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IET Archives blog

Stories from the Institution of Engineering and Technology

Early ICI Billingham Electrical Engineering Drawings

The IET Archives has recently received a donation of 200 electrical engineering technical drawings relating to ICI Billingham. The large majority of these drawings date to two specific periods, the late 1920s and the early 1950s. The earliest drawing was... Continue Reading →

BTH Research Laboratory – Recently Discovered Oral Histories Circa 1957

A recording of interviews of retired BTH Research Laboratory staff, made around 1957, has recently been discovered by the family of the original interviewer and a digital version of these interviews has just been donated to the IET Archives. An... Continue Reading →

Amy Johnson – New Papers Uncovered in WES Archives

Amy Johnson (1903-1941), the famous English aviator shown in the image above, was the first woman pilot to fly solo from Britain to Australia. Either solo or together with her husband, Jim Mollison, she set many long-distance flying records in... Continue Reading →

Theresa Wallach – Motorcycle Pioneer of the 1930s

In December 1934, Theresa Wallach and her friend Florence Blenkiron set out from London to Cape Town, South Africa, on a 600cc single-cylinder Panther motorcycle with sidecar and trailer. They rode straight through the Sahara desert without a compass to... Continue Reading →

The Archives of the Decca Navigator Company

Earlier this year the IET Archives was very fortunate to receive a donation of the records of the Decca Navigator Company. This company owned and developed the Decca Navigator System, probably one of the UK’s major contributions to radio navigation... Continue Reading →

Restoration of the Michael Faraday Statue

The Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) commissioned two bronze statues of Michael Faraday in the late 1980s. One statue was to be positioned in front of the IEE’s London venue at Savoy Place and the other at its Stevenage Office,... Continue Reading →

The Great Melbourne Telescope

The IET Archives has an ongoing multi-year project to conserve a collection of pamphlets known as the S P Thompson pamphlets. These pamphlets, covering a multitude of scientific and engineering subjects, came to the Institution of Electrical Engineers along with... Continue Reading →

Reflections from 1947 Concerning Princess Elizabeth and her Future

After the recent celebrations concerning the length of the reign of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, we have delved back into the IET Archive collections to uncover a fond tribute to the young Princess Elizabeth which occurred in 1947 on... Continue Reading →

Commemoration of Royal Events in the IET Archives

Today, with the reign of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II surpassing the length of Queen Victoria’s reign, we have taken the opportunity to look through the IET Archives collections to see how the IET’s predecessors and other organisations commemorated notable... Continue Reading →

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