New Perspectives on Welsh Industrial History , livre ebook

NEW PERSPECTIVES ON WELSH INDUSTRIAL HISTORY
NEW PERSPECTIVES ON
WELSH INDUSTRIAL HISTORY
EDITED BY LOUISE MISKELL
© The Contributors, 2020
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright owner except in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Applications for the copyright owner’s written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to The University of Wales Press, University Registry, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff CF10 3NS
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-1-78683-500-0
eISBN: 978-1-78683-502-4
The rights of The Contributors to be identified as authors of this work have been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 79 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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Cover image: The iconic entrance to the Hoover Factory at Pentrebach, Merthyr Tydfil. By permission Media Wales Ltd. Cover design: Olwen Fowler
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
List of Tables and Figures
Notes on Contributors
Introduction Industrial Wales: Historical Traditions and Approaches Louise Miskell
1 Welsh Copper: What, When and Where? Chris Evans
2 Enumerating the Welsh-French Coal Trade, c .1833‒1913: Opening Pandora’s Box Trevor Boyns
3 Hidden Labours: The Domestic Service Industry in South Wales, 1871–1921 Carys Howells
4 From Paternalism to Industrial Partnership: The Evolution of Industrial Welfare Capitalism in South Wales, c .1840–1939 Steven Thompson
5 The Affluent Striker: Industrial Disputes in the Port Talbot Steelworks, 1945–1979 Bleddyn Penny
6 From Margam to Mauritania: The Steel Company of Wales and the Globalisation of Iron Ore Supplies, 1952–1960 Louise Miskell
7 The Age of Factories: The Rise and Fall of Manufacturing in South Wales, 1945–1985 Leon Gooberman and Ben Curtis
8 The Welsh Development Agency: Activities and Impact, 1976–2006 Leon Gooberman and Trevor Boyns
Bibliography
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
T HIS BOOK started its life at a workshop event held at the National Waterfront Museum in Swansea in June 2015. Participants ranged from senior academics to the authors of recently completed PhD theses. All shared a sense of commitment to the task of bringing together a volume that would reflect some of the recent directions in the historical study of industrial Wales. Papers delivered at the workshop, all based on new research, covered more than two centuries of Welsh history. A number of recurring themes emerged, including the global interconnectedness of Welsh industry; the complexity of identities and relations in the workplace; the need for a better understanding of the products and markets for Welsh goods; the relative absence of the employer and the company from the historical literature; and the important role of the State in the economic life of Wales, especially since 1945. While attempting to address some of these themes, part of the intention of this volume is to highlight these as areas ripe for further historical scholarship.
A number of debts have been incurred in the preparation of this book. The original workshop event was co-organised by Dr Steven Gray and was generously sponsored by the Economic History Society. In addition to the contributors to this volume, scholarly presentations and contributions to discussions on that day were also made by David Selway, Adam Godfrey and Daryl Leeworthy. Dr Steven Gray read and commented on drafts of all of the chapters, while Martin Johnes and Sam Blaxland offered helpful comments on the volume introduction. Ongoing support and interest in this venture has also been forthcoming from Professor Huw Bowen and Professor Pat Hudson, whose work on copper and on the woollen industry, respectively, has helped open up new perspectives on industrial Wales.
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
AEU Amalgamated Engineering Union
BA Birmingham Archives
BISF British Iron and Steel Federation
BNS British Nylon Spinners
BOS basic oxygen steelmaking
BoT Board of Trade
BSC British Steel Corporation
CCL Cardiff Central Library
EEC European Economic Community
FDI foreign direct investment
GFS Girls Friendly Society
GA Gwent Archives
ICI Imperial Chemical Industries
IDC industrial development certificate
ISTC Iron and Steel Trades Confederation (formerly BISAKTA: British Iron, Steel and Kindred Trades Association)
LG Lucky Goldstar
LSE London School of Economics
MIFERMA Société Anonyme des Mines de Fer de Mauritanie
PP Parliamentary Papers
RBA Richard Burton Archives
SCOW Steel Company of Wales
SRC Shotton Record Centre
SWCA South Wales Coal Annual
SWCC South Wales Coalfield Collection
TNA The National Archives
WDA Welsh Development Agency
WET Welsh Economic Trends
WINtech Wales investment and technology
WINvest Wales investment location
WMIE Wales and Monmouthshire Industrial Estate Corporation
WMR Warwick Modern Records
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES
TABLES
2.1 Destination of British coal exports, 1830‒1913 (%)
2.2 Major ports for the importation of British coal into France, 1913 (tons)
2.3 Exports of coal to France from different groups of British ports, 1895‒1913 (%)
2.4 Shipments of coal, cinders and culm from Welsh ports to France, 1840‒7 (tons)
2.5 Exports to France from various south Wales ports, 1911
3.1 The size of the servant workforce in Wales, 1871–1921
3.2 Birthplaces of servants in Aberdare, Bridgend and Carmarthen (selected years)
5.1 Chronology of industrial disputes at Port Talbot steelworks, 1952–77
6.1 Share of total iron ore usage by principal UK consumers, 1958 (%)
6.2 West African iron ore production, 1960–5 (in thousands of metric tons)
8.1 Derelict land clearance funded by the WDA, 1978–9 to 2005–6
8.2 WDA business support, 1977–8 to 1989–90
FIGURES
2.1 Coal exports, UK and south Wales, 1833–1913 (000 tons)
2.2 British and Welsh exports to France, 1833–1913 (tons)
2.3 Map of British coal consumption by département , 1879
2.4 Major importers of British coal, French départements , 1847–1911 (000 tons)
2.5 The growth of coal exports from the main Welsh ports, 1833–1913 (tons)
2.6 Coal exports to France from various Welsh ports, 1895–1913
3.1 The butler’s pantry, Tredegar House, c .1890
3.2 The housekeeper’s room, Tredegar House, c .1890
6.1 Location of iron ore deposit and proposed railway in Mauritania
6.2 W. F. Cartwright, assistant general manager, Steel Company of Wales, c .1947
7.1 Manufacturing employees in south Wales, 1939–2000
7.2 The ‘spinning tower’ at British Nylon Spinners, Pontypool, 1948
7.3 Numbers employed at BNS/ICI Pontypool, 1945–2000
7.4 Enfield Cables/Dunlop Semtex, Brynmawr
8.1 WDA property activity, 1976–7 to 1989–90
8.2 Parc Mine, Llanrwst, before reclamation
8.3 Parc Mine, Llanrwst, after reclamation, 1978
8.4 Foreign direct investment in Wales, 1984–5 to 2005–6
8.5 Jobs claimed as created or safeguarded by WDA activities, 1990–1 to 2005–6
NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
Trevor Boyns is Professor of Accounting and Business history at Cardiff University. He has a long-standing interest in the history of the south Wales coalfield and has written a number of articles relating to various aspects thereof, most recently focused on the pre-First World War export trade. He has also published widely on the history of cost accounting and is the joint author of A History of Management Accounting: The British Experience (Routledge, 2013).
Ben Curtis is a historian of modern south Wales, the coal industry, industrial disability, and de/industrialisation. He is currently a research fellow at the University of Wolverhampton, working on the ‘ “On Behalf of the People”: Work, Community and Class in the British Coal Industry 1947–1994’ project. He is the author of The South Wales Miners, 1964–1985 (University of Wales Press, 2013), as well as numerous other academic journal articles and book chapters.
Chris Evans teaches history at the University of South Wales. Recent publications include ‘ “Voyage iron”: an Atlantic slave trade currency, its European origins, and West African impact’, Past & Present (2018) (co-authored with Göran Rydén), and ‘The plantation hoe: the rise and fall of an Atlantic commodity’, The William and Mary Quarterly (2012).
Leon Gooberman is a lecturer in employment relations at Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University. His research interests include government intervention in the economy, the evolution of employer collective organisations, and deindustrialisation. His recent publications include From Depression to Devolution: Economy and Government in Wales, 1934–2006 (University of Wales Press, 2017) and journal articles in Business History , Contemporary British History and Urban History .
Carys Howells is a teaching fellow in modern British history at the University of Warwick. She completed a PhD at Swansea University in 2015, her thesis focusing on the domestic service industry in south Wales between 1871 and 1921. Her research interests currently centre on the development of the domestic service and retail sectors in Britain.
Louise Miskell teaches history at Swansea University. She has researched and published widely on industrial towns in Victorian Britain and on the history of the copper and steel industries in Wales. She is currently researching the impact of the steel industry on urban Wales in t