News and events from The Sparrows' Nest.
We recently had a request from the London Anarchist Bookfair to solve a mystery concerning when the first such event took place and where it was held. Long-term memories varied and the Bookfair collective were presented with various accounts, so they sought hard evidence from our newly acquired Freedom archive.
We would like to say thank you for a most generous donation of books and papers/magazines given to us by the sister and friends of the late Ray Gosling (1939-2013).
Keith Leonard was a co-founder of Mushroom Bookshop, Nottingham's alternative and radical bookshop (which served hippies, activists and other malcontents between 1972-2000). He sadly died at Nottingham QMC on August 7th 2009 from heart problems, after years of living with disability.
Keith was born in Kent and studied maths at Cambridge. But in 1972, after a spell as a landscape gardener, he set up Mushroom with his then partner (now a Sparrows’ Nest Collective member).
Yes, we can't believe it ourselves!
We held celebrations at the Nest on 21st Dec - it was good to get together and think about all the achievements since the opening and think forward to the next 5 years!
Check out this interview by a Sparrow, printed in the latest bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library.
There is also an article in the December issue of Freedom newspaper.
Please note, the latter link is no longer working (updated January 2017).