Sunny blue sky with a pylon in a big green field

It’s grim up north

Really looking forward to presenting at this conference in June!

I’ll be discussing pit women’s experiences of disability and caregiving through the pit head baths debate.

Blood is the Price of Coal: Coal Communities, Health & Welfare in Britain & Beyond 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. Conference programme: Panel 1: Disasters, safety and commemoration 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 Chair: Dr Jörg Arnold, Universität Augsburg Panel 2: Health 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 Chair: Professor Mathew Thomson, University of Warwick

Panel 3: Welfare “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 Chair: Dr Quentin Outram, Society for the Study of Labour History Panel 4: Legacies 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 Chair: Professor Keith Gildart, University of Wolverhampton Showcase of 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 Poster of Mrs Sheila Truman Daniella Law, Historic England Glamorgan’s Blood: Dark Arteries, Old Veins – Exploring the Coal Collections at Glamorgan Archives Rhian Diggins, Glamorgan Archives When Coal was Clean: Soap and Smoke in Nineteenth Century Britain Oliver Marshall Mining Disasters in the Village of Worsbrough Maureen Gennard, Peter Fairham and David Bullock, Worsbrough Library Heritage Group

🚨 Conference booking open 🚨

Blood is the price of coal: Coal communities, health and welfare in Britain from the 19th century to the present

18 June 2026, University of Warwick

Booking form and additional information about the programme available at
warwick.ac.uk/services/lib...

Blood is the price of coal: Coal communities, health and welfare in Britain
18 June 2026 at Uni of Warwick
Hosted by @mrcwarwick.bsky.social &
Centre for the History of Medicine, Science and Technology supported by @sslh.bsky.social and @wellcometrust.bsky.social

Booking now open
#histmed #histSTM

Thank you! It has been a busy and tiring few days moving the flock around, but all worth it to feed this little ones!

My dad was unwell over Easter weekend so I ditched the thesis and became chief farmer. Lambs, sheep, cattle and hens all fed and watered, safe from the stormy weather!

There’s 23 yrs between photos 1 & 4. If I can’t stay in academia, maybe I can don my wellies and get into agriculture? 😂

“Why would you expect me to remember that?” Thomas Kuhn and the uses of oral history AIP History Weekly Edition: April 3, 2026

In today's AIP History Weekly Edition @janpotters.bsky.social looks at Tom Kuhn's frustrations interviewing ~100 physicists for the landmark Sources for History of Quantum Physics project. An important lesson in what we want from oral history and what it can give us.
📷Niels Bohr & Homer Dodge #HPS

Thanks so much! I’ll pop you a message on Insta, it would be lovely to have a catch up ☺️ Yes I completely agree with you! The leg aching is really distracting because as you say, there’s very little we can do about it. Movement has helped me a lot, but if I sit now for too long it flares up!

Great news Emma! I’d love to hear more about this if you are happy to chat? I started getting sciatic pain last summer, and whilst it’s mostly intermittent now, it has become one of the most annoying endo symptoms!

I’ve put off cleaning my car for months because I couldn’t bear the thought of removing Bella’s nose marks from my windows. So I’ve cleaned my car, but my windows are going to remain a reminder of all our adventures

The drop and the metric system: how an unruly unit survived revolutions A recently published paper co-authored by PDRA Rebecca Jackson has won the Trevor Levere Best Paper Prize.

How big is a ‘drop’? 💧 @beccajackson.bsky.social, Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Measurement Lab and the Affective Experience Lab, recently co-authored a prize-winning paper on the story of the non-standard unit of a 'drop'.

Read the paper:
medhumsplatform.org/the-drop-and...

Jobs! Three jobs! I am hiring three full-time, three-year postdocs to research the long history of song at Newcastle, from any disciplinary background (within reason), starting 1 October 2026. Spread the news far and wide – all details in the link below...

jobs.ncl.ac.uk/job/Newcastl...

The heartbreak when you’re nearly finished writing feedback for an essay and Turnitin totally crashes. I hope my responses are saved!

This Is Endometriosis BAFTA Award Best British Short Film 2026 This Is Endometriosis is an intimate, expressive film about how endometriosis has robbed Georgie Wileman of time.…

Wow, ‘This is Endometriosis’ won a BAFTA for Best British Short Film 2026.

What a powerful and personal project. It so accurately represents living with a chronic illness. If you haven’t already watched it, I heavily encourage you to do so, especially as March is Endometriosis Awareness Month.

Physical Disability and Deformity in Nineteenth-Century Britain Offering historical primary sources that outline both medical and experiential perspectives of physical disability, this book provides frequently mentioned but rarely provided material and supports re...

I have an edited primary source collection coming out on disability and deformity in c19th Britain. My hope is that you find it useful for teaching (apologies for the abstract, I did not write it! and the cost) #histmed #dishist www.routledge.com/Physical-Dis...

This officiating is the worst I’ve seen all season. Villa should have had 2 men sent off, they’ve been allowed an offside goal, another blatant offside that was ignored by the linesman and a foul not awarded because the ref blew for half time. Genuinely appalling #nufc

NUFC V PSV

3-0 to the Geordie Boys and my first Champion’s League match, can’t go wrong!

What a bonnie place to call home

The cover of the book which is titled ‘The Football History of Newcastle United As Told in the Headlines Since 1883’

An article from 1910

An article about Alan Shearer

An article about Joelinton

My dad got me the ultimate Christmas present that blended my love for history and Newcastle United together:

Thanks Lou!! I’m already thinking about what to get next. Maybe I should get a switchboard 😂😂

‘doing a PhD’ - I’ve lost the ability to write in clear sentences it seems 🤦🏼‍♀️

Are you even doing PhD unless you get your research permanently inked?

Wee postage stamps of Durham and the Angel of the North!

(Incase anyone doesn’t know by now, I’m from County Durham and research disabled expertise in the British Post Office)

Thank you Christina, she really was the core of our family. How lucky are we to have something so special, that makes saying goodbye so difficult.

We had to say goodbye to our Bella this morning. We’re all absolutely heartbroken, things won’t be the same without her. We got Bella when I was 13, and she’s been with us through the best and worst times of our lives. I could talk forever about how wonderful she is ❤️‍🩹 Our smart and beautiful girl ❤️

This was fantastic - moving, angering, and inspiring in turns. So proud of colleagues David and Julie-Marie, and the wonderful people at The Story, home of Durham archives - including archivist Victoria Oxberry (R), who is helping to build a community archive on HIV/AIDS in the county. 📜🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️🗃️

Yesterday Prof. Julie-Marie Strange organised an event to mark World AIDS Day with Dr Rupert Whitaker OBE, co-founder of Terrence Higgins Trust, here with Dr David Minto and colleagues from Durham County Council and The Story

It's official: 400 redundancies and a campus closure. At-risk staff will get a letter next week. Absolutely no serious consideration of any of the union's counterproposals.

Please share widely.

I’ve procrastinated my work so hard I’ve ended up at a Peep Show quiz in Newcastle. This has to be one of the highlights of my year.

History of Medicine CFPs If you wish to share your CFPs on the SSHM website please contact the Exec Sec, Dr Justine Pick admin@sshm.org Life Histories in Mind: Mental Ill Health and Learning Disability in Context Location:…

Two #histmed CFPs with deadline for abstracts Jan 2026!
Life Histories in Mind: Mental Ill Health and Learning Disability in Context (Manchester) &
Blood is the price of coal: Coal communities, health and welfare in Britain and beyond from the 19th century to the present (Warwick)
For more details 👇

ESRC Funded Studentships in Politics at University of Liverpool Apply for a ESRC Funded Studentships in Politics. Discover a wide range of PhD opportunities at jobs.ac.uk.

FUNDED PhDs! We are advertising for three ESRC-funded PhD scholarships! Any specialism permitted, depending on departmental supervision available. Spread the word! www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPH631/e...