Updated October 2025
Another in a succession of women who gave a great deal to the Association was
Rachel Fleming. She was a great support to
H J Fleure when the library and GA Offices moved to Aberystwyth and was his Assistant.
She was mentioned in Fleure's own entry on the blog as someone who supported his work and kept the library running smoothly at a time of great demand for its contents.
She did however get involved in some problematic work which is detailed later in this entry.
Update - October 2025
I was contacted by Vas who had located a letter for sale on eBay which was part of Aberystwyth's history.
The letter for sale was shown on the post and is included below:
It was sent in April 1921 to a Miss D M A Dickinson, who was it seems teaching at Rugby School, but had presumably paid for herself and a colleague to go on a GA organised trip to Guernsey of some kind, and is advising her to book boats and rooms for the trip.
It's lovely to see the handwriting of someone from over 100 years ago.
Miss Fleming is well known among teachers for
her skill in using folk tales to impart a general knowledge of history and geography to children.
This sounds interesting.
Assistant to Professor H.J. Fleure at Aberystwyth, Miss R.M. Fleming, who had conducted research on 'half-castes' in Britain
This sounds... inappropriate... to modern geographers for certain... and very problematic. The link with eugenics is particularly troubling.
Aspinall, P. and Caballero, C. (2021) Rachel Fleming’s Anthropometric Study. The Mixed Museum.
Rachel Mary Fleming is one of the category of people who are often invisible even in institutional histories, one of those who do their work with quiet devotion.
Text from some source which has been added to the Wiki entry:
"The work of the Geographical Association is still expanding rapidly, and we are all, as usual, deeply indebted to Miss R. M. Fleming, who, though without any official connection with the College, gives endless time to students to help them with problems and difficulties. It is therefore a special pleasure to state that this has been a year of very marked personal success for Miss Fleming, whose work has so long merited greater recognition. Her papers to the British Association at Edinburgh have appeared, one in the "Scottish Geographical Magazine " (Geography and Tradition), and one in "Man" (Sex and Growth Characters in delation to Race Study).
The latter was the subject of an evening lecture by Miss Fleming at the Royal Anthropological Institute.
In addition to this Miss Fleming's book, "Ancient Tales from Many Lands" (1922), has had a quite unusually good reception, and has sold very rapidly
I hope it may influence not only educational methods, but anthropological research as well.
This book is still available in reprinted versions.
Miss Fleming adds in an appendix three essays in which she expounds her philosophy of the use of the folk-tale in education and the principles of selection. If any further indication were needed of the thought, wide reading, and experience which have been laid under contribution in the making of this book, it would be afforded by these essays.
Finally Miss Fleming has been invited to become one of the Secretaries of Section H (Anthropology) of the British Association.
She has been President of the local branch of the Geographical Association during the current session.
Other publications
"The new geography". Times Educational supplement, 1920 - would be interesting to find this...Fleming, Rachel M. 1933 A Study of Growth and Development: Observations in Successive Years on the Same Children. With a statistical analysis by W. J. Martin. Report to the Medical Research Council. London: is Majesty’s Stationary Office, Code No. 45-5-90
