Rotherham The Unofficial Website An unofficial website about the Town and Borough of Rotherham

Rotherham - Iron & Steel Town

Up until very recent times the iron and steel industry was one of the major employers in Rotherham. It was also one of the major makers of muck. Many's the time I've been on the Sheffield bus on my way to or from work when we've run into a choking cloud of red smoke all along Sheffield Road. My mother lives over the hill in the next valley and boy oh boy did the net curtains get black when the steel mills were roaring. Some of these actually still exist at Brinsworth and Aldwarke but for how long who can say? June 2009 more redundancies announced at both plants. In Spring 2010 the Aldwarke plant is taking on a small number of steelmen again.

This is quite a difficult subject to deal with as there were the firms that produced iron or steel, or both and those that used it for the production of finished goods. Sometimes they were one and the same and sometimes not. Associated with the Iron & Steel industry therefore were iron founders, iron manufacturers, steel converters, fork makers, nailmakers, blacksmiths, agricultural implement makers, boiler makers, stove grate makers, chain manufacturers, file and spring makers, hoop makers, spade and shovel makers, steel rollers and similar trades. In fact almost anything that could be fashioned from the raw material was made in Rotherham at some time, from massive iron bridge sections to humble kitchen implements. To complicate matters firms were sometimes known by the name of the company that owned them, sometimes by the name of the works where they were situated and sometimes by both. I have tried to make sense of it all.

Information about the history of the trade and the various companies has proved elusive. As and when I find more details I will add them.

Songs of Steel

Songs of Steel Community Oral History Project was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund and was initiated by Rotherham Community Arts and Archives and Local Studies in 2009. The project's aim was to collect the memories and stories of people in Rotherham who worked within the steel industry and to celebrate Rotherham's industrial heritage and create a legacy for future generations. Written testimonies and songs about the Rotherham Steel Industry have been recorded and are now available at www.songsofsteel.com.

Top of Page