Strong Women of Victorian Manchester

Annie Horniman was a local celebrity, occultist and pioneer of the British repertory theatre movement. She leased the Midlands hotel as a 1000-seat theatre company for a trial season in the early 1900s. Following great success, she used £25,000 of her family’s packet tea forture to purchase Manchester’s Gaiety Theatre in 1908, with the intent of bringing classics and new locally written plays to the working-class audience. Horiman is noted for her celebrity status, extrovert behaviour, eccentric style of dress, heavy smoking and interest in astrology. She was a member of an occult group called the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and was noted for her daily use of tarot card readings. She embraced her love for the theatre, despite the disapproval of her wealthy family and actively shunned restrictive Victorian values.

Voice Acting by Roisin O'Callaghan Written & Produced by Ellie Andrews

Miss Lala was an expert circus acrobat whose star performance featured being hoisted to the roof of the Gaiety Theatre, Manchester and suspended by her teeth. Born in Poland to a black father and white mother, she began touring in 1867 at age 9 and became reputable for her flying trapeze and human cannon act. Lala’s African and European ancestry were regularly exploted to create mystery and reinforce so called ‘exoticism’ in order to increase ticket sales. At the age of 21, she became of the muse of French impressionist Edgar Degas’s painting ‘Miss La La at the Cirque Fernando’. Despite quitting the circus in 1888, her legacy still lives on and the painting of her hangs high today, just like she did, as part of the collection at the National Gallery London.

Voice Acting by Imogen Jacobs Written & Produced by Ellie Andrews

Born into a working-class family near Oldham in 1879, Annie Kenney was the fifth of eleven children. From the age of 10, she divided her time between school and work in a local cotton mill. In 1905, she attended a meeting in Oldham hosted by Christabel Pankhurst, who inspired Annie with her charismatic speech on women and voting rights. Shortly after, she joined the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), where she become one of the only working-class activists among the organisation’s senior leadership. Annie is noted for having several romantic relationships with women, including Christabel Pankhurst herself. Together they attended a rally here at the Free Trade Hall and interupt Sir Edward Grey to shout "Will the Liberal Government give votes to women?". They were shortly charged for assault after resisting arrest and spitting at police officers in protest.

Voice Recording by Emma Hodge & Tilly-Jay Hodge Written & Produced by Ellie Andrews

Perhaps best known as the lifelong partner of German philosopher, Friedrich Engels, Mary was a working-class Irish woman who is thought to have grown up in the Deansgate area. Whilst few details remain about her life, her impact on some of Engel’s major works are clear. She met Engels during his first stay in Manchester and is thought to have guided him through the worst districts in the region for his research on ‘The Condition of the Working Class in England’. After the German revolution, Engels returned to England where they set up a formal home arrangement together, where they remained for 20 years. Burns died suddenly in 1863 at the age of 41, but her impact lives on vicariously through Engels’ seminar work.

Voice Acting by Jessica Symons Written and Produced by Ellie Andrews

Born into a merchant family in Cuba, Enriqueta was raised and educated across New York, London and Paris. She arrived in Manchester in early 1860, where she befriended a woman called Martha, the wife of a wealthy Manchester merchant John Rylands. After Martha’s death, the young Enriqueta, married John, then aged 74. Together they adopted two children. When John passed away, Enriqueta was named as the inheritor of most of his fortune and became a major shareholder in his businesses. She founded the John Rylands Library in memory of her husband, which was inaugurated in 1899. Her impact in the community was recognised by many and as a result she was the first woman to be honored with the Freedom of the City of Manchester.

Voice Recording by Emily Bagshaw Written and Produced by Ellie Andrews

Mary Quaile was an Irish trade unionist who grew up in Manchester. Having left school at the age of twelve, she became a domestic servant before working in a café. During this time, she met future Labour politician, Margaret Bondfield, who inspired Quaile to encourage catering workers in the city to unionize. As a result, she was appointed as Organising Secretary of the Manchester Women’s Trade Union Council (MWTUC) and participated in 100s meetings here in Albert Square. She would later go on to lead a women’s TUC delegation to the Soviet Union and was engaged on the Women’s Advisory Committee of the International Federation of Trade Unionists, where she championed better pay, improved working conditions and gender equality for all.

Voice Acting by Ellie Andrews Written and Produced by Ellie Andrews

African American lecturer and abolitionist Sarah Parker Remond was born free in Massachusetts 1826, and became known as an agent of the American Anti Slavery Society. As an international activist for human rights and women’s suffrage, she made her first speech against slavery when she was 16 years old. In 1859 she came to Lancashire to appeal to mill owners and cotton workers to support the US anti-slavery movement. She later spoke at a meeting presided over by the Mayor in the Manchester Athenaeum on the subject, where she delivered this incredible speech.

Voice Acting by Morgan Busow Written and Produced by Ellie Andrews

A passionate pro-democracy and anti-poverty protestor, Martha Partington was one of approximately eighteen victims of the Peterloo Massacre. On the 16th of August 1819, the mother-of-two marched from her home in King Street, Eccles to St Peter’s Field to support the Anti-Corn Laws movement.However, she sadly died whilst fleeing the scenes, having either been thrown or fallen into a cellar on Bridge Street. Her husband and children were reportedly awarded just £5 in relief. The Peterloo Massacre resulted in over 700 serious injuries and remains a dark day in the city’s history. Whilst there were less women than men present at Peterloo, a disproportionate amount of women were either attacked or injured, serving as a reminder of the brutality women faced for a cause they believed in.

Written and Produced by Ellie Andrews