Website of historic industrial images is a hit

Over 600 people went online to view historical images focusing on the iron and steel industry in just two days of the website link going live.

The British Steel Archive Project, based at Teesside University, aims to catalogue, preserve and engage the public with the British Steel Collection – an extensive collection of photographs, maps, ledgers, deeds and other documents about the iron and steel industries on Teesside.

Several hundred photographs from the British Steel Collection, which is held at Teesside Archives in Middlesbrough, have been digitised and can now be viewed through the project’s website.

Hundreds more images to be uploaded And in the first two days since the online image gallery was launched, there were over 600 visitors to the website. Hundreds more images will be uploaded in the coming months.

The online gallery has been designed to encourage interaction, with visitors able to leave comments or provide additional information about any of the pictures on the site.

The images can be viewed online at www.britishsteelcollection.org.uk

For further information about The British Steel Archive Project and the British Steel Collection contact 01642 384478. Project Manager Dr Joan Heggie said: 'There is a really wide audience, from current and former iron and steelworkers and their families, to students, researchers and local historians, each with their own specific area of interest in the Collection.

'It’s much more than a collection of business records. It also provides insight into that moment in time, such as how a business operated and who they employed. It’s a slice of history of which people are so very rightly proud.

'It has been very successful, but this is only one way in which we are making the archive accessible. Our community engagement team is working with schools and holding workshops in museums and galleries with activities for families and children.

'Businesses can also get involved through donations and sponsorship, or even employees of local companies, as we’re also seeking qualified engineers to work as volunteers on a schools project. They would act as mentors in one of 12 local schools to help inspire children in engineering tasks which will promote the Collection and the region’s heritage.'

She added: 'We’ve achieved a tremendous amount already, but to make the project even more successful we need help from corporate and public donations and sponsorship. Our aim is to digitise as many of the important and much larger documents in the Collection as we can, such as the Sydney Harbour Bridge blueprints, but that will cost a lot of money – money which we still have to raise.

'The Collection contains items of international interest and could even help to attract companies here by highlighting and promoting the skills for which this region is famous.'

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