About Catherine
Catherine Beale is a writer and historian. She has written for Garden History, Hortus, Country Landowner, and the Hereford Times. She researched and wrote the guide book for Hampton Court, Herefordshire, when the gardens opened in 2000 and she co-wrote, with David Wheeler, the garden guide in 2009. She was involved in the restoration of the award-winning Judge’s Lodging, Presteigne.
Her latest book is Born out of Wenlock which tells the remarkable story behind the Wenlock Olympian Games, which were the inspiration for the modern Olympics. Like her first book Champagne & Shambles (below) Born out of Wenlock is set in the Victorian period and although firmly rooted in the countryside of the Welsh marches, it has much wider repercussions. It takes the specific story of the Wenlock Olympian Society and sets it in the context of the development of sport in Britain and then, of the Olympic Games. It was launched in July 2011.
Her first book, Champagne and Shambles: the Arkwrights and the Downfall of the Landed Aristocracy was published by Sutton Publishing (now The History Press) in 2006. It sold out in hardback and was published in paperback in November 2009 as Champagne and Shambles: the Arkwrights and the Country House in Crisis.
Catherine is the daughter of a Herefordshire farmer and lives on the Welsh border. She was educated at Cheltenham Ladies’ College, and after graduating from Cambridge University she worked in textiles, including, for a while, Sir Richard Arkwright & Co in Derbyshire. She is married and has one daughter.
Catherine Beale’s literary agent is Caroline Davidson Literary Agency, London (www.cdla.co.uk).
If you would like to order any of Catherine's published books or journals please email: emailcbeale@gmail.com.