Our Story, Changing Lives

Our story; sharing the details of Robert’s life with others – is all about INCLUSIVE history and artistic expression – and NOT about history as presented ‘top-down’ by those who have the benefits of wealth and formal education.   We are growing a new way of working born from the grassroots and used by local people in order to broker peace and greater understanding between communities.

This project will demonstrate that 120 years ago, a brave and principled man from a humble, northern, working class background decided to become a Muslim. He entered a new, foreign land of thought, religious and political discussion. But in many ways – at the age of 69 – this decision completed a lifetime’s journey for him. And he never neglected his devotion to local civic life and to his own family.

Robert died in 1911. His family didn’t seem to want to remember that he had been one of the first white recorded coverts to Islam in the British Isles. A century had to pass after his conversion, before his own Great Great Grandson discovered this unusual secret.

So, why the secrecy? The denial?  Our project and our books ‘His Own Man’  and ‘Imagining Robert’ explain our theories and in doing so, we hope to normalise the history of Islam in the Britain. We aim to encourage both Muslims and non-Muslims to enter into discussion together; to generate new friendships under the banner of shared local history, social landscape and of the generosity and benevolence of human nature and neighbourliness.