Alan W. Routledge – författare

Whitehaven and the Borough of Copeland have seen many changes over the centuries, but the pace of their transformation has been breathtaking over the past decade. Whitehaven's one-time commercial harbour, tied to the needs of local industry, has been wonderfully restored, and now boasts a new sea-lock and marina dedicated to the needs of the leisure industry. Gone are the coal and iron ore mines, the iron- and steel-making industries and the great chemical works. Of the large employers, only the nuclear facility at Sellafield and the West Cumberland Hospital remain. These changes have pushed the people of West Cumbria toward alternative professions, largely within the tourist trade. This should not be surprising, as about a third of the district lies within the Lake District National Park, the home of England's highest mountains and deepest lake. Whitehaven's nearest lake, Ennerdale, is the subject of an imaginative scheme 'Wild Ennerdale', which will allow all future development within the valley to occur in a sustainable way. Apart from the lakes, mountains, castles, villages, rivers and museums, there are over 40 miles of coastline, including some fine sandy beaches and high, precipitous cliffs. Whitehaven and District Through Time is the perfect introduction and guide to this beautiful land.

The Georgian town of Whitehaven, located on the West coast of Cumbria, was once the third most important port in Britain but today is only used by a handful of fishing vessels. It has, however, seen development in the form of a new sea-lock and marina, which have enhanced the town's tourist appeal. Whitehaven Through Time captures the changing face of the town through a series of spectacular old photographs, each paired with their modern equivalent. In this stunning book, Alan Routledge shows how industry has changed, with the once flourishing trades of coal mining and shipbuilding now just a memory, and even gives us a glimpse of what the future holds for the seaside resort.

Coal was the very bedrock on which the town of Whitehaven was built, the trade in coal with Dublin starting after the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Shipping ever increasing quantities of coal to Ireland brought another industry to the town – shipbuilding. In the seventeenth century, the Whitehaven Pottery began, local coal firing the kilns. Coal mining fathered several more local industries, including chemicals, iron ore smelting, glass bottle making, foundries, engineering and even the railways made use of phenomenal quantities of coal.The winning of coal was a costly business in terms of lives lost, with several disasters occurring in the Whitehaven Colliery. Women and young children were employed in the mines, working for twelve hours or more a day. Now, there are few physical traces left of the Whitehaven Colliery: some sites have become housing estates and others have been returned to grass. In this book, Alan W. Routledge looks at the history of the Whitehaven Colliery.