ABSTRACT
Susan Isaacs, born Susan Sutherland Fairhurst, on 24 May, 1885, spent the first twenty-three years of her life in Bolton, a Lancashire mill town in the north-west of England. Susan came from an upwardly mobile family, whose parents had achieved middle class status from a mainly working class background. Her mother was, christened Miriam Sutherland at her birth in November, 1847. Although Susan's sister, Alice, believed she came from Sale in Lancashire, and a family friend thought she was Scottish, she was, in fact, born in Southwark in south-east London, though then in the County of Surrey. Much more is known about Susan's father, William Fairhurst, who became a prominent citizen of Bolton. William Fairhurst's newspaper was one of the first of its type and, according to his obituary, had many imitators. The paper ranged outside strictly sporting activities giving, for example, in Footlight Flashes, information about theatrical events in the north-west of the country.
