Our 2024 ‘30 under 30’ list

Below, meet our 2024 '30 under 30' cohort:

Alfred Hawkins

Alfred is Assistant Curator of Historic Buildings at HM Tower of London & the Banqueting House, Whitehall for Historic Royal Palaces and Cathedral Archaeologist for Portsmouth Cathedral. Through these roles he has advised on numerous large scale development and conservation projects and regularly makes on screen appearances on various platforms including BBC2, Channel 5 and the Discovery Channel.

Beth Reid

Beth Reid is a writer and content creator who works to promote Scottish history as an accessible and vibrant subject to a social media following of over 73k. Beth is particularly passionate about women in Scottish history and is currently writing her first book, Women in the Scottish Wars of Independence.

Catherine Warr

Catherine Warr is a historian and filmmaker from Leeds. She creates entertaining, engaging, and accessible historical documentaries on YouTube to a world-wide audience and is the author of the 2023 book A Yorkshire Year (Carnegie Publishing). She also assists the British Association for Local History as Digital Content Coordinator. Read more about Catherine

Charlie George Eve

Like a magpie collecting shiny things, Charlie collects lesser known tales of history. Through creating digestible and easily accessible content via The History Magpie, he hopes to remove the stuffy old stigma that comes with the label of 'historian'.

Charlotte Bowyer

Charlotte is a medieval historian whose short-form videos on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram form a love letter to the UK’s lesser-known local heritage sites. From the ruins beneath our cities to our most remote castles, she seeks to reveal the historic heart of our modern world, 60 seconds at a time. Read more about Charlotte

Ciara Garcha

Ciara is a historian from Manchester, working on histories of race and migration. Her work focuses on South Asian migration and anticolonialism in the British Empire, postcolonial migrations in the 20th century, and the global histories of mixed-race identities and experiences across European colonies. Previously, she has been involved in South Asian Heritage Month and has curated exhibitions and events on mixed-race and South Asian histories. She studied at the University of Oxford and is now doing her PhD at the University of Cambridge. Read more about Ciara

Dr Lisa Berry-Waite

Dr Lisa Berry-Waite is a historian, heritage professional, and blog editor for the Women’s History Network. She is currently working on her book A Woman MP?: From Parliamentary Candidates to Westminster Representatives, 1918-1939, which will be published by Routledge. Lisa previously worked as a historian at The National Archives, and now works with the Heritage Collections at UK Parliament.

Elin Tomos

Elin is a writer, historian, and producer from Eryri in north Wales. She works as a producer for production company Cwmni Da where she aims to explore history at an individual, personal level through experimenting with different media outlets. Elin has produced and presented three historical series for BBC Radio Cymru and has published nearly 30 articles for BBC Cymru Fyw.

Erica Stevenson

London-born Erica Stevenson earned a BA in Classical Civilisation from New York University. Her mission to make ancient history accessible led her to starting MoAn Inc. – MOdern ANcients, a YouTube channel now garnering over a million views – which aims to promote the wider conversation of classics by offering breakdowns of ancient texts book-by-book as well as in depth discussions with professors, fiction writers and independent scholars. Erica hopes to encourage more people to engage with the ancient world in vibrant and new ways.

Han Parker

Han Parker, aka Historical Han, is a public historian and presenter bringing the ancient world to life through engaging storytelling. Creating accessible content on topics like art, archaeological discoveries and women's history, she aims to make the people of the past relatable to a modern audience through social media.

Jackson van Uden

Jackson van Uden is a historian and political theorist specialising in totalitarianism and totalitarian regimes. He runs a history platform called History with Jackson which produces and shares history content from a variety of authors, periods and historical events! He also supports the Katharine of Aragon Festival as Talks Curator.

Jess Brandwood

Jess is the youngest woman Trainee Tour Guide on the Liverpool City Region Blue Badge Qualification, a Charity Manager for the Royal Albert Dock Foundation helping young people engage in culture and tourism, and runs 'HistoryByJess' which chronicles her visits to historic places in the UK and following her tour guiding progress.

Kate McCaffrey

Kate McCaffrey is the Castle Historian and Assistant Curator at Hever Castle in Kent. Her groundbreaking research with Anne Boleyn’s Book of Hours gained international press attention. She has co-curated two celebrated exhibitions, written three books, and recently headed an exciting re-interpretation project at Hever Castle, called the ‘Boleyn Apartment’. Read more about Kate

Katrina Kelly

Host of the Classics Podcast, founder of the Classical Association’s largest branch in the UK, and the national CA’s Engagement Co-ordinator, Katrina is passionate about making the ancient world accessible to everyone of all ages. Her historical interests range from Roman gardens to the London Underground, via Victorian seaside resorts!

Kyle Lewis Jordan

Kyle Lewis Jordan is an early career archaeologist and curator who specialises in the study of disability in antiquity. Born with Cerebral Palsy, he has been passionate about history from a young age, and firmly believes that understanding disability – past and present – is critical to our understanding of humanity itself. Read more about Kyle

Louvain Rees

Louvain is a social historian, specialising in the history of death and Wales. Her research focus is working-class histories, exploring the lives of the everyday people often overlooked by mainstream history. She is currently exploring patients' personal histories at Glamorgan County Lunatic Asylum. Read more about Louvain

Luke Daly

Luke Daly is embarking on groundbreaking PhD research on the financial records of 13th century Canterbury Cathedral. He has published his debut book in 2024, Medieval Saints and their Sins: A New History of the Middle Ages Through Saints and Their Stories with Pen and Sword Books. Luke also hosts The Daly Medieval Podcast on YouTube.

Luke Tomes

Luke is a producer and presenter at History Hit. In the series ‘Could You Survive’, he quite literally steps into the shoes of our ancestors, whether they be noble medieval knights, roman legionaries, poor victorian factory labourers or brave spitfire pilots. He hopes to be at the forefront of the evolving history space. Having amassed over 17 million views on his videos, he believes that he's not only reaching a broad demographic of history lovers, but also encouraging those who thought history was “boring” at school to think again.

Meg Hyland

Meg Hyland is a PhD student in Celtic and Scottish Studies at the University of Edinburgh with a degree in Mediaeval History from the University of St Andrews. Originally from the USA, she has lived in Scotland for 11 years and has run the website "Women of 1000 AD" for 6 years. Women of 1000 AD is an innovative art and research project that brings to life the stories of women from around the world who lived 1000 years ago.

Molly Anderson

Molly Anderson is currently pursuing a part-time MA in Heritage Management at Queen Mary University of London in collaboration with Historic Royal Palaces, and she's a tour guide at Knebworth House. While Molly believes that social media is an exciting tool to share historical knowledge, she also understands the importance of engaging with people in person. In 2023, she curated and hosted a pop-up exhibition of the village she grew up in which reached out to members of the community.

Naomi Cooper

As Learning and Engagement Officer at University of St Andrews Museums, Naomi works on planning and delivering unique engagement activities for children, students and families. From Young Archaeologist Club, to an archaeology degree and now working in museums, she has always had a passion for helping others access the past in fun, creative and different ways.

Rachel Cockerell

Rachel's first book, Melting Point was released earlier this year. It's about the forgotten search for a Jewish homeland outside Palestine, which culminated in her great-grandfather sending 10,000 Russian Jews to Texas. The book is formed entirely of primary sources, woven together to create a story told only through the eyes of those who were there. Her biggest hope is that Melting Point inspires other young people to investigate their own family histories, and write about them in a way that breaks all the rules. Read more about Rachel

Rosie Maggs

Rosie Maggs is founder of The Historians and Little Historians magazines. Through this role, she seeks to provide opportunities to people of all ages and at different stages of their careers – one of the youngest writers for Little Historians was just 7 years old! Along with her team, she also produces educational videos for children interested in history, and takes workshops to schools and events such as Chalke History Festival.

Ryan Ellis

Ryan Ellis, Head of Storytelling at the Royal Signals Museum, has captured over 200 hours of oral history testimony. His interviews span a wide range of topics, from the daring exploits of the Special Operations Executive to the 2021 evacuation from Afghanistan. He is a member of the National Museum of the Royal Navy's Youth Advisory Group and the Cold War Network Steering Group.

Samuel Hume

Samuel received his PhD in British imperial history in 2023. As a public historian, Samuel is passionate about making great history available to everyone. The producer of historical podcasts for more than seven years, his podcast Pax Britannica was shortlisted for the 2023 Independent Podcast awards.

Sarah Roller

Sarah Roller manages Historic Houses' policy and education work, as well as contributing articles for Historic House magazine. Before joining Historic Houses in early 2022, she worked in various history and heritage sector roles, including in communications, digital media and collections/curation work. She is a trustee of the Heritage Education Trust.

Tom Ayling

Tom Ayling is an antiquarian bookseller who runs his eponymous business dealing in rare books and manuscripts from the Oxfordshire countryside. He also makes video content across YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram, teaching viewers about book history, sharing the stories of some of the incredible books he handles, and trying to open up the sometimes arcane world of rare books to new audiences. Read more about Tom

Tom Cable

Tom designs and delivers award-winning living history projects across Nottinghamshire. Using performance techniques, he helps make history more accessible for thousands of young people every year. He also supports teachers across the world with accessible digital teaching resources, recording podcasts in prehistoric caves and flying drones over medieval castles.

Verity Babbs

Verity Babbs is an art historian, comedian, and presenter. She is the founder and host of Art Laughs art-themed comedy nights which bring stand-up, improv, and comedy guided tours to museums and galleries and her ‘1 Sentence Answer’ videos aim to make art history more accessible. Read more about Verity

Will Davis-Coleman

Founder of a genealogy business, Will specialises in the history of houses. As host of The Cloak and Dagger Podcast, he delves into lesser known tales from history, now in its seventh season. Will also works on history documentaries, book research and writes articles for the Living Medieval Magazine.

If you are, or know of, a young person making a difference in the history space, keep an eye on HistoryExtra for future chances to enter.