New Shildon Mechanics Institute - Half Yearly Report Book - 1855 to 1892

It's taken a long time to digitise this book for you to access owing to the process we've had to follow which involved photographing pages and then straightening them and re-assemblling the book.

Be warned - it's a large document at 399MB so it may take a little while to come up on your computer. Please be patient. We'd not recommend viewing this .pdf on a smartphone (though you are welcome to try).

Back before it had a premises the Institute used to produce a report to members every six months outlining significant events, the state of the Institute as an organisation, and its financial standing. In 1855 when the Institute was 22 years old they started to record these in a half yearly report book. This book therefore covers the period in the years preceding the erection of the first dedicated New Shildon Institute building on Station Street and its expansion in the mid 1880s. It also expains the events that led to the Institute creating its once renowned portrait collection. It ends in 1892, some 14 years before the Station Street building became unsuitable leading to the erection of the present building on Redworth Road.

You can access the .pdf of the Half Yearly Report Book by clicking this link

This document image has been produced by the Shildon Heritage Alliance CIC for Shildon Railway Institute