The Media Archive for Central England is the public screen archive for the East and West Midlands. An independent charity and company based at the University of Lincoln, MACE acquires, catalogues, preserves and makes widely available moving image materials that inform our understanding of the diverse cultures and histories of communities between the Lincolnshire coast and the Welsh border.
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Corby Steel Works Closure
Save Steel to Save Corby' the banners call. This has become more than a battle to save a steelworks, it's the fight for a whole town's existence.
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Overview
Before the arrival of Stewarts and Lloyds to Corby in the 1930s it was a village with a population of only 1,500 people. By 1979 thousands of mostly Scottish steel workers had moved south and the Corby steel plant, now operated by British Steel, was under threat. 11,000 jobs were at risk and so too the future of Corby. Union convenor Mick Skelton explains to Terry Lloyd that the only action left to take is to raise a banner and call for strike action!
The national steel strike prolonged the demise of Corby steelworks but it finally closed in 1980. Nearly half of the working population of the town were employed by British Steel Corporation.
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