Conference programme
Blood is the price of coal: Coal communities, health and welfare in Britain from the 19th century to the present
This free one day conference aims to bring together researchers from higher education, libraries, archives, museums and community and campaign groups to explore the history of health and welfare in Britain’s coal mining industry.
Held jointly by the University of Warwick's Centre for the History of Medicine, Science and Technology, and Modern Records Centre, the event will run alongside an exhibition which will explore some of the themes covered by the speakers through the National Union of Mineworkers' archives.
When and where:
Thursday 18 June 2026, 9:15am – 5:30pm
Faculty of Arts Building, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL
Additional information about venue and travelLink opens in a new window will be supplied to attendees closer to the date of the conference.
Booking:
To book a place for the conference, please complete our online booking form.
For additional enquiries, please contact the conference organisers at archives@warwick.ac.uk.
The Society for the Study of Labour History (SSLH)Link opens in a new window is providing financial support to enable the Modern Records Centre at the University of Warwick to offer up to five bursaries to support postgraduate students, early career researchers and participants who cannot draw upon institutional funding to attend the conference. The bursaries are intended to cover travel and accommodation costs and SSLH membership costs. Please indicate if you wish to apply for a bursary to attend the conference when filling in your booking form for the conference and further information will be provided.
Conference programme:
More detailed information about the conference papers and presenters is available separately.
9:15am - Registration
9:45am - Welcome and introduction
9:55am - Panel 1: Disasters, safety and commemoration
Chair: Dr Jörg Arnold, Universität Tübingen
Oaks Colliery Disaster, 1866
Paul Darlow, National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and Paul Hardman, former NUM National Executive Officer
The Safety Men: the Colliery Deputies union in the British Coal Industry
Professor Peter Ackers, Loughborough University (Emeritus)
Welcomed to Wrexham
Sarah Castagnetti, The National Archives
The 1959 Auchengeich Disaster: class, community and commemoration in Scotland’s coalfields
Professor Jim Phillips, University of Glasgow (presenting work co-written and researched with Dr Ewan Gibbs, University of Glasgow)
11:25am - Break
11:45am - Panel 2: Health
Chair: Professor Mathew Thomson, University of Warwick
The Violent Realities and Multiple Temporalities of a Miner’s Life
Liv Robinson, Northumbria University
‘A wonderful difference to the home life’: pithead baths, pitwomen, and disability in twentieth-century British coalmining communities
Lucy Jameson, Durham University
Pneumoconiosis, Environment, and the Politics of Coal Miners' Health in Twentieth Century Britain
Dr Andrew Seaton, University of Manchester
A Special Case? Miners’ Health, Wage Relativities and the Fall of Heath’s Government
Robert Rayner, University of Birmingham
1:15pm - Lunch
Exhibitions, displays and posters:
On Behalf of the People: Work, Community and Class in the British Coal Industry 1947-1994
Professor Keith Gildart, University of Wolverhampton
Coal: a record of an industry
Gary Winter, Historic England
Glamorgan’s Blood: Dark Arteries, Old Veins – Exploring the Coal Collections at Glamorgan Archives
Rhian Diggins, Glamorgan Archives
Mining Disasters in the Village of Worsbrough
Maureen Gennard, Peter Fairham and David Bullock, Worsbrough Library Heritage Group
Mrs Sheila Truman
Daniella Law, Historic England
When Coal was Clean: Soap and Smoke in Nineteenth Century Britain
Oliver Marshall
2:05pm - Panel 3: Welfare
Chair: Dr Quentin Outram, Society for the Study of Labour History
“Feeding on the job?” Pit canteens in 1940s Britain
Dr Ariane Mak, Université Paris Cité & IUF
The Warmth of Home: Concessionary Fuel and Domestic Energy in British Coalfield Communities, 1945-1995
Dr Kathy Davies, Northumbria University
Class, Culture and Democracy: the Miners Libraries of South Wales
John Pateman, University of Leicester
Deindustrialisation and the recreational provision of the nationalised British coalmining industry (1950s-1984)
Dr Marion Henry, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne
3:35pm - Break
3:55pm - Panel 4: Legacies
Chair: Professor Keith Gildart, University of Wolverhampton
Now The Dust Has Settled
James O. Davies, Historic England
'The Big K: The Pit that shaped a community': Its legacy, a decade after closure
Judi Alston, One to One Development Trust
Union Poorhouse to Union Leader - Herbert Smith, President of the Miners Federation of Great Britain 1922-1929
Kathryn Stainburn, Castleford Civic Society
The Afterlife of Coal in Barnsley: Youth, Community, and Intergenerational Legacies
Dr Kat Simpson, The University of Huddersfield
5:25pm - Closing remarks followed by reception and exhibition at the Modern Records Centre
