International Women’s Day 2025
We’re so excited that, in celebration of International Women’s Day 2025, we are releasing our filmed version of Mother of the Revolution to stream free online across Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th March as well as hosting in-person screenings at Leeds Industrial Museum.
Celebrating Betty Beecroft: A Trailblazer in Industry and Her Legacy in Mother of the Revolution
The idea of Mother of the Revolution came from hearing the story of Betty Beecroft, as I explain in the video below.
When making the show we were often asked why people hadn’t heard of Betty or were given comparison to other ‘remarkable’ women of her era like Anne Lister. It’s not unusual for women’s stories and contributions to be overlooked, in making Mother of the Revolution we were too often reminded about how little has changed since Betty’s time in the obstacles women face to be heard and recognised. But there’s also an injustice in not naming why these stories aren’t told - that the value that the structures of power has placed on these stories has been low.
Women weren’t, and still aren’t in many ways, allowed to operate in the same spheres of ‘achievement’ and ‘glory’ of men; their impacts and engagements in change-making have often had to come about through subverting expectations of finding routes off-course from the usual ‘hero story’. But the beauty for us in Betty’s story has always lived in this nuance of her having to forge a path that wasn’t provided for or clear to her but she had to pioneer through her own self-belief (a radical trait still today as a woman). But also, crucially, at the heart of Betty’s story is that she isn’t ‘remarkable’ - she is a real, ordinary person who just saw an opportunity, was provided the resource of education, and made the next steps in hope that they were the right ones for herself, her family and her community.
In telling Mother of the Revolution we wanted to embrace this wholeheartedly. This was never going to be a story about Betty as an abstract woman from history who did some great things and who we should remember a bit more. Betty’s story is a call to arms to platform and uplift the potential and beauty of the stories of all of us.
In acknowledging why Betty’s story wasn’t told, we reflect on the injustice of the privileges of storytelling, legacy and power and we hope for the potential of a little revolution of being inspired by the plenty of ordinary extraordinary stories that live side by side to us everyday. People like Betty and the communities of workers after her that we meet in Mother of the Revolution who have lived too often without their deserved acclaim, but made a difference nonetheless.
We really hope you can join us in celebrating these stories with us this International Women’s Day by watching Mother of the Revolution free online across Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th March, keep an eye on our Instagram and Facebook or sign up for our mailing list at the bottom of the webpage to get the link to watch from the comfort of your own home.
Or for the full immersed experience you can pop down to Leeds Industrial Museum to catch a screening at their on-site cinema (more information can be found at their website here).
Here’s to the Revolution!
Beth
archipelago arts collective co-director & directing/dramaturgy lead
Kathryn Hanke, Lucinda Yeadon and Beth Knight at the Betty Beecroft mural at Kirkstall Forge. Photography by Andrew Knight.