We tend to think of coal mining as predominantly a male occupation, with women confined to roles as wives and support workers. Women worked at the coal face for many years before they were banned in 1842. However, mere legislation was not going to stop them - many continued to work underground, with mine owners making little attempt to stop them due to the low wages paid to women. Some would dress and pass as men to fool visiting inspectors. For the majority though, they worked on the pit brow where they received the coal, cleaned, sorted and cut it to uniform size. Dirty, laborious work, including many accidents and deaths, done by women and girls, some as young as 10 years old. Society was appalled, and harshly criticized women (but not men) for working in such environments and so close to male workers. Find a respectable job, like domestic service, they were told - despite the fact that few jobs for women were available in such industrialized areas. Like the more famous Pit Brow Lasses of Lancashire, the Tip Girls were castigated for having ‘unsexed’ themselves, accused of immorality, of being unfit wives and mothers and society went on a mission to save them. But the Tip Girls did not want to be saved. For nearly a hundred years, these women fought society and Parliament to keep their jobs and clear their reputations. Norena Shopland tells their story for the first time. New research from census returns and newspaper accounts have uncovered over 1,500 named women who worked in the Welsh coalfields – only a few could be included in this book - but it shows how much more work is needed in order for us to continue to celebrate these remarkable women.

This volume marks the twentieth anniversary of the first publication of this groundbreaking book. It reflects the pioneering research of its contributors to the development of modern Welsh women’s history. The eight chapters range widely across time (1830-1939) and place, from exploring working class women’s community sanctions and the perils facing collier’s wife to the very different lifestyles of ironmasters’ wives. They also tackle the idealised images of respectable Welsh women in periodicals and the tragic reality of those who took their own lives as well as showing us the transgressive actions of suffrage rebels. They examine how women carved out space within movements such as temperance and track the fluctuating fortunes of women’s employment and domestic life from the Great War to the eve of the Second World War. This volume makes available once more a book that has become a classic in its field and a vital part of the historiography of modern Wales. This expanded edition also brings us up to date. It reveals the research and publications of the last two decades and comments upon the extent to which Wales has moved beyond being the familiar ‘land of our fathers’. Written in a lively and accessible style, it nevertheless draws upon a wealth of research and expertise and should appeal to both the academic community and to a much wider readership.

First Published in 2005. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

What happens when fossil fuels run out? How do communities and cultures survive? Central Appalachia and south Wales were built to extract coal, and faced with coal's decline, both regions have experienced economic depression, labor unrest, and out-migration. After Coal focuses on coalfield residents who chose not to leave, but instead remained in their communities and worked to build a diverse and sustainable economy. It tells the story of four decades of exchange between two mining communities on opposite sides of the Atlantic, and profiles individuals and organizations that are undertaking the critical work of regeneration. The stories in this book are told through interviews and photographs collected during the making of After Coal, a documentary film produced by the Center for Appalachian Studies at Appalachian State University and directed by Tom Hansell. Considering resonances between Appalachia and Wales in the realms of labor, environment, and movements for social justice, the book approaches the transition from coal as an opportunity for marginalized people around the world to work toward safer and more egalitarian futures.

"How Green Was My Valley" is Richard Llewellyn's bestselling -- and timeless -- classic and the basis of a beloved film. As Huw Morgan is about to leave home forever, he reminisces about the golden days of his youth when South Wales still prospered, when coal dust had not yet blackened the valley. Drawn simply and lovingly, with a crisp Welsh humor, Llewellyn's characters fight, love, laugh and cry, creating an indelible portrait of a people.

Coal is a topic that has been, remains, and will continue to be of significant interest to those concerned with the causes, course and consequences of industrialization and de-industrialization. This six-volume, reset collection provides scholars with a wide variety of sources relating to the Victorian coal industry.

It is widely believed that the employment of children underground in coal mines ended in 1842. This book, in contrast, shows that young people remained an important part of the workforce up until the virtual demise of the industry in the late twentieth century. The Children’s Employment Commission was established in 1840 to expose the conditions under which children had to work underground; as we might expect, public opinion was outraged by what came to light, and a law was passed to prevent all females and boys under the age of ten from working underground. However, the lack of inspectors made the law difficult to enforce, and many females and boys under ten continued to work illegally until Parliament made school attendance compulsory in the 1860s. This popular and accessible book is a rich source of information about the working lives of children and young people in the Welsh coalfields, richly illustrated to include extensive work from Amgueddfa Cymru’s photographic archives.