| Description | The Friends Reading Society was founded in 1829 by some of the young members of Bull Street Preparative Meeting and held an important place in the lives of Birmingham Friends for many years. It aimed to ensure that reading material of an informative nature (no novels) was available to all members of the Society of Friends on payment of a small subscription.
Many of Birmingham's prominent Quaker citizens were involved with the Society. The founding members included Edmund Sturge, Joseph Sturge, James Cadbury, Thomas Southall, James Pearson and Edward Bissell. Later members included Arthur Albright, William Lean, Richard Tapper Cadbury, William Southall, John Henry Lloyd, William Adlington Cadbury, Walter Barrow, among others. Although women were allowed as members, none joined until 1832 after the Reading Society undertook a campaign to encourage them to do so. By the time the first annual meeting was held in 1849 at the Cadbury Brothers works in Bridge Street, 200 Friends were in attendance.
The first Reading Society meeting was held at Bull Street Meeting House on Christmas Day 1829. Initially the Society's books were kept in the gallery at the meeting house but from 1856 until 1880, the Society used two rooms in Old Square for its library and meetings. From 1881, the Reading Society had its library and committee room in purpose built accommodation in Dr Johnson Passage, designed by the architect William Doubleday.
The Society's activities were not limited to providing Birmingham's Quakers with books. Edwin Laundy, a Birmingham accountant, and Secretary of the Reading Society from 1842, introduced lectures and discussions on subjects such as poetry, mineralogy, chemistry and geology. Under the Secretaryship of John Henry Lloyd from 1878, other activities included debates, reading aloud, public speaking, reading parts of plays, and critical reading meetings which involved criticism by the audience of the way in which a piece had been read aloud. Alfed J. Cudworth, Robert L. Impey and Arthur Godlee organised performances of plays, and there were talks at which Friends gave accounts of their travels, and annual photographic evenings at which those interested in photography exhibited their slides. In the summer each year there was an excursion which generally incorporated a train journey and a visit to somewhere of historic interest. An annual meeting and soiree was held in the Priory Rooms on the first Tuesday of the New Year, and at the same time, an exhibition of art and other items of interest collected by members or made by local manufacturers was also held.
By the early 20th century, many of these additional activities had ceased, and numbers attending the annual business meeting dwindled, although the annual summer excursion and annual soiree continued to be popular. The Reading Society finally wound up in 1963. |