Ruth Frow
The death of Ruth Frow is a sad blow for the North West Labour History Group. Ruth attended the inaugural meeting of the Group in 1973 and was a Committee member from then until her untimely death. Her contribution to our meetings, which she rarely missed, was immense. Her great knowledge of the history of the working class and her many contacts throughout the world were of immense importance in our Group’s progress and development.
She will of course be primarily remembered for the creation, with her late husband Eddie, of the Working Class Movement Library. It was first established in their home in Old Trafford, Manchester and the North West Labour History Group held many meetings there. It was a pleasurable venue, surrounded by books of the labour movement and, as always, the Group was made welcome with Ruth’s famous cakes and tea. When the Library was relocated to 51 The Crescent, Salford, Ruth and Eddie continued to host the Group’s meetings. Unquestionably the Working Class Movement Library is now a major library institution and will, like Eddie’s, be Ruth’s lasting monument.
Ruth was a woman of fierce loyalties. A strong feminist, she never allowed us to overlook the importance of women in the working-class struggle. She was an incisive writer and, like Eddie, a keen researcher and excellent labour historian in her own right. As can be seen from the range of the publications with which she was associated, she made a major contibution to the labour history of the North West.
She was devoted to our Group and her charm and kindness to us all will be long remembered. It has been a privilege to have known her for so many years. Though I mourn her passing, I celebrate her life of devotion to the cause of the working class.
Eric Taplin
Chair North West Labour History Group 1973-2001
Selected Publications by Ruth and Edmund Frow
The Half-time System in Education
To Make that Future - Now!: a history of the Manchester and Salford Trades Council
And the New Paths are Begun!: a history of Manchester and Salford Trades Council, Vol. II (Jim Arnison and Edmund & Ruth Frow)
Politics of Hope
Political Women
Engineering Struggles
The General Strike in Salford in 1911
Essays on the Irish in Manchester
The Battle of Bexley Square
Radical and Red Poets and Poetry
Frederick Engels in Manchester and ‘The Condition of the Working Class in England’ in 1844
Essays in Insurrection
Greater Manchester men who fought in Spain
Karl Marx in Manchester
Manchester and Salford Chartists
The New Moral World
Radical Salford
Shop Stewards
William Morris in Manchester and Salford
Democracy in the Engineering Union
Communist Party Pit and Factory Papers, 1927 and 1934
The Communist Party in Manchester 1920-1926
Citizen Guillotine
Bob and Sarah Lovell
A more comprehensive bibliography appears in Born With a Book in His Hand, ed. Michael Herbert and Eric Taplin, North West Labour History Group, 1998.