Died: 1944, Ansdell, England.

Son of Wesleyan min­is­ter Ed­ward Light­wood, James was born and bap­tized while his fa­ther was on the Leeds Bruns­wick Cir­cuit. He at­tend­ed Kings­wood School (1866-72), earned a BA from Lon­don Un­i­ver­si­ty, and be­came Head­mas­ter of Pem­broke House, a pri­vate school in in Lyth­am. He went on to serve for three years as a mem­ber of the Board of Im­prove­ment Com­miss­ion­ers in Lyth­am, on the the Lyth­am Coun­cil for six years, and as Chair­man of the Streets Com­mit­tee for four years. His re­so­lu­tion to bring gas into Fair­ha­ven was event­u­al­ly car­ried by one vote. Apart from mu­sic, his other great love was cy­cling. He be­gan cy­cling in 1874 on a “bone­shak­er.” By 1885, he was a mem­ber of the Cy­clists Tour­ing Club (CTC), and soon gained prom­i­nence. He was Chief Consul for Lan­ca­shire, and a mem­ber of the Coun­cil of CTC from 1887. Hon­o­ra­ry life mem­ber­ship came in 1907 in re­cog­ni­tion of his ser­vic­es to the club, and in par­ti­cu­lar with pub­li­ca­tion of the club’s route books and other writ­ings.

Music was his great love, though, and hymn­o­dy in par­ti­cu­lar. He was an ac­comp­lished or­gan­ist, and af­ter two years as de­pu­ty or­gan­ist at the Drive Wes­ley­an Church, St. Annes, he was ap­point­ed Hon­or­a­ry Or­gan­ist and Choir­mas­ter in 1894. When the press­ure of work due to his ap­point­ment as ed­it­or of the new Meth­od­ist pub­li­ca­tion The Choir and or­gan­iz­ing the new­ly formed Mu­sic De­part­ment of the Meth­od­ist Pub­lish­ing House, the trust­ees at Drive Church made him a grant of Ł20 to as­sist him in his re­search in hymn­ol­o­gy. While ad­vis­ing Methodism on mu­sic­al mat­ters, he found the unique 1761 Snetz­ler or­gan for the New Room at Bris­tol.

Lightwood’s works in­clude:

Music

  1. Lytham

Wanted