Top award for historian
12 June 2009
Whitby Gazette
Whitby historian Christiane Kroebel has gained a top award for the quality of her research and publication. Christiane, who lives in Sandsend and is a volunteer helper at Whitby Museum, was presented with her award at the annual Local History Day held by the British Association for Local History in London.
Each year the association selects five winning articles from all those published in the journals sent to the reviews editor of its journal, The Local Historian.
Christiane’s article entitled A Hypothesis on the Origins of St Oswald’s Church and Lythe Parish, 650-1100, published in the Transactions of the Scarborough Archaeological and Historical Society, was highly praised by Dr Alan Crosby, editor of The Local Historian, not least because of her use of difficult primary sources.
Keith Johnston, editor of the Transactions, who also attended the Local History Day, said: “It’s a great honour for Christiane and for the Scarborough Archaeological and Historical Society.
“The five articles selected for awards are chosen from a total of more than 200 published each year by local history societies throughout Great Britain. It was also good to hear Dr Crosby praise the high standards of the society’s Transactions.”
Christiane said: “I’m a librarian and historian, having studied history and library science in the United States in Washington DC, where I lived and worked for 15 years. After two years in Zimbabwe at a United Nations project at the Geological Survey, I came to London, where I had a temporary job with the Royal Society of Chemistry. London was too big and I took a job as librarian for a chemical company on Teesside. I left the company 11 years ago to study at Durham University for a MA in Anglo-Saxon history, which I obtained in 2003 having had a baby in 1999. Living in Sandsend, it was obvious to start volunteering at the Lit and Phil and I became honorary librarian and archivist in 2000”.