I spoke to Bryan Walters, a passionate local historian and the creator of Geography Juice You Tube Channel, in the very fitting and the incredible heritage of the Joseph’s Well building in central Leeds.
I wanted to find out about what he does, why he does it, how he does it and many more interesting facts and historical nuggets about the wonderful City of Leeds and its people.
Are you a Loiner and if so, which part?
I was born at St Mary’s at the edge of Armley, like a lot of people in Leeds were – of my age anyway – and I grew up there. The first house I lived in for about six months was at Western Flats in Wortley and then after six months we moved to Armley on Ridge Road for twenty-three years. After that, I got married and moved to Bramley and now I’m living on the south side of the City, living in the south side of Leeds. So yeah, I’m a Loiner.
What was it like growing up in Leeds as a Leeds lad?
I think the thing about living in Leeds is you knew that the City Centre was there, which we always called town and we’d go into town. We’d never sort of appreciated that we were in the City; we would go into the City even though we were growing up in Armley. Armley was a good place; people were friendly. There were definitely tough aspects to it, but everyone seemed to work together and we never really realised that those tough aspects existed. I went to a little primary school, which was really nice. I went to Armley Park Middle School, which was a bit tougher, but I loved it; I thrived there. I think Armley was a good place to grow up, so I’m quite happy and satisfied that I grew up in Armley.
That was the 70’s and 80’s?
Yeah, that’s right.
The best decades, as we call them.
I still have a lot of friends from then that I’m still in touch with.
When did you start to become interested in the history of your City?
I became a geography teacher in 2003 and a lot of the text books that we were using then were for other places, like Bristol, London, Manchester. I thought if I started to use local examples for pupils, they would start to better understand what I was trying to teach them. So we did field visits to Leeds to see parts of Leeds. I worked at a school in Wakefield and Leeds is only ten miles away, which made it very accessible. I started to develop Leeds as a case study and aspects of the curriculum I matched to parts of Leeds. As I started to explore Leeds to develop those, I started to explore the history of Leeds as well, because that was important for the curriculum, but also I just started to develop my own interest in it.
My grandma lived in Quarry Hill then; she lived in Saxon Gardens, so I was looking into that, part out of interest and part out of a case study. I made a video about The Bank, which is that area and I really enjoyed doing that, so I thought – as well as making videos about geography and case studies, I’d try and make something just about the history and then I realised that other people were really interested in it. Once you start looking into places, you can’t help looking into another place, then another place. The thing about Leeds, it’s got such a great history. It’s a really great City, but there’s so much that hasn’t been fully explored and shared. Once I started, I started to enjoy it more and because it’s me that is arranging and making the videos, I can go wherever I want. I’m not tied into going in one direction. The geography videos, they have to match the curriculum, so there’s some limits there – but with the history videos I can go in whichever direction I like.
So, I made a few and started to expand a little bit and now I’ve got videos of Parts of Leeds, Streets of Leeds, History of Leeds, People of Leeds and then a little bit of about the Top Ten of Leeds, which is a bit more current, thinking that people might like to know where they can go now and see the history of the City.
That’s really varied. You should work for the tourist board! What gave you the idea to start Geography Juice? I guess you’ve answered that question already.
What happened was, I enjoyed being a teacher, I’m not a teacher anymore and I used to try to create lessons that were engaging. When it came to the end of each midterm, we used to have not full lessons, because we weren’t allowed to have full lessons, but we were able to make constructive lessons that were slightly not curriculum directed. You were still learning but you were exploring more about your topic and subject and at that time there was a programme on T.V. called Celebrity Juice and I just called the lessons Geography Juice and the kids loved it. There were all kinds of different formats and the kids really bought into. This is where the name comes from.
I’d always been making loads of resources, powerpoints, etc for the lessons and in 2020 I decided I’d start trying to make videos. I started out calling it by a different name, but then I realised Geography Juice is actually a really good name and nobody else has got that name, so why not stick with it. That’s how the name came about. I started making the videos for lessons for the pupils and teachers, using Leeds as a case study. I left teaching in 2021 actually, but I carried on because I loved the subject. Later that year, that’s when I started making the history videos alongside the geography videos and now it’s sort of a blend of making videos of geography and videos for Leeds history.
Your video content is really good. You have the skill of picking out the most relevant and interesting facts of history, not just the obvious history. How do you choose what to put in your videos?
That’s a good question. When you first start making You Tube videos, you really don’t know what you’re doing and I’m not trained, so you start from scratch, but I looked into it and what everyone was saying was, just start making videos and eventually you’ll find out what sort of videos you are and what you are trying to do. A lot of the time you’re learning and some of my older videos, there’s lots of things I would change now, but they’re done. They’re out there. You’ve got to sort of live with that. As I’ve gone along, I’ve tried to make the videos interesting, engaging to some extent. I’ve tried to get some facts across that help people understand why a place is like it is, what’s happened to a place. I think above all, I am trying to share my love of the City. I’m trying to get across, what I found out, that I think other people would be interested to find out about. There are so many things that interlink. You have no idea until you start looking at it. Actually, you are looking at a building the person involved in that building is involved in this building and then that building was linked to another. It’s all interconnected. I think, to answer your question: the main point is, I’m trying to share the love of the City, share the interesting things that I found out because I’m constantly learning and try and put across interesting information other people might also find interesting.
There are so many people that love the City and love this topic and that have an interest in it. I’m trying to share that. Some things people already know, sometimes it’s brand new information. I guess that’s what I’m trying to do. I want them to be watched, so my videos don’t have adverts in the middle of them. When I first started, any video that is over eight minutes long, You Tube put adverts in. However, I want people to enjoy the videos. You can earn a little bit of money on You Tube with adverts. Once you reach a certain level, You Tube pay you, but it’s not really just about getting a bit of money back to help fund it all. I don’t want people to be interrupted in the middle of a video by advertisements. I make the videos to be enjoyed. I don’t have a set length. I’m just trying to get across the main parts of what I’m trying to share and that’s it.
These are the things that come across in your videos. Your passion, love and respect for the City that you live in, definitely comes across in your videos and this is what is so attractive about your videos, because your heart is in the right place, because you’re not focused on making money from the videos, you want people to enjoy them.
You’re filming skill is very good as well. Do you have any formal/professional training in filming and editing?
No. I have to admit, when I first started making videos, I came across a guy called Adventure Me and I like his videos; I like what he does. He shared his equipment and some of his techniques at that time. I looked at what he was doing, although I do it slightly differently. I do want to do a lot more of in front of camera in the future. He does his very much in front of camera. I do mine more of a documentary style, but I do want more of that in front of the camera, in the future. Not lots, just a little bit more of me and the reason is, is because AI is becoming more and more prevalent and I’m a bit worried if I don’t introduce a bit more of me it’s going to look a bit like the AI versions. I don’t want that to happen, so I do need to introduce a bit more of me.
Everything is pretty much self-taught, apart from watching other people making videos, looking at some things online and trying to improve sound, video quality, editing -all of those things, so yeah, no training.
You’re doing a great job thus far. Leeds has so many undocumented interesting areas, alongside the more well-known areas. How do you choose which area to document?
That’s a good question as well. Okay, I’ve ended up with five strands that I’m developing. One area that isn’t quite as popular yet, but will become popular, is The People, because the people aspect is actually what I get the most out of. I love the building, I love the history but I love the fact that these buildings were in existence and other people lived here, moved through them as in this was their place. I think the people aspect, I haven’t quite got that going yet. I’ve done one or two videos about architects in Leeds; famous people. I did about the Barnbow Lasses; they’re an incredible story. I’d like to do more of that, definitely more of the people aspect.
Briggate by John Atkinson Grimshaw 1880s. Oil paint on photograph © University of Leeds
There are some streets which are so well known that people want to see, so I did Briggate, Kirgate. I will come back to doing Boar Lane, Park Lane. Really, it’s what’s peaking my interest at that time and what I’d like to discover and share next, but I do get a lot of suggestions from people, like yourself – you suggested Marlborough Grange, so I do get suggestions and I write them down and I have made quite a few videos that were from suggestions, that I’ve developed and eventually I’ve created them. There’s no given process of choosing apart from, if I’ve promised to make a video, I will do it. I’ll do a little post on the You Tube channel and I’ll say I’ll do this or I’ll do that and I make sure I do it, even if it doesn’t happen in the order that I’m saying, I’ll definitely get around to it. Within the last year I’ve tried to reduce that list, because it was getting a bit out of hand. I tried to not add too many things on, to try to complete the videos I said I will do. In the future it will be, again interesting areas, interesting streets, the history of the City – but also the people. I want to keep improving this.
That’s great. I love Leeds people and there are so many characters here, which will make a great tribute. I look forward to that. Do you have a favourite video thus far?
That’s a question I didn’t expect really!
It must be hard to choose?
Yeah, it’s difficult. I don’t think I have a particular favourite yet. I try to create as good a video as I can at the time, then go onto the next one and try and create a video as best as I can at the time and so it goes on. I try to improve each video. I do know looking back that there were times that I changed the way I recorded the sound. There was a point that I moved to 4K rather than just standard video. I know when I changed camera, I’ve got a camera that has a slightly better exposure, etc …. I’ll have to come back to you on this question.
I’d need a bit of a heads up on that question.
That’s fine, because the answer is you don’t have one yet, which means it’s yet to be created. I’m excited to eventually find out what that might be.
Are there any areas that you feel you absolutely have to do but haven’t got round to doing yet?
When I did the Kirgate video, I was very of how important Kirgate is and I took a bit of time to see, have I got the story of Kirgate well enough. I want to keep telling the story of Leeds as it goes along. I would like to do about Elland Road at one point, but I don’t want the channel to be like it’s cherry picking. I want it to be about the City as a whole, but I do realise that I need to do something about it, because it’s so important to the City and I’m a big football fan as well.
And when you say Kirgate is that different to Kirkgate, or just an old word for it?
So, this is something that happens. When I make the videos, quite a lot of the places I’m familiar with, how they are pronounced. When I started to make the videos the subtitles would automatically come on, but if you didn’t enunciate very well they would look very garbled. When I first started making the videos I was pronouncing everything, not really necessarily sounding like my Leeds accent. When you are pronouncing things, you pronounce things in a way that the subtitles would come across really well, you weren’t pronouncing them in the way you would pronounce them. Like I would say Round-hay, but I’m used to calling it Roundy. Now I put my own subtitles on, and I don’t have to worry about that so much. In the early days, that would take place. People would pick me up on certain pronunciations of places, either because they disagreed with it or because I had mistaken it – or they’d mistaken it.
I’ve always called Kirgate, Kirgate. There are other areas around Yorkshire where it’s Kirkgate and I did ask somebody questioning if it was right to say Kirgate or Kirkgate, but my answer is I am from Leeds and we always call it Kirgate Market. Maybe some people call it one thing, maybe some people call it another. I’m from Armley, so I feel like I can more or less argue about how a place is called in Armley, but I did a video that was close to the Hyde Park area and somebody was questioning if I was saying Brudenell correctly. We say Brudnell and they were saying BrudenelI. I have to accept that, that person knows because they live there – they have the right to know what it’s called.
There are odd little areas like Steander or Stender which is close to the river near the Royal Armouries. I’m not sure if anybody knows how that is pronounced, but it’s probably called Steander. I went in some forums to ask people how do you pronounce it and I went with Stender, but looking back it might be Steander. Nobody really knew. It’s just a little risk you have with making these videos. You’ve got to research a bit and go with your gut and hope that you’re pretty close. Generally speaking, 99% of the time people are happy with the way that I’ve put things across and the effort I’ve put in to make things accurate, but you do get 1% for whatever reason don’t like it. You have to try and not get hung up on, but you can’t help it, you do think I wonder why they didn’t like it?
Have there been any areas with any surprising, unique or strange histories?
Not that comes straight to me, but I am learning all the time and I’m finding things out as I go along. I do get rather excited when I start to discover things and how those chain of events fit together. I can’t say there’s been one particular outstanding event I can think of, but there’s lots of little surprises along the way, when you discover things you realise, because what I do is I try to second check everything that I do. I don’t just rely on one form of evidence. I try to second guess on things. Am I right in the fact, when I’m doing my research, could it be different? As you’re doing that you discover other things and you do get rather excited about what happened in the past and the links. There isn’t one particular thing that I’ve discovered.
Not yet. That’s another not yet you potentially have to discover.
Living in Leeds all of your life and seeing the City’s changes over time, how do you feel about the City from your time as a child to now?
As a kid growing up in Leeds, my mum would go down into Leeds to the market, on market days, particularly on Fridays is when we seemed to go. Leeds was pretty run down. There were a lot of buildings that were in poor shape. Buildings that were very black and sooty. They were quite unloved. There were buildings torn down, just to become car parks and as much as I love the City…… I think it’s improved over time, because luckily people have recognised the worth of those buildings that were still there and they’ve cleaned them up and made use of them. Lots of those buildings are still around. There were a lot of buildings that were at risk. All of Boar Lane might have been taken down at one time. All of those lovely buildings could have gone, but somehow they were saved. Leeds Civic Trust deserve credit for that. I think they were involved in protecting those buildings. When Leeds set out to be the motorway city, it changed so much. Now I was around when they were building the flyover down near The Evening Post building, all of that at the late stage of the inner ring road, but the inner ring road took a lot Leeds’ buildings, residential areas and it changes the City.
Up until, probably the 1980’s, there was a lot that was not good about Leeds. A lot of areas that you wouldn’t want to go. The Calls area, around the back of The Corn Exchange. It was those sort of areas you wouldn’t want to be about alone on your own. Going out in Leeds, it was pretty rough. Going out for a night out in Leeds, you’d have to stick with your friends. It was a great time, but it was also a little bit of a dodgy time as well. I think in recent years, the City has really taken off as a destination. It’s realised what it wants to be. There’s lots of things that are not right. I don’t dwell too much on those in my videos. There are things that need to improve.
I think the City is a welcoming place. It’s got a lot of history that’s not been fully explored. I think it’s a good place to visit. People like to visit. It’s good for a day out, good for a night out. So, in my lifetime it’s got better and better really, is what I would say – and I know people reading this, they won’t agree with that, I get that and understand that, but that’s my own opinion.
What is your personal favourite place in Leeds?
My favourite place…? I do like The Corn Exchange. I think it’s just a beautiful, unique building, but I also like other little places as well. It’s not just the bigger buildings. There’s a building that’s on St Paul’s Street. It’s an old warehouse. All that area at one time was warehouses for the central railway station. When they built those warehouses, they built them with love and those buildings are still there, with lovely arches, lovely big doorways . They’ve used coloured stones and bricks and slate. I like those sort of buildings as well. It’s not just the big bold statement buildings, it’s the little, quirky buildings. I would say my favourite would be The Corn Exchange, because it’s so unique – but there is quite a list of lovely buildings in Leeds that are desirable in their own way.
What is your favourite element about Leeds?
I think it’s the people. I do think we’ve lost a bit of the Leeds accent, in my lifetime. I remember in the market, you’d go into Leeds market and you could tell a real central Leeds accent. People selling potatoes, oranges, whatever. You could really tell. As we’ve become a bit more cosmopolitan as a City, we’ve lost a little bit of our accent, but we’ve still got really good people. I think if you come to Leeds, visit Leeds or live in Leeds – of course there’s crime going on and there’s people causing problems, but generally speaking if you’re getting off a bus in Leeds, everyone says “thank you” to the driver because it’s that kind of a place. You don’t in some other cities; they don’t talk like that. They don’t have that sort of welcoming politeness. So, I think the one thing, first and foremost, is the people and I guess that’s all the way through from when I was a kid, it was the people that lived here and what they lent to the City and I think that’s passed on to the next people and the next people. I can only speak from my point of view; I can’t say everybody will feel welcome. Some people might think that’s not true. I know there is good and bad, but generally speaking I can say it’s a welcoming City.
I absolutely agree. I wouldn’t live anywhere else in Yorkshire.
Are you close to covering all of Leeds or are there many more areas to cover?
So many more, honestly.
That’s good, as you’ll be occupied for a long time.
I can’t help it either. It is a passion. I don’t get tired of it. I just want to keep doing it. Funnily enough, when the video is made, I’ve about had enough and I’m ready for the next one. I’m already thinking for the next one, even though I haven’t quite finished the one I’m working on. That’s me investigating, researching and exploring, thinking about what I want to go on to next.
Are there any other cities that you are interested in?
I do like Filey as a seaside resort. I always enjoy going to Filey, but there are no other cities that I make videos about or go into their history. I’m just particularly interested in Leeds.
There’s so much to cover anyway…
…and so much that hasn’t been covered as well. There are things around us and we don’t even realise, until we start to look a little further. People are busy, which means they don’t have the time – but you look around like walking along The Headrow and you look up and see statues on buildings and you can think, what is this? There’s not that much information around about all of the buildings. There’s still so much more to be discovered.
You are doing such a great job and service to the local history of Leeds, because as greatly interesting and significant Leeds is, there is still a great deal of history that’s hasn’t been documented. Does this hinder you when researching?
No. I have to say Leodis have been really good. They’ve supported me. I include Leodis photographs in quite a lot of my videos and they’ve been really, really helpful letting me include their photos. I’ve always been really careful with the credits and make sure I credit them and it’s always by agreement. I’ve been doing these videos for five years come this summer and they’ve been so supportive allowing me to use their photos, because it’s a real treasure trove and I’ve actually added some of my own photos to that collection as well – to try give a little back, but those photos make such a difference.
Secondly, Leeds Central Library has got lots of information. They’ve got, obviously, maps from different times. They’ve got the street directories that you can go through. They’ve got old telephone books. They’ve got publications. They’ve got so much. This is where AI can’t include that. If it’s not in the digital world, AI can’t do it. There’s an awful lot of information there, that’s not out there available and it’s only through research, that that can be shared. So no, I do manage to get what I need . I can’t say that I always get everything. Sometimes I’m left with one or two questions, but generally I’m able to research and put across, what I’m looking to put across.
Do you think that an interest of the local history of Leeds has increased over the years?
Yes, I do. I think making the videos and sharing them, you realise there’s a lot of people really, really interested in the City. A lot of older people, because they’ve lived in the City and they’ll be familiar with the City. They’ve got the memories, because as you get older you do look back on your memories and can reminisce a bit. There’s young people as well who are interested in where they live and wanting to know why it’s how it is. Students who come to live in the City and want to know about it. People who have moved to the City and want to show their family where they’ve moved to and what it’s like. It’s definitely of interest to people, but I also think it’s an area that has so much more to give. There’s so much more of the history of the City to be shared, that’s not been shared yet. People are going to get more and more interested as time goes on.
This is why what you do is so important and valuable, because there’s not lots of people doing what you do.
No there’s isn’t. I’m aware of a couple of people who are on social media and doing things. There aren’t lots of people. Probably just a handful.
Also, the way you create your videos is very thorough. You’re concise. It’s not just the obvious historical facts, or a fifty second Tik Tok video. It’s a really good and solid format that you’ve got. You fit a lot in a short video.
Do you have an interesting historical fact you haven’t shared yet about Leeds?
The video I’m working on now, is the Alphabet Streets video, which is just along Kirkstall Road.
What’s the Alphabet Streets?
What they were was twenty one streets starting at Angel Street and went all the way up to Vent North Street and each street started with a letter of the alphabet. There were by my calculations one thousand two hundred and thirty four homes on those streets. From about 1840 is when they started to build them, as Kirkstall Road became more industrialised by the river, these houses were developed. Where Yorkshire Television is now, is where these houses were. By the time the Second World War came along, the houses were gone just about. They had this strange thing where they would clear a whole area, but leave a pub by itself on the corner. Within a hundred years they had all gone. People are still aware of the alphabet streets and that they were there. This is what I’m looking into at the moment.
The Video of The Alphabet Streets is now up on the Geography Juice Channel
Big thank you to Bryan for a thoroughly interesting conversation about himself and the wonderful history of Leeds.
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