Archives are resources for teaching anti-racism

Great to see another example showing just how relevant archives are and can be to our modern society – we learn about the past to inform and inspire a better future.

ARALearning

London Metropolitan Archives (LMA) is a public research centre which specialises in the history of London. We are currently focusing on work with our audio collections as part of a UK-wide project ‘Unlocking Our Sound Heritage’. LMA aims to digitally preserve almost half a million rare and at-risk sound recordings, keeping seminal speeches of Londoners safe for future generations.

Two such Londoners are Jessica and Eric Huntley. The Huntley’s played an active role in the British African – Caribbean community from their first arrival in England in 1956, and worked on seminal campaigns for racial and social justice. Their archive contains a wide range of materials relating to black supplementary schools and the Black Parents Movement, the New Cross Massacre Action Committee, international campaigns to end the South African apartheid regime, political repression in Guyana and to free former Black Panther and radio journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal from death row. Their…

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Keele University’s 44th Latin and Palaeography Summer School – online

For anyone who frequently finds they need to read old handwriting or understand medieval Latin - not an uncommon occurrence when undertaking research in historic archives - you might be interested in the news from Keele University that their annual summer school will be held online from Monday 2 August. Here is some information from …

A Cheese Pudding

One of my favourite things to eat is cheesecake, and when looking through some recipe books in the archive for something fun to bake I came across several for cheese cakes and also this one for cheese pudding: From the list of ingredients, I could see it wasn't an early version of the kind of …

Researching Railways

A short guide to the published sources and archives relating to the rail industry in Derbyshire. A very brief history The Stockton-Darlington line, the world’s first public steam railway, opened in 1825. The Livepool-Manchester line, the world’s first public passenger steam railway opened five years later. From this point onwards many railway companies were formed, …

Researching Derbyshire Canals

As long ago as the period of the Roman occupation, the Fosse Dyke from the River Trent to the River Witham had been constructed.  But, the first canal with locks was not cut until 1567 at Exeter.  There were no further major developments until the 18th century, when a series of technical innovations such as …

Transport archives

A short guide to archives available for researching the history of transport routes and methods in Derbyshire, from roads to airports and vehicle manufacturing to hauliers and carriers. More detailed guides, including for roads, canals and railways will follow in the coming month. No particular mention is made below of material in the local studies …

New catalogues available online

As with many catalogues we have been adding recently, the following collections have not been catalogued from scratch. I have relied exclusively on the original lists sent to us by Sheffield Archives as the material was first donated to them in 1940 and 1965 respectively. As both collections actually relate to Derbyshire, they were transferred …

Local and Community History

May is Local and Community History Month so this seemed an appropriate time for a new research guide for anyone embarking on a local or community history project. Giving a definition of local and community history might seem a bit odd as it feels rather self-explanatory, but whether you are looking at the history of …

Welcoming visitors back to the record office and improving our catalogue

We are so pleased to be inviting customers back to the record office when we re-open at 10 o'clock on Tuesday 13 April. As you might expect there are a few changes to the way we are operating at the moment... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsmnDUSdCaw If you are thinking of visiting the record office, one of the main …

Putting colour into the past

If you have followed our blog for a while, you will know that one of our favourite subjects is Sir John Franklin and his lost expedition to discover the northwest passage from the Atlantic ocean to the Pacific via the Arctic. On 16 May 1845, the officers of Franklin's expedition had their photographs taken by …