(Simon Camper / Lumen Photography)

7.30 pm Friday September 12th 2025

David is renowned as a brilliant speaker and story-teller and makes a much-anticipated return to the Talks

A former Curator of Timekeeping at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, he has spoken previously on several aspects of time. For his latest Talk, David has moved away from time and will be telling the amazing story of the race to make the first non-stop flight across the Atlantic.

In his sensational new book, The Big Hop, David details how, in Newfoundland in 1919, an unwieldy aircraft, buffeted by winds, struggled to take to the air. Cramped side by side in its open cockpit were two men, freezing cold, but resolute. They had a dream - to be the first in human history to fly, non-stop, across the Atlantic Ocean. But there were three other teams competing against them in the race

The young aviators who would get off the ground had already defied death many times during World War One but David’s evocative account shows how it was their thrilling wartime experiences that ultimately led them to the "Big Hop" and brought old friends together for one more daring adventure.

These Atlantic pioneers were not scientists or upper-class officers. They were ordinary men, risking their lives in the name of progress, who ultimately ushered in the age of global connection in which we live now.

Some of the stellar reviews of The Big Hop:

“An engrossing account … a delectable serving of escapist nostalgia, a heroic adventure story perfect for a time when genuine heroes are few … This book was a joy to read” - The Times (Book of the Week)

“A glorious romp through an overlooked part of aviation history, stuffed full of intriguing characters and white-knuckle courage” - Sunday Times

“A true-life thriller … the accumulating tension of a whodunnit … The Big Hop reminded me of a John Buchan novel. Rooney has Buchan’s knack for acute imagery … and for spare, compelling action scenes" - The Observer

“I haven’t been under the spell of a book about dangerous journeys since reading David Grann’s spectacular The Wager … Rooney comes into his own as a master of suspense … a sure-footed combination of technical detail, lively characterisation and artful narrative structure that keeps the tension going until the final pages … a splendid book” - Literary Review

David took up a traineeship in 1995 at the Science Museum, where he first encountered the aeroplane that completed the Big Hop in 1919. Over an almost thirty-year career, David has curated timekeeping, transport and engineering collections at institutions from the National Maritime Museum to the Science Museum, bringing historical stories vividly alive.

"It is 30 years since I first walked beneath the canvas wings of an ungainly biplane and wondered what must have possessed two young men to fly it across the Atlantic. Writing this book is my way of paying tribute to the pioneers of aviation – men and women from all walks of life – who risked everything: for freedom, for progress - and for us"

If you are interested in attending this talk or would like to reserve a ticket please Contact us

Children over 16 welcome. Entry to the event in St Mary's Church, with an upgraded sound-system, is £10 in cash and includes free food, featuring delicious sandwiches and sumptuous rocky-roads., with wine and soft drinks available for a modest donation (all profits to Ukraine).

 Cards can be used to buy copies of The Big Hop.

Photo - Alex Chisholm

7.30 pm Friday October 10th 2025

Harriet is a leading tree scientist and was formerly based at the Tree Council where she helped research on tree diseases and city tree strategies. Before joining this sector, Harriet worked in landmine clearance in the Middle East and is a trustee of the Iraqi environmental charity, Hasar

Harriet will be talking about her widely-praised book, The Genius of Trees, which one reviewer described as a mesmerising global story which shows how trees have learned to use the soil, air, water, plants, fungi, fire, animals and people around them to shape our world - possessing powers beyond anything we might have imagined.

From oaks growing in Devon and Amedi in Iraq - to the laurel rainforests of the Canary Islands, metasequoias in California and fossil forests preserved from hundreds of millions of years ago, trees not only farm the landscape in which they grow, but also manipulate the fundamental elements, other species (and even humans) to achieve their ends.

Leading scientists claim The Genius of Trees restores trees to their rightful position - not as victims of our negligence but as ingenious, stunningly inventive agents in a grand ecological narrative. Some have been using fire as a reproductive tool since prehistoric times - others have gone to extraordinary lengths to make sure their fruits reach large primates, who can spread their seeds over vast distances, while poisoning smaller and less useful mammals. Harriet adds that some trees can split solid rock and create fertile ground in barren landscapes, effectively building entire ecosystems from scratch. There are countless inventive and astonishing ways trees sculpt and even master their environment - and Harriet will explain the science of how they achieve these feats. One reviewer added that The Genius of Trees is a remarkable journey into the inner lives of nature’s most powerful plant - presented in a profoundly original way of understanding both the miracles trees perform and the glories of our natural world.

Harriet has worked with Robin Lane Fox, the FT's Gardening Correspondent for 40 years, who has appeared twice at the Wootton Talks. In one column, Robin wrote about their expedition to find crocus banaticus, the iris-flowered crocus which has three big outer petals.

"I first discovered its distinctive beauty in the Bulletin of the Alpine Garden Society, that seminal influence on the prose-style of the great travel writer Norman Lewis, as he once told me in his sitting room in Essex. About 40 years later, the same crocus was discovered in the same bulletin by Harriet Rix in Devon, my indomitable companion on our ride last year into the high floral meadows of Kyrgyzstan. While we put brave faces on the mountain storms, we discovered a shared love of this crocus and pledged in mares’ milk to find it in its Romanian home. She, not I, realised that it overlaps there with Patrick Leigh Fermor’s Between The Woods and The Water, the immortal tale of his walk from London to Istanbul. In summer 1934, the 19-year-old Leigh Fermor trod above our crocus, dormant in the Transylvanian grass, while he eloped with high-spirited Angéla, one of those “times when hours are more precious than diamonds”.

If you are interested in attending this talk or would like to reserve a ticket please Contact us

Children over 16 welcome. Entry to the event in St Mary's Church, with an upgraded sound-system, is £10 in cash and includes free food, featuring delicious sandwiches and sumptuous rocky-roads., with wine and soft drinks available for a modest donation (all profits to Ukraine).

7.30 pm Friday November 7th 2025

Tom is one of the country's leading environmental writers and broadcasters - often featuring on BBC One's Countryfile, specialising in investigations; Radio 4's Costing the Earth, as well as the anchor on The Climate Show on Sky News. He has also worked on the Today programme and presented editions of Panorama covering food, energy and the environment

Tom is also the presenter of Radio 4's new Rare Earth series and was the creator and presenter of BBC Radio's flagship climate-change podcast, 39 Ways to Save the Planet

Tom was the first Rural Affairs Correspondent for BBC News and reported for the BBC live from the Khumbu Icefall on Mount Everest with the broadcasting team covering the 50th anniversary of the summitting of the mountain. After making early contributions to Countryfile, he took over the investigative-reporter role on the programme from John Craven

For his appearance in Wootton, Tom will be talking about his latest book, Land Smart - in which he discusses how we require land for so many of our expanding needs, such as food, renewable energy, carbon storage and housing. Traditionally, says Tom, we've stolen it from Nature, but this has led to a mounting toll of extinction and pollution that is now punishing us. So, as there's no land left to take, Tom asks - how do we get more from the same space?

For Land Smart, Tom toured the British countryside meeting the farmers, scientists, conservationists and even warehouse managers who are solving the most pressing challenges facing our countryside and the world. Tom claims that if we use land cleverly it can give both humanity and Nature the space to thrive on the same planet. If not, we're in trouble.

If you are interested in attending this talk or would like to reserve a ticket please Contact us

(Children over 16 welcome) Entry is £10 in cash and includes free food, featuring delicious sandwiches and sumptuous rocky-roads., with wine and soft drinks available for a modest donation