Collections

**Note: the Mining Institute building has been closed for extensive refurbishment until 2021. During this time most of the Library’s physical collection was unavailable however prebooked visits are now possible.  A new portal to the Library’s digital collection will be launched in autumn 2021.  For access to the collections, please contact The Common Room

The NEIMME Library has one of the largest, most comprehensive collections on mining engineering in the world. It includes many early scientific and technical reports relating to the development of the coal industry and associated mechanical engineering especially the early work on safety in mines. The Library includes items relating to mining of all types, worldwide, plus all the related industries such as metallurgy, geology and railway engineering as shown in our Acquisitions Policy.

The Library includes over 35,000 volumes dating from 1556 through to the present day, over 600 different periodicals from around the world and over 15,000 pamphlets, technical reports and off-prints. We also have a large map collection including maps from the Ordnance Survey, Geological Survey and underground mine plans covering the Great Northern Coalfield and Northern Pennine Orefield area. There is also a substantial image collection which will be available via the digital portal soon.

Here are some of our favourite items from the collections:

The Archives Collection documents the work of colliery viewers such as John Buddle and reveals how the coal industry operated through the Industrial Revolution. The collection includes manuscript records, letters, colliery surveys and sketch maps of those viewers and the colliery companies with which they were involved.

We can provide scans by email of most documents; please see our charges and fees list for more information.

More information about how to research some popular subjects within our collections is available in our free Resource Guides.

Comments are closed