‘IF SOMEHOW the tradition of thrift and caution of the past can be married to the tradition and enterprise of youth, Bradford could have a great future.’

In his latest book, author Colin Speakman looks forward optimistically to the role Bradford will play as the world undergoes major changes both globally and locally.

Colin, of Burley-in-Wharfedale, writes of Bradford - demographically one of the youngest cities in Britain in terms of the average age of its population - as ‘becoming an increasingly attractive place to live and work, ‘especially in a new greener, post-Covid economy.’

‘Yorkshire Ancient Nation, Future Province’ examines the region as a whole, looking at this ‘nation within a nation’ from its history to its landscape, economy, industry, culture and dialect.

It asks questions as to the future of Yorkshire, which for almost a century before the Norman Conquest, was an independent Anglo Viking kingdom, divided for administrative purposes into three ancient ‘thridings’ or ‘ridings’ of East, North and West, which survived for more than 1,000 years until abolished in local government changes in 1974.

Dissecting the regions and settlements therein, the book - with a foreword from the newly elected Mayor of West Yorkshire Tracy Brabin - devotes a chapter to Bradford, its development and the individuals who helped to shape it.

‘Pity poor Bradford’, are the words he uses to introduce the city, referring of course not to Bradford in its present guise - as the vibrant, up-and-coming city bids to be UK City of Culture 2025 - but the words supposedly uttered by a ghostly lady in a dream to the Earl of Newcastle as he slept in Bolling Hall on July 3, 1643.

The frightening vision came to him as his Royalist troops pillaged and ravaged the then small town which had supported the Parliamentarians. The Parliamentary forces, under Fairfax and Cromwell ultimately won.

The book, which was launched at the University of Bradford where in 1997 Colin was awarded an honorary doctorate, documents Bradford’s growth following the opening of the Leeds-Liverpool Canal, its role as the hub of the UK’s textile industry and later rise as centre of banking.

It honours the contribution made by sons of the city, from industrialists such as Samuel Cunliffe Lister and Titus Salt, and by the workers who grafted hard in the mills, coming to West Yorkshire from the Indian subcontinent.

‘Cultural activity in the city has been hugely enriched by its diversity’, writes Colin, of present-day Bradford.

The city’s role as a hub of creative talent, producing the likes of JB Priestley, John Braine and Andrea Dunbar, has never waned. The city and its surrounding landscape continues to be the setting for many films and dramas, writes Colin.

This background culminated in 2009 with Bradford becoming the world’s first UNESCO City of Film.

The book recounts events that have shaped the city, including ‘one of worst in tragedies in British sporting history’, the fire at Bradford City’s Valley Parade ground on May 11, 1985, resulting in the death of 56 spectators and injuring at least 265, and the Bradford riots in 2001 sparked by social tensions.

Bradford shares a chapter with Wakefield, Kirklees and Calderdale, which along with the City of Leeds is one of nine 'cultural landscapes of Yorkshire', the others being the South Pennines, the North York Moors and Cleveland, the City of York, the Vale of Mowbray and York, the Yorkshire Wolds, Holderness and Hull, the Forest of Bowland, South Yorkshire and the Yorkshire Dales.

The development of the Yorkshire Dales as a tourist destination is recounted in the book, and the important role played by the railways. In 1849 Sir Titus Salt treated his entire workforce to day trip to Malham, via the railway. ‘Passengers alighted at little Bell Busk Station for the five mile walk to the village,’ writes Colin, who is probably best known as the co-creator alongside the late Tom Wilcock of the popular long-distance walking route the 81-mile Dales Way.

He combines this informative journey around the region with questions as to Yorkshire’s future within Britain as a whole, and the prospect of devolution. “Is there now a distinct possibility that even the four hundred-year-old idea of ‘Britain’... may have to change?”, he asks.

He examines what is meant by being One Yorkshire, the title of the cross-party, cross-sector, cross-regional committee seeking greater powers for Yorkshire. Colin’s book was published with financial support from the committee, which was founded on Yorkshire Day 2018.

Speaking ahead of the book’s launch at the University of Bradford, Colin said: “The book is about devolution but it’s also about Yorkshire, its people, its landscape, its huge strengths and resources.”

*Yorkshire: Ancient Nation, Future Province, by Colin Speakman is published by Gritstone Publishing Cooperative; gritstonecoop.co.uk

*Colin Speakman will be talking with Brian Groom, author of Northerners: A History, From The Ice Age to the Present Day, at a Bradford Literature Festival event chaired by writer Kate Fox on Sunday, June 26 at 7pm to 8pm at Waterstones, The Wool Exchange, Hustlergate, Bradford BD1 1BL