Saving Steeltown: Conserving the records of the Ebbw Vale steelworks
Project cost: £30, 467
Grant award: £22, 608
Lisa Snook, County Archivist, and Rhiannon Griffiths, Conservator, write: The Steelworks was an imposing feature of the landscape in Ebbw Vale and part of the everyday work, social and educational life of the inhabitants of the town and environs. It had a huge reach: the site was several miles long and employed 14,000 workers at its height.
This collection is the only intact steelworks archive in the UK. It represents over 200 years of iron and steelmaking in Ebbw Vale, from the beginning of the ironworks in 1789-1790, the rolling of the world’s first steel rail in 1857, through successive changes in ownership – including British Steel and Corus - and fluctuating fortunes to its eventual closure in 2002 and subsequent demolition.
After its closure the records were rescued by volunteers and moved to a storage unit, but it had poor environmental conditions. The collection suffered some water damage, resulting in stiff and brittle parchment and damaged ink. The collection also has ingrained and surface dirt and mould in small sections, and parts are housed in acidic or plastic packaging with metal fastenings.
This generous grant from the NMCT will allow the conservator and a Preservation Assistant employed specially for the project to humidify older deeds to relax the parchment and flatten them for safe use; ‘fix’ loose or powdery ink to prevent loss of information and to clean and repackage documents into archival packaging. Once preserved, the collection will be catalogued and made available for research and engagement activities.
Blast furnace documents in poor condtion.
