New ruskin archives launched
Early Ruskin students including George Harvey who is recorded in the newruskinarchives
A new public history website, newruskinarchives, has been launched to record and crowd – source historical information about former students of Ruskin college, Oxford since 1899.
A year ago there was much anger about the destruction of the student archives at Ruskin College undertaken by the principal Audrey Mullender. Thousands of signatures to a petition, letters and emails and a lobby of the governors could not restore what had already been trashed.
But in the spirit of the old wobbly song’ Don’t mourn, organise!’ a group of us with, it is hoped, hundreds of others are attempting to collect information in a database form about the lives of former students.
Of course, it will not be possible to ‘recreate’ the destroyed material. But it is important to acknowledge the experiences of people treated so shabbily. It is also important to ensure that this philistine and totally unnecessary action is not forgotten.
Please visit the newruskinarchives and consider submitting information on someone you know or who you have read about who was a former student at Ruskin.
My grand farther was a student at Ruskin college around 1910. I am appalled to
discover that they intend to destroy the early archives of the college .
Please keep me informed
Edwin H Haywood
Thanks for your comment Edwin. Sadly most of the student records were destroyed including those from the early years. Some of us have set up a website to re-create a database of students who were at the College. It’s called newruskinarchives You can read more about what happened there.It would be great if you could add the details of your grandfather to our database.