Ironbridge and the Electric Revolution

This text recounts the dramatic impact of electricity across Shropshire. Ironbridge, the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, has also played a central role in the age of electricity. This book draws upon archives and the memoirs of engineers, architects, and construction and power workers.

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Ironbridge, the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, has also played a central role in the age of electricity. Nowhere was the contrast between the old regime of steam, coal and iron and the Electric Revolution of the 20th century more vivid than in Shropshire. This illustrated book recounts the dramatic impact of electricity across the county. Within a few years a monumental "super station" - in the same genre as Battersea - was built on the banks of the River Severn, overhead pylons carried lines over meadows and spoilheaps, and householders were offered a clean, modern alternative to candles, oil lamps and gas. Ironbridge's second power station was also a model design, one of a series of 500 MW unit stations built in response to the demands of the boom years of the 1960s. "Ironbridge and the Electric Revolution" draws upon archives and the memories of engineers, architects, and construction and power workers to tell a story of enthusiasm, of frustrations with new technology and of the conflict between traditional values and prophetic visions inspired by modern technology.
Drawings and archive photographs reproduced in black-and-white and colour illustrate the construction of the two power stations showing also the contribution made by the young profession of landscape architecture. This book is suitable for architectural historians, industrial archaeologists and anybody with an interest in 20th-century society.