About the Archive

James Morgan, was employed at The Michelin Factory in Stoke. He began to take photographs of the City in the 1950's.

His first project was the bottle kilns that were beginning to disappear with the use of electric and gas kilns in the pottery works. He continued to travel around the city on his push bike with cameras placed in a basket on the front of his bike. He was able to gain access to places under construction and demolition, a task which is very difficult to do in this day and age. He witnessed the construction of the A500 and A50 roads. He took images of the buildings that were demolished so these roads could be built. His legacy is this archive that captures the changing face of the City of Stoke on Trent over a long period of time.

I was able to get access to this archive from the Morgan Family, when the band I play for, was looking for a sound engineer to master a CD we recorded. The guy who mastered the CD, was James Morgan's grandson, who is also named James Morgan. He gave me 2 boxes of negatives, which I scanned and restored, to the best of my ability, over a period of 5 years. I hope you enjoy perusing this archive and hopefully see some of you at exhibitions that will be planned in the future.

Dec Brennan (1st January 2025.)