Stories from Nottingham in 1844 of the courageous men and women, who sought enlightenment from libraries and from books and newspapers of their choice and who asserted their right to freedom of association.  As chartists, socialists, co-operators, they challenged the inhumanities of the Poor Law; confronted the forces of established religion and championed new forms of democratic control,272pp seeking new lives and futures, and a new society – “a city of light upon a hill”.