Oral history archives in the East Midlands

Please note that this list is selective. More information about audio collections in the East Midlands can be found in our Audit of Audio Collections in the Midlands, 2025.

Derbyshire

Chesterfield Library accept any relevant donations of oral history recordings.

Derby Local Studies Library, based at Derbyshire Records Office, has around 172 general oral history tapes plus a number of radio and audio recordings covering: local memories and reminiscences, Derby County Football Club, events from 1976-1991 and BBC Radio Derby broadcasts.

Derbyshire Record Office has a collection of around 130 interviews covering lives lived in Derbyshire communities, local industries, farming, World War Two and covering local communities including Ashover, Belper and Renishaw.

Leicestershire

100 Stories of Migration in Leicester is an online audio archive created by BBC Radio Leicester of 100 stories from people who left their lives in another country to come to live in Leicester.

Harborough Museum holds a collection of over 200 oral history interviews on topics including: Welland Valley agriculture, domestic service, life in Market Harborough’s courtyard slums in the 1920s, shops and shopping and wartime experiences. The collection is available on cassette tape. Tapes can be consulted by appointment at Harborough Museum.

Lincolnshire

Boston Library Oral History Collection at Boston Library has taped interviews with the following people: Charles Sharp, JJ Parker, AH Mather, Peter Kitwood, JG Horton, Harry Fountain. All were recorded in the 1990s.

Grantham Museum holds the following oral history material: four cassette tapes containing memories of VE Day, one tape about airfields in Lincolnshire during World War One, one tape about the World War One attack in May 1918 on Chemin des Dames (recorded in 1975), one tape containing World War Two RAF crew room sound effects, one taped interview with Harry Humphries about the World War Two Dambusters raid, one tape of Clifford Dack talking about Henry Preston. Find out more on the museum website.

Grimsby Library, part of North East Lincolnshire Museum Service (NELMS), has a collection of between 150-200 oral history recordings which also include radio programmes of local interest. The collection will soon become accessible by appointment and there are hopes to transfer the recordings onto CD in future. Find out more on the North East Lincolnshire's Museums website.

Lincoln Central Library has recordings about the following local places: Saxilby – two taped recorded interviews with Mr Wright form March 1969; Gainsborough – an interview with Walter Kelsey (born in 1899 and recorded in 1988); Mablethorpe – A Short history of Mablethorpe by J Bell recorded in 1982; Bardney Lock – lockkeeper's daughters Hilda and Sheila Wright recorded in 2007; recordings related to Saxilby and the Fossdyke from 2007. Other tapes contain: Reminiscences of Lincoln Typhoid Epidemic - 1904/5; Mr Browning and Jenny Haith; Lincoln in 1904/5; Lincoln Horse Fair, pubs, sanitation, pigs; VE Day and Wartime memories; Frank Bonsfield (born in 1904 and interview in 1988); Lincoln County Play – recollections of Early Lincoln - taped interview with gentleman born in 1914; Working Lives Recalled, a tape series covering Oil Milling and Railways.

Lincolnshire Sound Archive is based in Scotland but in 2024 it's unclear where to find information about the Archive as the website at https://www.preciousvoices.co.uk/ isn't working.

Louth Library has the following recordings: Brian Street, chemist in Louth (1946-1981); Miss Pyle, librarian for Louth (b.1948); Percy Fenton; Mary Howden recalling the Louth Flood of 1920; Grace Bett interviewed about Lincolnshire Dialect; David Vinter on Bygone Louth; Cecilia Vinter on Lincolnshire Dialect; David Robinson on the Lincolnshire Coast; Stuart Sizer - Brown's eye view of Louth; Hymns by Louth Methodist choir; Mary Burrows on Lincolnshire Dialect; Harold Jackson; John Brocklebank on Louth Boys' Grammar School; Jesse Baggaley on Rural Rhymes; Working Life down Riverhead, Louth.

Museum of Lincolnshire Life has a number of recordings covering subjects such as the First and Second World Wars, local dialect and pig breeding.

Northamptonshire

Both Northamptonshire Archives and Northamptonshire Central Library hold collections of oral history recordings. Details of recordings held at the Library can be found on EMOHA's catalogue.

Nottinghamshire

Nottinghamshire Oral History Collection is stored in Nottingham Local Studies library and is accessed on a regular basis by students and readers, either at the library or by using the loan system. The Oral History Collection contains recorded interviews with ordinary people, plus some well-known names, who have lived and worked in the City and County. They recall their own memories of work at Boots, Players or the Raleigh, in the lace and textile industries, in the countryside, down the mines and in a variety of other jobs. They also tell of life on the dole, home life, schooldays, entertainments and social life: personal accounts of Nottingham and Nottinghamshire during the 20th century. Nottingham Central Library is currently closed. For more information email enquiryline@nottinghamcity.gov.uk or telephone 0115 915 2828.

Southwell Workhouse is a National Trust property. It holds a collection of over 60 interviews with people who once lived or worked at the Workhouse, some of which have been used to recreate aspects of the property's past.

Manuscripts and Special Collections, University of Nottingham have many oral history recordings covering the following subjects:

D.H. Lawrence  
MS 910: These interviews took place with residents of Eastwood in Nottinghamshire. The collection mainly consists of interviews he conducted with local people and former acquaintances of D.H. Lawrence during the 1970s and 1980s. The elderly men and women, born in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, recall their personal memories of the Eastwood area and D.H. Lawrence’s early life. Local themes covered include the mining industry, farming and local businesses, local gentry and domestic service, as well as general day-to-day life at the beginning of the 20th century. There is even an interview with a well-known stunt diver! 

In addition, the collection contains recordings of radio broadcasts and public talks given by some of the people who also feature in an interview. UKRI funding has enabled MSC to digitise the collection of 158 cassette tapes and make them available to researchers. Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room. 

Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room.  A selection of clips from the interviews can be accessed online

Other Lawrence items include:

• For/L/3/5/9 Recording, entitled 'D.H. Lawrence Remembered by his niece Mrs Margaret Needham' in a collection of papers associated with D.H. Lawrence collected by W. Forster, bookseller, 1988 (1 interview). Digitised and available in the reading room
• La Av 1/3 Recording of reminiscences by Laurence Bentley on D.H. Lawrence and Jessie Chambers; 1981 (1 item). Digitised and available in the reading room
• La Av 1/4 Recording, entitled 'D.H. Lawrence Remembered by his niece Mrs Margaret Needham', 1988 (1 interview). Digitised and available in the reading room
• La Av 1/8 (ACC 3172) audio tape reel recordings of interviews in Taos and one audio cassette tape recording of an interview with Alberto Moravia taking about DHL recorded by Mr Peter Davis, 1968 (4 interviews). Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room.

Activism
FME/4 Interviews with women activists involved in the Women’s Liberation Movement or involved in campaigns to defend or fight for the rights of women, in the 1970s-1990s in Nottingham (and the wider East Midlands region), recorded in 2019-2026 by the Nottingham Feminist Archive Collective (50 interviews to date). The majority of interviews are available in the reading room but cataloguing is still in progress with a small number.

NRF/9 Interviews relating to the origins of Nottingham and Nottinghamshire Refugee Forum, an independent registered charity set up in 2000 to work with and for refugees and asylum seekers (12 interviews so far but more recordings are expected). Stories of some of the refugees who have worked with the Forum which feature on its website are also being captured for the archive. Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room. 

MS 1035 Interviews for dissertation 'Nottinghamshire Women in the Miners' Strike 1984-85' conducted by Victoria Shepherd, 2013 (5 interviews). Digitised and available in the reading room.

FWC/5/13 Transcripts of interviews with a hosiery worker, a miner, a bookseller and two trade unionists recorded in 1969, compiled by regional Communist Party official and ‘professional revolutionary’ Fred Westacott, (5 interviews). Printed transcripts available in the reading room.

CCN/1 Video montage of interviews and audio recording of group reminiscence with members of the Nottingham Clarion Choir,(1988-), a campaigning choir singing for social justice, 2008 and 2023 (2 digital files). Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room.

Hospitals
MS 953/1 Oral history interviews with former staff of Nottingham General Hospital; 1994. Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room.

MS 953/11 Digital recording of oral history interview with two members of staff at Nottingham Children's Hospital recorded by Dallas Simpson, 27 June 1994. Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room. 

Local history 
MS 979 (ACC 2994) Papers of Dr Stephen Wallwork relating to his local history research upon Beeston, Nottinghamshire. Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room. 

MS 1060 ‘Echoes’: The City of Caves Oral History Project. From March 2023 to June 2024, a team of staff and volunteers at the University of Nottingham recorded a selection of people's histories of the caves. These included experiences of working in caves connected to pub premises, excavating caves as a part of an archaeological team, and holding tours, talks and even poetry events in these inspiring spaces (18 interviews). Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room. 

GG: Manuscripts, books and research papers associated with George Green (1793-1841) of Sneinton, Nottinghamshire, miller and mathematician (11 items). Available in the Manuscripts reading room. 

MS 864/4 Oral history interviews with residents of the village of Laxton in Nottingham were carried out as part of a Laxton History Group Grassroots funded project. Laxton is unique in the country in having a surviving medieval open field farming system working a three field rotation managed by the last legally constituted manorial court in the country. A number of interviews were carried out and recordings made in a variety of formats, 2010. Available in the Manuscripts reading room. 

MS 1076 Interviews and materials gathered at the Living and Working Along the Leen reminiscence event, as part of the programme for the exhibition ‘The Leen: Nottingham's River' ran from 9 October 2025 to 15 March 2026 at Nottingham Lakeside Arts. Available in the Manuscripts reading room. Clips from the interviews recorded at the event, accompanied by images from the exhibition can be accessed online.

Theatre
SJL/1-3 Interviews with Stephen Lowe (born 1947), playwright and director of Meeting Ground Theatre Company, one recorded before his papers were transferred to the University of Nottingham, 2011 and further interviews in 2018 and 2019.  Available in the Manuscripts reading room. 

MS 1049/6/10 Oral histories relating to Footprints Theatre. Audio interviews with Janet and Steve Stickley, founders of Footprints Theatre Company (1978-2018), a touring theatre company with a Christian ethos based at St Nicholas Church, Nottingham.  Interviews were conducted in 2026 during cataloguing of the Papers of the Footprints Theatre Trust archive. Cataloguing is still in progress but interviews can be made available with advance notice in the reading room. 

NYT/3 Oral histories relating to College Street Arts Centre and the Nottingham Youth Theatre. Includes interview with David S Stewart, OBE, who devised and produced multiple inclusive theatrical productions from the 1980s to the 2010s starring children with learning disabilities. Interviews were conducted in 2026 during cataloguing of the collection. Cataloguing is still in progress and access is currently restricted. 

War and revolution 
MS 690 Professor Molly Andrews’ interviews for the 1992 'The Evolving Revolution' project, which aimed to examine the way in which internal critics of the former East Germany or the German Democratic Republic (Deutsche Demokratische Republik, DDR) interpreted the dramatic changes experienced by the country during and after reunification with West Germany in October 1990 and the revolutionary events of 1989 that led to it. The project involved interviews with 40 East German men and women shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The interviews were conducted between February and April 1992 by Dr Andrews with the assistance of an interpreter. Professor Andrews subsequently re-interviewed some of the same people in 2012, and again in 2019. The interviews featured in exhibitions, a radio programme, a film and a symposium. She has published extensively on her use of oral histories in her research practice. In 2008, her book ‘Shaping history: Narratives of political change’ (2007 Cambridge University Press) received the outstanding book of the year award from the American Education Research Association, Narrative and Research Special Interest Group. She is Professor of Political Psychology at UCL and is co-director of the Association for Narrative Research and Practice. The collection consists of 80 cassettes which have been digitized. Printed transcripts, summaries and a report on the project are also available. Available in the Manuscripts reading room. 

MS 695/5/1 Two tape cassettes recording memories of the wartime experience of William Rogan of Newark, Nottinghamshire, who was an allied prisoner of war in Germany from 1940-1945, c.1980 (2 items). Available in the Manuscripts reading room. 

University history   
BHT: A series of frank and in-depth interviews with current and former staff (from ground keepers to the Senior Executives) of the University conducted by Dr Brian H. Tolley for his published History of the University of Nottingham (2001); 1989-1999 (222 interviews). Cataloguing is still in progress and access is currently restricted. 

PJB (ACC3016_M0002): Interviews/notes from interviews recorded by Professor John V. Beckett in the process of writing his book Nottingham: a history of Britain’s global university, 2016 (c.84 interviews). Cataloguing is still in progress and access is currently restricted. 

UAD2/3/2: Oral history interviews with former members of staff of the Adult Education Department which were recorded to aid in the curation of the Knowledge is Power exhibition at Nottingham Lakeside Arts, which celebrated the history of first Department of Adult Education in Britain, established in 1922; 2022 (5 interviews).  Cataloguing is still in progress and access is currently restricted.