Utilising business records to

bring Teesside’s industrial

heritage to life: the British Steel

Collection and the Tees

Transporter Bridge Visitor

Experience Project

Tosh Warwick

Tees Transporter Bridge / University of

Huddersfield

tosh_warwick@middlesbrough.gov.uk

Introduction

• A brief historic overview of Middlesbrough and wider

Teesside’s industrial heritage

• The British Steel Archive Project: Origins of the British Steel

Collection (BSC)

• Uses of the BSC to date

• The Tees Transporter Bridge Visitor Experience Project

• Using the BSC: – Research

– On-site interpretation

– Augmented reality

– Education and Outreach

“Infant Hercules”

“This remarkable place, the youngest child of England’s enterprise…it is an infant…but it is an Infant Hercules” William Gladstone at the Old Town Hall, Middlesbrough during a visit to the town in 1862

“The Hercules spirit needed now on Teesside” ‘A BBC survey has highlighted Teesside’s weakness in being able to cope with the economic downtown and the looming spending cuts’

Evening Gazette, 10th September 2010

Historic Context: The

Manufacturing Town

• The Victorian boom town that expanded vastly from a small hamlet in 1801 to one with a population exceeding 100k by 1911 with vast expanse from the grid plan town to one moving rapidly southwards

• The centrality of the iron and steel manufacturing along the banks of the River Tees made for a highly polluted town with high infant mortality rates and poor living conditions

• Iron and steel continue to form internal and external perceptions of the town

Bolckow Vaughan Programme c.1929, TA, BS.BV

British Steel Collection • In early 2000s the business records of Teesside’s

major iron and steel firms were deposited

• In 2000s The British Steel Archive Project was

launched in partnership with Teesside University

• The key aims of the Project were:

British Steel Collection • Includes the records of famous firms including

Bolckow Vaughan (the leading early ironmasters

behind Middlesbrough’s Victorian Boom), Bell

Brothers’ who shifted their interests from Tyneside

to Port Clarence and Dorman Long

• The British Steel Collection has been accessible

to the public since c.2010-11

• The records are now searchable online by

accessing the Teesside Archives catalogue at

www.middlesbrough.gov.uk/teessidearchives

• They offer potential for research by historians,

engineers, genealogy researchers, planning

departments, companies and economists

British Steel Collection

Catalogue

Bridge Records

• The British Steel Collection holds records relating to the

construction of a number of landmark bridges

• These include plans for:

• Tyne Bridge (Newcastle – Gateshead Bridge)

• Correspondence files, minute books, reports, blueprints,

photos and exhibition panels for the Sydney Harbour

Bridge

• Numerous African and Asian Bridges including the

Birchenough Bridge

• In addition to the Dorman Long bridges, Teesside

Archives holds an extensive collection of material

relating to the Tees Transporter Bridge. This

information is currently available in catalogues in the

search room.

Dorman Long overseas

representation c.1950s

Tees Transporter Bridge

Tees Transporter Bridge

Tees Transporter Bridge

NEFA footage, 1911

Tees Transporter Bridge

Tees Transporter Bridge

Visitor Experience Project

Informing the Visitor

Experience research process

Dorman Long Directors Minute Book No.8 1930-

1939, TA, BS.DL/1/2/8

Heritage Lottery Fund

Tees Transporter

Bridge Visitor

Experience Project • Drawing upon British Steel Collection

and other archival materials in

developing a new heritage trail

• Extensive photographic holdings in

BSC particularly useful in bringing

the company records to the wider

public – contextualise the place of

Bridge in the wider industrial story

Draft in-development Transporter Heritage Trail

App, courtesy of Indigo Multimedia

Tees Transporter

Bridge Heritage Trail

Early Town Trail: Draft in-

development Transporter

Heritage Trail App, courtesy of Indigo Multimedia

Tees Transporter Bridge

Heritage Trail

• Interactive smart phone/device App uses

material from the minute books of Bolckow

Vaughan catalogued and contextualised by

the BSAP as part of the Collaborative

Doctoral Placement to bring the ironmaster

John Vaughan to life!

• Able to draw upon images from the

archives that were digitised to enhance

interactive experience

Interactive Heritage Trail:

Bolckow & Vaughan –

ironmaster John Vaughan

Draft in-development TeesTransporter Heritage Trail App, courtesy of Indigo Multimedia

Onsite heritage resources

and interpretation

• Encourage visitors to explore the Bridge

and the area’s engineering and industrial

history through interpretation onsite

• Images from the British Steel Collection

supplements material from council

archives and footage from the North East

Film Archive

Education and Outreach Activities

• Bridge building activities – drawing upon

plans and famous bridges featured in the Bridge steel collection

• Developed talks using the material from the BSC to showcase the area’s industrial, bridge building and river heritage

• STEM projects with Middlesbrough and Newcastle Colleges exploring science, technology, engineering and mathematics reflected in historic structures

Education and Outreach

Activities: The Green

One and the Blue One

• Archival photographs of the Tees

Newport Bridge, the world’s largest

vertical lift Bridge, were utilised to

celebrate the 80th anniversary of the

Transporter Bridge’s neighbour (2014)

• Research student utilised the company

records of Dorman Long in developing

information for the Exhibition, held at

the Heritage Gallery – the former

offices of the Cargo Fleet Iron

Company

Education and Outreach

Activities: The Green One

and the Blue One

Social Media and

Networks: Facebook

example

• Use social media to promote outputs and

use of the British Steel Collection

Blogs and Newsletters

‘Bringing Teesside’s Iron and Steel Heritage to Life: The British Steel Collection and the

Tees Transporter Bridge Visitor Experience Project’

Business Archives Council Newsletter, No.176, Winter 2015 http://us9.campaign-archive1.com/?u=3ff4320e70f030a52ea49455a&id=44685cb731#mctoc4

Some conclusions

• The BSC has played a key role in the

Visitor Experience

• Business Archives have proven to be a

valuable source for heritage

• The Transporter Bridge Visitor

Experience has enabled business

archives to reach new audiences

• Strong potential for future use across

heritage and education projects