Harry Satloka, Harrogate’s famous and much-liked free walking tour guide has stepped forward, and this time with his fiancee Rebecca, to support Harrogate’s ‘Women Winning’ project by offering to guide a new walk dedicated entirely to inspirational women from the town’s past.
Rebecca will use her acting skills to enhance this inaugural walk which will take place later this year. The Women Winning Walking Tour will bring to new audiences some of the amazing achievements of Harrogate’s often forgotten pioneering women.
From the first Yorkshire born woman to qualify as a doctor, Dr Laura Veale (1867-1963) who faced hostility from the medical profession to enter medical school but she overcame that to qualify at the grand age of 37. Born in Hampsthwaite, she became Harrogate’s first female doctor opening her surgery on Victoria Avenue.
To local philanthropist Lady Frainy Bomanji (1893-1986) wife of shipping magnate Sir Dhunjibhoy Bomanji who lived in a grand house on Cornwall Road. Fondly known as Lady Harrogate, she was a generous benefactor to the town and is one of only a handful of women to have been granted the Freedom of the Borough of Harrogate.
And on to one of the country’s first female magistrates appointed in 1924, Leonora Cohen OBE (1873- 1978). Whilst she may not be that familiar a figure in the suffragette movement, she acted as one of the bodyguards to Emmeline Pankhurst. She was definitely ahead of her time as a life-long vegetarian who along with her husband opened a vegetarian B&B in Harrogate. She died aged 105 in a vegetarian nursing home in Colwyn Bay.
During the walking tour, there will be stops at locations in the town associated with these famous women. Harry will act as tour host and Rebecca will give a short talk about their accomplishments and the reasons they are so important, often in national terms as well as local.
That covers just three amazing women connected to Harrogate but there will be more on the tour which is being planned for August this year. Full details will be revealed soon but check out https://www.harrogatefilmsociety.org/women-winning for this event and others.
- Women Winning is Harrogate’s twelve month project marking International Women’s Day 8 March 2025. It is being delivered in partnership between Harrogate Film Society, Harrogate Town Association Football Club and Soroptimist International Harrogate and District
