Our Prominent FPs

In the course of our school’s nearly 780-year history, a substantial number of Former Pupils, both present day and historically, have gone on to become successful in their respective fields and truly made their mark on the world.

One of our themes for this year’s edition of Schola Clara focuses on The Arts, so we thought it would be particularly poignant to shine a spotlight on some of our historical FPs who made an impact through their creative career fields, with a particular focus on journalism.

Here we share a glimpse into the lives of two female and one male journalist, whose experiences and endeavours in the field of journalism differed significantly.

Franziska Maria Isabella Imandt, known as Marie, was born in Dundee in 1860 to a family of partial Prussian decent. Marie’s mother, Anne McKenzie, was a local Scottish woman whilst her father, Peter Imandt, was a Prussian. Her father was nicknamed “Red Wolf” as a young man due to his relationship with the Communist League and the fact that he helped found the German Social Democratic Party. He was also close with renowned Communist philosopher, Karl Marx. Marie’s parents married in 1856 and went on to have three children together before Peter died in 1897.

Peter Imandt taught German at the High School of Dundee, where Marie attended as a pupil. After leaving the School, Marie attended the University of St Andrews where she became the first female to graduate with Honours as a Lady of Literature in Arts (‘LLA’) in German, English and French in 1880. LLA was a distance learning qualification and at the time Marie graduated, men were still graduating and educated in very different ways to women.

Elizabeth Maxwell, more commonly known as Bessie, was over 10 years Marie’s junior and was born in Dundee in 1871 into a family of journalists. Her great-grandfather was the first Editor of newspaper The Peoples’ Choice, and her father had also worked as an Editor as well. Bessie went to the School during her teenage years, where she showcased her talents in the arts in particular. She then attended the University College in Dundee, which was one of the few institutions that accepted female students at the time.

At the age of 27, Marie began working for D.C. Thomson’s newspaper The Courier. What was unusual at the time was that Marie fully supported herself from her own earnings.

Seven years later, Marie was selected as one of two Female Correspondents to spearhead a new project which involved a 12-month adventure around the world to report on the lives of women across the globe. Bessie, who begun working for the newspaper company at the age of just 23, was chosen to join Marie on the quest.

A year prior, The Courier had launched a project which sent male journalists to North America, but the owners of D.C. Thomson acknowledged that the reporting from this project ignored women, and so sought to rectify this by launching the project Imandt and Maxwell were sent on. The duo were described as “not only intrepid, but… shrewd and observant… possessed of undoubted literary ability, and… in complete sympathy with the stupendous task in which they are about to engage.”

They set sail on their travels on February 16th 1894, during which they worked hard and lived well, writing two two-column reports with accompanying sketches every week for The Courier and Weekly News. Some of their reports were even shared across publications in London.

Throughout their travels, Marie and Bessie encountered many difficult situations, one incident in particular Marie recorded in one of her columns. She recalled how she and Bessie had been forced to fight off French and Italian cabbies and porters numerous times, who seemingly targeted British females to steal their belongings unless they were willing to fight or had someone to fight for them.

Their adventures took them to countries across the world, including Egypt, Arabia, India, China, Japan, Canada and the United States. Their columns shared their stories and experiences such as their visits to an Italian cigar factory, a women’s prison in China and a silk factory in Shanghai. The duo also described Florentine art, Japanese temples and a Turkish wedding. Perhaps one of their most harrowing stories related to their travels in the USA and their visit to a working girls’ hostel. Here, they spoke with a female lawyer and numerous British women who had been sent to Seattle as mail-order brides.

In particular, Marie and Bessie were very captivated by the freedoms of North American women, but they made a strong point of contrasting this with the treatment women faced in other areas of the world. For example, the confinement of harems and zenanas and how in China men treated women with contempt. How in Japan, and even European countries such as France and Italy, men appeared to despise women and actively made fun of them. One of their columns refers to how “Life holds possibilities for [Americans and] us undreamed of by our sisters in the East.”

Over the course of their 12-month travels, Marie and Bessie visited 10 countries, covering a tremendous 26,000 miles in the process. Come February 1895, they had returned to Dundee where they were given gold bracelet watches before returning to their jobs. They also gave lectures and presented talks on their experiences.

Bessie continued her work as a journalist, writing articles for publications such as the Weekly News. She famously reported on the working conditions of miners by travelling down into a coal mine in Fife. Marie on the other hand wrote a series called “Where to go for a day out” and worked on a variety of other projects.

Marie never married and died in 1945. She was buried in Barnhill Cemetery in a plot right next to her father. Bessie had relocated to England and married a painter, Arthur Pitt Taylor whom she outlived by several decades. However, Bessie passed away in December 1946, only one year after Marie’s passing.

The McManus Art Gallery & Museum, in the duo’s hometown of Dundee, showcased an exhibition of their worldwide adventures. Likewise, their stories are shared in a book produced by the Abertay Historical Society.

Information sourced from Dundee Women’s Trail: www.dundeewomenstrail.org.uk

Images sourced from The Courier

Former Pupil Henry Noel Brailsforth has been described as “the most prolific British left-wing journalist of the first half of the 20th century”.

Born on Christmas Day 1873 in the Yorkshire town of Mirfield to parents Edward John Brailsford and Clara Pooley, Henry was the first of two children. Despite being born south of the border, he was raised and educated in Scotland as his father was a Wesleyan Methodist preacher who mainly worked in Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Before joining the High School of Dundee, Henry attended George Watson’s College for one year. Throughout his five years at the School, his talents as a Classicist quickly became apparent. In 1890, he was awarded Dux of the School in English and won a scholarship to study at the University of Glasgow.

Whilst at university, Henry studied Classics and Philosophy and was taught by the distinguished scholar Gilbert Murray, who later became a friend and mentor. Graduating in 1894 with his Master of Arts degree, he pursued an academic career in teaching and was employed as an Assistant Lecturer. During his tenure, Henry set up a university branch of the Independent Labour Party, having been inspired by a speech by James Keir Hardie during the 1895 General Election campaign.

Come 1897, he stepped away from his academic career to become a journalist, raising to prominence as a foreign correspondent specialising in the Balkans, France and Egypt. In April of the same year, Henry joined the Philhellenic Legion, a volunteer force fighting for the Greeks in their struggle with Turkey. His time on the battlefields inspired his novel The Broom of the War God. The publication of his novel led to a job offer from C.P Scott, the Editor of the Manchester Guardian. From here, he was tasked with investigating the turmoil in Crete. One day before his departure to Crete, he married his former student Jane Malloch.

His experience fighting on the front lines ignited his distaste for excessive patriotism and the brutality of war. From this stemmed Henry’s opposition to oppression and he became an active campaigner on various issues, with women’s suffrage being a plight he was particularly passionate about. So much so that in 1909, he resigned from his post with The Daily News after it supported the force-feeding of Suffragettes.

By 1899, Henry had relocated to London where he worked for the Morning Leader and then The Daily News, prior to his resignation from the latter. His wife, Jane, was an advocate of women’s suffrage and joined Emmeline Pankhurst’s Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1906. Whilst Jane supported and took part in acts of violence to protest against the use of forcible feeding on suffragettes, Henry disagreed with such militant tactics. However, he strongly believed that women should have the right to vote and so, along with 41 others, he formed The Men’s League for Women’s Suffrage in 1907. An active Labour Party supporter, Henry was one of two representatives of the National Union of Suffrage Societies who entered into negotiations with the Party after it passed a resolution committing itself to supporting women’s suffrage.

Henry separated from his wife Jane in May 1913, but they later reconciled in 1914, although they held strongly opposing views about the First World War. Whereas Jane was a patriotic supporter of the war effort, Henry was not and was a member of the Union of Democratic Control. They later separated for a final time, although did not divorce, in 1921. He campaigned to be elected as the Labour candidate for Montrose Burghs in the 1918 General Election but wasn’t successful. Instead, he toured Europe recording the tragic suffering being endured by people living in the defeated countries. He was one of the major critics of the Versailles Treaty, warning that unless renegotiated it would lead to an increase of German militarism and risk a future war.

Developing an interest in the Russian Revolution, Henry was impressed by the Soviets’ economic achievements attained through their communist regime. However, he criticised communism for its lack of freedom and suppression of dissent.

By 1922 Henry was appointed as Editor of The New Leader, which was the newspaper of the Independent Labour Party (ILP) that quickly became known as one of the most successful and radical of its time. He employed an array of talented writers including George Bernard Shaw and H.G. Wells, with each issue containing illustrated articles about politics and culture. He lost his role as Editor after Henry’s attacks on the Labour Party’s moderate, non-socialist policies were viewed as too radical and upset many Labour Party leaders. However, he did continue to write for the publication until he left the ILP.

Following the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, Henry was outspoken with his opinions that an anti-fascist alliance was essential. The defeat of the Republicans convinced him that only military resistance to Adolf Hitler would halt the expansion of Fascism. In January 1937, he agreed to write for the radical weekly publication The Tribune, which openly advocated for vigorous socialism and demanded resistance to Fascism at home and abroad. He publicly denounced the Munich Agreement, which was one of the strongest and most powerful indictments to appear in British press.

Having published many books throughout his life, Henry continued to be active in politics into the later stages of his life. During the Second World War, Henry wrote for the New Statesman and broadcasted for the BBC Overseas Service.

Outside of his career, Henry was a well-known advocate for animal rights and was a vegetarian. He defended the practice of vegetarianism in The Daily News, openly opposed blood sports and published several essays which alluded to his friendships with cats.

After the death of his first wife, Jane, in 1937, Henry went on to remarry twice more but fathered no children. He passed away in March 1958 in London.

Content sourced from: Spartacus Educational: spartacuseducational.com/Jbrailsford.htm and Wikipedia: en.wikipedia. org/wiki/H._N._Brailsford

Images sourced from: University of Wisconsin Milwaukee Library and Spartacus Educational