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Girton College Fire Brigade, 1901 (image via Science Museum) Who were our five main characters in real life? Did Girton College students really create their own Fire Brigade? Which discoveries from our research have made it into the show? What shapes our approach to writing a musical based on real people and events from history?…
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Girton College Fire Brigade, 1880. Hertha is on the left, holding a bucket. (image via Physics World) Towards the end of the October term of 1878, two Girton students watched a haystack burn to the ground in a nearby field. Together, they wondered what terrible price would be paid by the College and its students…
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One of the central driving forces behind our version of the show’s main character, Hertha, is her powerful sense of justice. She has to do the right thing, whatever the cost. First she feels compelled to form a Fire Brigade, then later in the show she starts a campaign for women at Cambridge to be…
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Fighting fires, smashing the patriarchy and studying hard for a degree they won’t even earn. Our intrepid band of firefighters were a busy gang. But amongst all their studies and drills, they also found time for fun – and one of the many activities they enjoyed was singing. Many of the fire brigade were members…
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Our characters decide to start their own fire brigade – but, how do you do that? Nowadays, the answer would be simple (youtube), but in the late 19th century information was harder to come by. The real Hertha Ayrton solved this problem by going to an expert – Captain Eyre Massey Shaw. Born in Cork,…
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Some exciting news from Fire Brigade HQ! We’ve been awarded a generous grant by the Institute of Physics Public Engagement team. Their support means we can run a series of free “Family Physics Singalong” workshops during the summer of 2026. The workshops will sit alongside our very first concert performances of the show, at three…
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Ethel’s own microscope, held at the Lawrence Room, Girton College’s Museum. For updates on future performances, subscribe to our mailing list or follow us on Instagram and Facebook Earlier this year I was asked to write an article for The Linnean Society’s membership magazine, after spending time in their fascinating archives researching one of our…
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Hertha Ayrton Year, aka 2026, has started strong. After months of form-filling, extended arguments with helpdesks, and support from many and various techie types, we have finally convinced Google Maps to put Hertha Ayrton on the map! This mission started last year, when we realised that Hertha’s blue plaque was incorrectly named on Google Maps.…
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Today, we handed in a full first draft of “The Cambridge First All-Ladies Fire Brigade” to the Musical Theatre undergraduates at The University of Lincoln, and their brilliant programme leader and director Clare Chandler. Cue epic celebrations! Before they start workshopping it, and we start rewriting it… This seems like a good day to throw…
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A few days ago we got an email from Dr Ricky Carvel at the University of Edinburgh. He told us that a teaching room in the School of Engineering’s brand spanking new building has been named after Hertha Ayrton – physicist, inventor, suffrage campaigner, Marie Curie’s penpal, and the main character in our show. The…
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Annie Maunder with the solar camera she invented at a 1900 eclipse in Algiers, taken by her stepdaughter Edith – and her photograph of the sun’s corona taken during a 1901 eclipse in Mauritius. Today is astronomer Annie Maunder’s Birthday. Born as Annie Scott Dill Russell in 1868 in Strabane, County Tyrone – now part…
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While researching Hertha Ayrton for The Cambridge First All-Ladies Fire Brigade, we’ve uncovered dozens of places, buildings, artworks, streets, awards, fellowships – and more – that have been named after or inspired by her. So we’ve created a map to collect together everything we can find today that reflects Hertha’s life and legacy, and the…
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Girton College Fire Brigade in 1889. Image courtesy of the Mistress and Fellows of Girton College, Cambridge Click here to read this wonderful article by journalist Katy Prickett of BBC Online Cambridgeshire, all about our musical and the real women of STEM history who inspired it! We’ve been totally overwhelmed by the response to Katy’s…
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Our first student production, performed by University of Lincoln undergraduates at Lincoln Arts Centre, May 2026. All photos by Brian Sayle. It’s been an extraordinary weekend, watching a full production of our musical by student performers, stage managers, designers and theatre technicians, all studying at University of Lincoln. Over Spring term 2026 they took Hertha…
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We are excited to present our first guest expert Fire Brigade blog! It’s all about Charlotte Angas Scott, who studied at Girton in the same year as Hertha Ayrton (née Marks) before going on to carve out her own international career in Mathematics. In our musical, Charlotte starts out at Cambridge as a rule-following, mathematics-obsessed…