophy of Science with first class honours. I was awarded the John Le Patourel Prize for the best piece of original historical research by an undergraduate for my dissertation, 'The first political scientist: Hobbes's scientific rationale of politics'.