A fascinating oral history of working lives in post-war industrial
Britain.
In the early 1950s Britain was still the most urbanized and
industrialized nation in the world, a global power in shipbuilding and
the leading European producer of coal, steel, cars and textiles. For the
many millions of men and women hard at work during that time, an
infernal landscape of smoke-blackened factories, towering slag heaps and
fiery furnaces dominated their lives. From the deep docks and towering
cranes of the Tyneside shipyards to the mills and chimneys of Lancashire
and beyond, "Working Lives" takes us right to the heart of those
industrial centres through the words of those who were there.
Drawn together from hundreds of hours of first-hand interviews, "Working
Lives" is a unique collection of oral testimonies from workers whose
stories might not otherwise have been told: mill girls who risked life
and limb in dusty, noisy weaving sheds; steel workers who wrestled
sheets of white-hot metal in the blistering heat of the foundries; and
miners who hewed coal by hand on filthy, cramped, claustrophobic
coalfaces.
Local industries shaped these workers' entire lives but also gave them a
sense of pride, identity and belonging. As they look back on the dangers
and hardships of their jobs, and the place of industry in their
close-knit communities, these fascinating voices paint a vivid and
moving portrait of working life in Britain not to be forgotten.
