The Rocket – British Manufacturing History

Tag: The Rocket

2 Posts

George and Robert Stephenson – the railway men

April 13, 2026 — 1 Comment

Building is in my blood; my mother’s family ran a Midlands building company for ninety-nine years having previously been itinerant craftsmen. I remember with huge affection childhood visits to the ‘yard’. My last employment before I retired was as Chief Executive of Lincoln Cathedral where I learnt something of stone masons and the way medieval […]

How Manufacturing Shaped Britain

My explorations are moving toward the built environment. This book sets out to discover how manufacturing shaped this island. Why manufacturing spread across the country, how it grew, why it declined and what was left. It is looking at manufacturing through the lens of geography. Manufacturing transformed the places where it took place. Villages became […]

The American relationship

America has been there in the background all my life. My father was a fan; I had an American godmother. Both these stemmed from the Second World War and my father’s role in army supply, where American industry played such a large part. I went on from there to explore army supply in the First […]

Youth Unemployment

Alan Milburn has published the first part of his report on Youth Unemployment The Guardian ends its leader on target when it says say ‘there needs to be work’. What is the point in training for jobs that don’t exist? I have spent the last five years exploring the story of British manufacturing witnessing from […]

The State we were in?

I read Will Hutton’s The State We’re In when it was first published thirty years ago. I had left my job in the accounting profession for a new career in the not for profit sector. In many ways I was filled with hope. In his Observer piece this Sunday Hutton writes: ‘Yet in 2026 we […]

British Manufacturing History

How manufacturing shaped Britain. Why manufacturing spread across the country, how it grew, why it declined and what was left.

Tag: The Rocket

George and Robert Stephenson – the railway men

Obstacles to progress