Claire Ridgway

Claire Ridgway (born 1971) is a British writer of history books about the Tudor dynasty, with a particular focus on the life of the Boleyn family.[1] Since 2009 she has run the websites TheAnneBoleynFiles.com and Elizabethfiles.com. In 2014, Claire founded The Tudor Society.

Claire Ridgway
BornClaire Brassington
(1971-02-11) 11 February 1971
Lancashire, UK
OccupationAuthor, historian
LanguageEnglish
EducationAlcester Grammar School
Alma materUniversity of Warwick
GenreHistory
Notable worksThe Fall of Anne Boleyn
The Anne Boleyn Collection
On This Day in Tudor History
SpouseTim Ridgway
ChildrenChristian (1997–present)
Verity (2000–present)
Joel (2002–present)
Website
theanneboleynfiles.com

Early life

Ridgway was born in Lancashire in 1971, her father was a headteacher and her mother was a housewife. She credits her primary school teacher, Mr. Taylor, for setting her off in her love of literature and history.

Ridgway met her husband, Timothy Ridgway, at university and the couple married in 1995. They have three children and Ridgway opted to give up her teaching career to be a full-time mother for 10 years before returning to her career.

Education

Secondary
  • English Literature
  • French
  • History

University

BA Hons. with Qualified Teacher Status (QTS) in Religion and Education (English as subsidiary subject) from University of Warwick 1989–1993

Early career
  • Primary School Teacher – 1993–1996
  • Freelance Writer – 2008–2009
  • Historian, author, blogger and vlogger – 2009–present

Historian, author, blogger and vlogger
I fully admit to being addicted to Anne Boleyn and Tudor history and I am on a crusade to debunk the myths surrounding Anne Boleyn and educate the world about the REAL Anne Boleyn[2]

—Claire Ridgway on Anne Boleyn

In 2009, Ridgway set up her Tudor history website, www.TheAnneBoleynFiles.com, and it rapidly grew into a major website for the study of the Tudor period. Through her website, Ridgway was involved in running historical tours through her company History Tours of Britain. The first tour was in 2010, with subsequent tours until 2012. These tours were based around Hever Castle in Kent, with notable guest speakers such as Eric Ives, John Guy, Julia Fox and Elizabeth Norton. The company was closed due to Ridgway wanting to focus on her writing[3] in 2012, but in 2018 the tours started again in collaboration with British History Tours.

Ridgway's first book, The Anne Boleyn Collection (2012), was an instant success with her fans and is a collection of the top articles from her website. Ridgway quickly followed her first book with a more in-depth study of the lead-up to the execution of Anne Boleyn. This book, The Fall of Anne Boleyn (2012), shows the brutal speed that Anne Boleyn was taken from power, and has been an even larger success with over 69,000 copies selling in its first two years.

Putting together her detailed research into the Tudor period, Ridgway's third book, On This Day in Tudor History (2012), is a larger book with 366 entries about things which happened during the reign of the Tudors. It includes notable births, deaths, coronations and interesting trivia. This book sold 12,000 copies within its first year.

Ridgway's success in self-publishing led her to want to share her knowledge with other authors. With this in mind, Ridgway interviewed top self-published authors to discover what their secrets were, and what motivated them. The results are published in Interviews with Indie Authors (2012).

Claire's blog, recently made available in book form, is more rigorous than that of many professional historians

—Susan Bordo, author of "The Creation of Anne Boleyn"

In 2013, Ridgway published a second instalment of The Anne Boleyn Collection. However, in this book she was able to publish articles which had only been seen by her private members-only website, making this book of more interest to her readers. In its first six months the book has sold over 3500 copies.

Through her research into Anne Boleyn, Ridgway became interested in George Boleyn, the brother of Anne Boleyn. Her book, written jointly with Clare Cherry, George Boleyn: Tudor Poet, Courtier and Diplomat, fleshed out George as a popular and well-liked courtier from the court of Henry VIII, continuing Ridgway's aim to clarify what is known about the Tudor period. This book was the first modern biography of George Boleyn, the last biography was written over 100 years ago by a French ambassador, Edmond Bapst.[4][5] This book was published in 2014.

Ridgway's other published works include Illustrated Kings and Queens of England (2014), Sweating Sickness in a Nutshell (2014), Tudor Places of Great Britain (2015), The Life of Anne Boleyn Colouring Book (2018), The Anne Boleyn Collection III (2019) and The Tudor Puzzle Book (2021). She is currently working on a social history of Hever Castle with the castle supervisor, Dr. Owen Emmerson.

She also has an active YouTube channel[6] which has over 55,000 subscribers as of January 2021. Her videos include On This Day in Tudor History,[7] in which she looks back at Tudor events.

Bibliography
  • The Anne Boleyn Collection (2012)
  • The Fall of Anne Boleyn: A Countdown (2012)
  • On This Day in Tudor History (2012)
  • Interviews with Indie Authors (2012)
  • The Anne Boleyn Collection II (2013)
  • Two Gentleman Poets at the Court of Henry VIII, Edmond Bapst (2013, translated from the original French)
  • George Boleyn: Tudor Poet, Courtier and Diplomat (2014)
  • Illustrated Kings and Queens of England (2014)
  • Sweating Sickness in a Nutshell (2014)
  • Tudor Places of Great Britain (2015)
  • The Life of Anne Boleyn Colouring Book (2018)
  • The Anne Boleyn Collection III (2019)
  • The Tudor Puzzle Book (2021)

References
  1. "Claire Ridgway". Our Authors. MadeGlobal.com. Retrieved 13 March 2014.
  2. "About". The Anne Boleyn Files. Retrieved 18 March 2014.
  3. UK Company No. 07576296
  5. List of Ambassadors of France to Japan
  6. "The Anne Boleyn Files and Tudor Society - YouTube". www.youtube.com. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
  7. "On This Day in Tudor History - YouTube". www.youtube.com. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
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