Oral History

Reading Museum Service has been collecting people's memories since 1995

Oral history is a unique and often vivid source of Reading's history. We have interviewed a diverse range of Reading people including, among others, biscuit makers, wartime evacuees, amateur theatre members, an artist, a cinema usher, a carnival costume designer and a football fan. So far we have recorded over 80 hours of interviews.

There are two sound points in the Museum of Reading where visitors can listen to extracts from interviews in the collection.
 

Huntley & Palmers: A Name to Remember

Reading's important biscuit makers Huntley & Palmers and the associated tin box manufacturers Huntley, Boorne & Stevens are particularly well represented in the collection. A CD, called 'Huntley & Palmers: A Name to Remember', has been created as an introduction to the material relating to these industries.

Download an excerpt from the CD:
An excerpt from the film 'The Royal Baker', 1936: 0:19 min, 280kb
Huntley & Palmers song 'For Every Mealtime There's a Biscuit', 1924: 0:54 min, 785kb
The world wide popularity of Huntley & Palmers as illustrated in 'The Royal Baker',1936: 1:12 min, 1.06mb
 
The Transcripts for the three clips are available HERE
 
‘The Royal Baker’ was a promotional film made by Huntley & Palmers in 1937. The film was part of the company’s increased drive to advertise its products and is very much a product of its age.
 
You may download these recordings for private study or educational purposes only.
Please see the copyright section on our home page for further information.
 

"It was a very strange day when I returned to Reading on the Monday after the [Huntley & Palmers] factory had stopped producing biscuits. When you arrived at work there was always a hustle and a bustle and a big hum about the factory and the Monday after it closed there was silence".
Midge Harris, remembers the end of biscuit production at Huntley & Palmers in 1976

To find out more about the individual interviews you can download an index of the collection here: Oral History Index
If you would like to hear any of the interviews or the 'Huntley & Palmers: A Name to Remember' CD please contact us via the contact page.

How to record Oral History

Reading Museum Service has produced Reading Within Living Memory, a brief and practical guide to recording Reading's oral history, illustrated by quotes from Reading Museum Service's growing oral history collection. It also contains a list of useful contacts and a list of the published local histories of Reading that have made good use of oral history.
You can download a copy here: Reading Within Living Memory
 

N.B. You may need Adobe Acrobat Reader installed to view the documents.
To download a free reader please click here: