Florence Ada Keynes

Florence Ada Keynes
1920s
Born	Florence Ada Brown 13 February, 1861 Cheetham
Died	0, 1958 Cambridge
Nationality	United Kingdom
Education	Newnham College, Cambridge
Known for	author, historian and politician
Spouse(s)	John Neville Keynes

Florence Ada Keynes (née Brown; 10 March 1861 – 13 February 1958) was a British author, historian and politician.

Sister of Walter Langdon-Brown, Keynes was an early graduate of Newnham College, Cambridge. She started an early juvenile labour exchange, and was one of the founders of the Papworth Village Settlement for sufferers of tuberculosis, a forerunner of Papworth Hospital. She was secretary of the local Charity Organisation Society, which provided pensions for the elderly living in poverty, and worked with inmates of workhouses to resettle them into society.

She was the first female councillor of Cambridge City Council in August 1914, and was also a town magistrate. At 70 years of age, Keynes became Mayor of Cambridge on 09 November 1932. She chaired the committee responsible for the building of the new Guildhall, completed 1939.

Retiring from public duties in 1939, she wrote a history of Cambridge, By-Ways of Cambridge History (Cambridge University Press, 1947). In 1950 she published a memoir, Gathering up the threads (W Heffer & Son Ltd, 1950), in which she discusses her ancestors along with the childhoods of her children John Maynard, Margaret and Geoffrey.

Keynes was the daughter of the Rev. John Brown of Bunyan's Chapel, Bedford. Her brother was the Regius Professor of Physic (medicine) Sir Walter Langdon-Brown.

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