Oral History - guide to resources: North West

Ambleside Oral History Group has been conducting oral history interviews since 1976 on a broad range of subjects relating to life in Ambleside and the Lake District area. They maintain an expanding archive, currently numbering over 450 interviews. The interview transcripts for the entire archive are available online and are fully searchable by keyword, or browsable by topic. Access to the online transcripts and search facility must be requested using the registration page on the website. The audio recordings themselves are not available online and only accessible by prior appointment at Ambleside Public Library.

Topics: People; Work

Keywords: agriculture; childhood; community; education; leisure; WWI; WWII

This website provides online access to full written transcripts and audio extracts from 29 oral history interviews conducted with Bolton people about their memories of life in the town during the Second World War. The focus of the interviews is on the Home Front, but they also document some of the stories of those who were in Bolton for the beginning of the war and later joined the Services.

Topics: War & Conflict

Keywords: childhood; naval history; POW; RAF; women; WWII

This archive hold the audio and transcript collections for three oral history projects conducted by Elizabeth Roberts during the 1970s and 1980s on the social and family life of Barrow, Lancaster and Preston from 1890 to 1970. Sets of transcript extracts from the interviews are available to read online on five different subjects: The Lancashire Way of Death, Health, Childbirth, Neighbours, and Working Class Marriage 1890-1940. The subject indexes for the archival interview collections are also available to download from the website.

Topics: People

Keywords: community, death; family

Finest Hour is a project to record the memories and experiences of those who lived through the period of the sustained bombing of Liverpool during May 1941. A selection of audio extracts from the interviews is available to listen to online. In order to access the complete collection of interviews, which amounts to over 100 hours of audio recordings, researchers should contact the project organisers directly.

Topics: War & Conflict

Keywords: bombing; WWII

This project, which resulted in a book publication, sought to explore the memories of the Jewish population in Leicester during the 1940s and 1950s. Six short audio extracts from interviews recorded at the project book launch are available to listen to online. It is also possible to download chapters of the book from the website.

Topics: People

Keywords: community; Jews

This project tells the history of Sellafield in West Cumbria by means of oral history interviews with 100 people about their personal experiences of the site. Interviewees include current and retired employees, as well as local residents and opponents. Short audio extracts and complete interview transcripts are accessible online, although it is first necessary to register for a login password. The transcripts are also searchable by concept/topic. The complete recordings are available to listen to at the Cumbria Archive and Local Studies Centre, Whitehaven.

Topics: Science & Medicine; Work

Keywords: community; industry; politics