cads.2la@gmail.com
Talks
1. Similarities between the Confederate warship CSS Alabama and Captain Nemo’s Nautilus in Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
2. How the Wirral Peninsula became the literary template for Jules Verne’s novel Mysterious Island.
3. How Birkenhead’s Bidston Hill became the literary inspiration for four major novels.
4. Did Robert Louis Stevenson set his 1883 novel Treasure Island on the Wirral? Is Mother Redcaps the Admiral Benbow Inn and is Bidston Hill the 'Spy Glass Hill'?
5. Birkenhead’s considerable role in the American Civil War, the involvement of the Royal Mersey Yacht Club, the first shots, the CSS Alabama, the Laird Rams, the final surrender and the Confederate haven.
6. President Theodore Roosevelt and President Franklin D Roosevelt, their close links to Birkenhead and Wirral, from the construction of the CSS Alabama, the relationship with Thomas Ismay and James Dunwoody Bulloch to Birkenhead’s Mary Roosevelt and her present-day role in protecting the legacy of her father in law - President Franklin D Roosevelt. .
7. Liverpool’s Unheralded Major Role in the Abolition of Slavery. The story of the Cropper Family of Dingle Bank.
My website ‘Jules Verne and the Heroes of Birkenhead’ can be found here.
Jules Verne – Just another WordPress site (julesverneandtheheroesofbirkenhead.co.uk)
I am a former geography teacher born in Birkenhead. My website ‘Jules Verne and the Heroes of Birkenhead’ celebrates the new found literary links between Jules Verne (the world’s second most translated author) and the Wirral Peninsula. Verne mentions Birkenhead and the town’s Lairds shipyard in ten of his fifty-six novels and there are major links with James Dunwoody Bulloch of the extended Roosevelt family who commissioned the CSS Alabama in Birkenhead. Bulloch was the uncle of President Theodore Roosevelt and great uncle of Eleanor Roosevelt, the wife of President Franklin D Roosevelt.
I offer seven talks, not all to do with Verne. I usually charge £50 for a 1 or 1 ½ hour talk, or for free if talks are not usually remunerated. I usually ‘customise’ each talk depending upon where on the Wirral it is given.
Testimonials
I have no hesitation in recommending John Lamb for his great work on this subject that adds to the heritage tourism portfolio of Merseyside. - Councillor Jerry Williams - Wirral Heritage Champion.
Remarkable findings - Stephen Guy Historian Radio Merseyside.
‘How interesting that Jules Verne should have explicitly placed the construction of Captain Nemo's Nautilus in Laird's shipyard of Birkenhead. Thankyou for telling me about this.’ – Sir David Attenborough
‘Astonishing Links between the CSS Alabama and Captain Nemo's Nautilus’ – Jimmy McGovern
‘A gripping story’ Gyles Brandreth
'Fascinating and important' - Dr Richard Benjamin former Head of the International Slavery Museum 2006-2022
'Absolutely fascinating' - Mary Roosevelt, Birkenhead born daughter in law of President Franklin D Roosevelt.