The Collection

Our Collections

Our collections tell the story of working class resistance and radical movements from the late eighteenth century onwards through ephemera, publications, photography and memorabilia. Here are some of our highlights….

Anarchism

The WCML holds significant collections of material exploring anarchist communism and anarcho-syndicalism dating from the 1880s onward. This includes an almost complete run of early editions of the newspaper Freedom (the longest running English language anarchist paper) established by Peter Kropotkin and Charlotte Wilson in 1886. We also hold collections of the anarchist publications, Anarchy, Direct Action and Class War.

 

 

 

The Suffragette Movement and Women’s Liberation

We are home to a collection of periodicals produced by the women’s liberation movement in the 1970s and 1980s including Red Rag, Shrew, Spare Rib and Banshee. We also have many leaflets, pamphlets and other documents which explore issues such as sexuality, wages for housework, reproductive rights and other socialist feminist areas of discussion. We also hold material relating to the Suffragette and Suffragist movement, including the influence of working class women within these movement. Our collections include material relating to suffragette and political activist Sylvia Pankhurst including copies of the Workers Dreadnought which she edited.

Spanish Civil War

The library is home to a significant archive relating to the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) and the International Brigades made up of people from Manchester and surrounding towns who fought Fascism in Spain. Our collection includes letters, photographs and diaries. We also have a beautiful collection of rare Spanish Civil War political posters and ephemera from the Aid for Spain movement.

 

 

 

Communism and Communist Party Great Britain

The library has an extensive collection on the history of Communism and of the Communist Party Great Britain which was founded in 1920. Our collection includes a near complete run of the pamphlets produced by the CPGB from 1920 to 1991. We also house the records of the Manchester and Salford Branch of the CPGB of which our founders, Edmund and Ruth Frow were members.

Our Library collection includes many books on Marxism and Marx and Engels; contemporary writings on the Paris Commune and Russian Revolution; copies of the proceedings of the First and Second Internationals; very early copies of the People’s Russian Information Bureau Bulletins and material relating to the British Workers Sports Federation and the Young Communist League.

We also hold the archives of communist activists, including Mick Jenkins, Angela Tuckett and the influential Black Communist, Len Johnson.  The archive includes a fantastic collection of posters produced by the Communist Party and Morning Star.

Trade Unionism

We care for a vast collection of archive material from the trade union movement, including the historical records of early trade unionism, including the Society of Journeymen Brushmakers, founded in 1747, the first minute book of the GMB 1889, and many documents from the early cotton industry. Unions representing transport workers, engineering, blacksmiths, graphical trades, tailors, stonemasons and furniture and timber trades are also represented in our collections. We hold the archive of the National League for the Blind and Disabled, an early union advocating for the rights of disabled people. Our collection also covers the National Unemployed Workers Movement.

 

Creativity, Culture and Leisure

Our collection includes political theatre, poetry, music, film and sport. Some of our significant collections are, Manchester Unity theatre, Manchester and Salford Film Society, Workers Music Association, the Federation of Worker Writers and Community Publishers and the Federation of Radical Booksellers. We also hold the collection of the socialist tv and film writer, Jim Allen.

The library holds early bound copies of the socialist newspaper, The Clarion founded by Robert Blatchford in 1891. We also hold material from the leisure and educational movement that were a feature of the Clarion movement, including the archive of the National Clarion Cycling Club. We hold the archives belonging to the land access and environmental activist, Benny Rothman, and of the Right to Roam campaign including material exploring the Kinder Scout Mass Trespass.

Strikes and Protest

We care for a large collection about mining and miners strikes, these include the Lancashire Women Against Pit Closures archive 1992-1993 and a significant collection about the Miners’ Strike 1984-1985 including posters, badges, clothing, photographs, banner and ceramics. We hold material from the Grunwick Strike in 1976 and material about the 1926 General Strike. Our collection covers protest marches, including the Peoples March for Jobs in the early 1980s, Hunger marches in the 1920s and 1930s and the National League for the Blind march in 1920.

Photography

We hold a unique and significant collection of photography representing working people, individual activists and protest from the early twentieth century. These include the Independent Labour party photography collection and the photography collection of the publication, The Leveller, as well as a rich collection of photographs from the Spanish Civil War.

 

Peace Movements

We care for an amazing collection of ephemera showing the breadth of support from working class people for peace and solidarity across national boundaries. Our collections include materials from the Greenham Common peace camp, the papers of the Greater Manchester branch of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Stop the War Coalition materials and rare archive material from the No Conscription Fellowship dating from the First World War.

Anti-Colonial Movements

The collection includes a small but important collection of material relating to the Pan African Congress held in Manchester in 1945 and activists involved, such as Len Johnson. We hold papers from the organisation, the Movement For Colonial Freedom, later known as Liberation alongside many other anti-imperial campaigns. The library holds a large collection of Irish history, the Irish struggle for freedom from British rule and Irish communities in Britain. These include the library collections of historians and writers Tommy Jackson and Desmond Greaves, the Irish in Britain Representation Group archive, letters written by Republican prisoners held at Long Kesh prison and materials relating to the Troops Out movement.

Peterloo and Chartism

We have an important collection of archive material from the Peterloo Massacre, 1819, including a letter from witnesses to the aftermath of the event and a 1819 map of St Peter’s field.  The library has an extensive collection of over 500 items on Chartism, including contemporary publications, historical studies, the Northern Star newspaper on microfilm, poetry, novels, prints and objects.

 

Political Banners

We care for over 100 political banners some dating from the late nineteenth and early twentieth century and represent local and national campaigns and many different trade unions. Some of our highlights are an early East Bradford Socialist Sunday School banner from 1902, a Lancashire Women Against Pit Closures banner from 1992 and a late nineteenth century Manchester and Salford Women’s Trade Union Council banner.

 

 

 

This is just a snapshot of the material we have in our collection. To search our entire collection please use our online catalogue.

We continue to collect and preserve the history and material culture of working class movements. If you have material you would like to donate to the collection, please get in touch.