Speakers

• 

  Catherine Sampson MSc
  

  Catherine Sampson MSc

  Catherine is a veteran family historian. Her own family history research is mainly concentrated in East Anglia and the North-East.

  She loves history across all periods, both the very early and the more modern. She is a keen social historian and regularly gives talks across Berkshire and the surrounding counties.

  Catherine is Chairman and Projects Coordinator for Berkshire Family History, and a former chairman of Project Purley, Purley’s local history society. She has published several histories of her own family and in 2010 edited “Purley in Old Images”. She is currently working on a new book on the history of Purley’s River Estate.

• 

  Vanessa Chappell
  

  Vanessa Chappell

  Vanessa has been a member of the society since 2006 and is currently society Secretary. She was the Chair of the Abingdon Branch for many years and is still an active committee member and also volunteers at our Research Zone assisting visitors with their research.

  Vanessa has lived in Abingdon and been married to Duncan for 30 years and has two grown up children. When not researching her own ancestry in Wales, Birmingham, Gloucestershire and Bedfordshire, or her husband’s Scottish roots, she enjoys creative paper-crafting and working in her garden. Vanessa also helps in her husband’s music business ‘Big Ginger Tom Music’, which promotes live acoustic music and she can be found behind the bar in Harwell Village Hall on gig nights!