About this episode

The episode explores the history of guidebooks for fell-walking in the Lake District with Dr Liz Woodham.

...in which we climb Walla Crag in the company of academic and Back o’ Skidda’ resident Dr Liz Woodham for a deep dive into the history of guidebooks dedicated to fell-walking in Lakeland. Striding out from Surprise View, we set the historic context for the emergence of the walking guidebook – the earliest travellers seeking low-level views from Thomas West’s formative Guide to the Lakes (1778), and the use of paid mountain guides, often shepherds, taking well-heeled visitors on mountain adventures. ‘Roving Laker’ Harriet Martineau’s Complete Guide to the English Lakes(1855) was among the first to speak to fell-walkers, Liz tells us, with an ascent description of Fairfield that was – like the woman herself – quietly revolutionary. On the long climb of Cat Gill we discuss the forgotten Victorian colossus of Keswick, Henry Irwin Jenkinson, who compiled the most authoritative guide of its era, his Practical Guide to the English Lake District (1872), in just seven winter months (he would go on to consult on mountain rescues, and organise the Latrigg Fell Mass Trespass of 1887). Entering the age of M. J. B. Baddeley, we turn to his evergreen (tiny type) Thorough Guide to The English…

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