History@Portsmouth

University of Portsmouth's History Blog

Tag Archives | accident prevention

2018 HHSG booklet cover for slider

Looking backwards – and forwards

By on November 15, 2018 in Learning in Focus, New Publications, Research in Focus

In this post, Mike Esbester, Senior Lecturer in History, outlines student and staff work with an external partner to mark a significant anniversary. Mike’s research focuses on nineteenth- and twentieth-century Britain, particularly on the cultural history of safety, risk and accident prevention, and on the history of mobility.  When people hit a big milestone age – 40 is a common one – it seems that for many the mind starts to think with greater focus about the past, as well as turning to the future. In some respects organisations are no different: big anniversaries are often used as a moment to pause and take stock, as well as to consider […]

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sdr

(Un)safe heritage?

By on August 31, 2018 in Learning in Focus, Public History

In this post, the third in our series of blogs looking at sites of historical interest in Portsmouth, Mike Esbester, Senior Lecturer in History at Portsmouth, explores what might be learnt from an apparently unexceptional piece of the city’s built environment. Mike’s research and teaching focus on the everyday, including ideas about mobility and accidents in modern Britain. Not far from my office, there’s yet another mundane object that for most of the time, most people don’t notice – for 140 years it was part of the background to life around Burnaby Road. For a week or so earlier this year, however, it became very noticeable – particularly its absence, […]

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BSC First Aid 1972

If you go down to the Archives today …

By on November 21, 2017 in Events, New Publications, Public History, Research in Focus

In this post, Mike Esbester brings us up to date on the book he wrote earlier in the year, marking the 60th anniversary of the British Safety Council – now picked up by The National Archives and health and safety professionals. 2017 marks the 60th anniversary of the British Safety Council, one of the leading organisations aimed at improving health, safety and wellbeing in the workplace, in the UK and beyond. Fortunately the BSC is an organisation attuned to the value of the past, and – as discussed in an earlier post  – has been prepared to put its money where its mouth is, including creating an excellent digital archive , […]

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1914 SM p.38, platelayer edit

The dangers of railway work documented

By on August 30, 2017 in News, Public History, Research in Focus

In this blog, Dr Mike Esbester, senior lecturer in history, provides an update on the ‘Railway, Life & Death‘ project he has been working on in conjunction with the National Railway Museum. A database that details the stories of nearly 4,000 individuals who were killed or injured at work, including 16-year old James Beck, who Mike discussed briefly in an earlier blog (http://history.port.ac.uk/?p=315), is now available online.  Mike’s research focuses on the cultural history of safety, risk and accident prevention in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The ‘Railway Work, Life & Death’ project has just made available the database of nearly 4,000 individuals killed or injured at work on the […]

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health-safety2

What use is the past?

By on August 16, 2017 in Public History, Research in Focus

In this blog Dr Mike Esbester, senior lecturer in history, tackles a question that has long been discussed by historians and reveals how, if used carefully, the past can sometimes provide illumination for the present. Mike’s research focuses on nineteenth- and twentieth-century Britain, particularly on the cultural history of safety, risk and accident prevention, and on the history of mobility. It’s not an original question, and historians have been wrestling with it for years. Is it possible to learn from the past, given circumstances and context change and no two situations are ever precisely the same? Do we risk hollowing historical study out by trying to ‘apply’ it to the present? Must […]

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Vinnie Jones and Paul Gasgoigne

‘Do it the safety way!’ 100 years of accident prevention.

By on July 13, 2017 in Research in Focus

In this blog Dr Mike Esbester, senior lecturer in history, discusses how he has been working with the British Safety Council in order to create an online archive of their material. Mike draws upon his research interests in his 3rd year Special Subject strand. Mike’s wide-ranging take on the history of accident prevention touches upon accidents at work, in the streets and at home, and examines how the state has interacted with its citizens – and how the messages found in safety education were not neutral, but contained some very distinct ideas about who could prevent accidents. This is just one aspect of Mike’s research, which has been funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and supported by […]

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