Local studies and information

Discover North Tyneside is based in North Shields Customer First Centre.

We collect material relating to the people and places that make up North Tyneside. If you're researching your village, the history of your house, local industries, or the people involved, Discover North Tyneside is the place to start.

We have a range of guides to help get you started.

Research your family history at Discover North Tyneside.

We have:

• census returns
• parish and nonconformist registers
• monumental inscriptions
• the IGI, GRO indexes
• free public access to Ancestry, Find My Past (including the 1921 Census) and The British Newspaper Archive via any People's Network computer in North Tyneside Libraries

If you're looking for a photograph of a person, town, village, street, house, or an event, try here. We have over 50,000 indexed photographs. If you'd like a copy of a particular photograph, it may be possible to arrange this for a fee.

The main local newspaper, the Shields Daily News, is extensively indexed from 1854-1960. Other newspapers - the Whitley Seaside Chronicle, for instance - are partially indexed.

There is a vast amount of cuttings and other material relating to people and events of the area, arranged in categories. We encourage researchers to leave their details in the folders. Many researchers with mutual interests have been connected in this way, and families have been reunited.

There is a good range of Ordnance Survey maps, from the first edition of 1857 onwards, as well as a large number of other maps of the area.

Discover North Tyneside
North Shields Customer First Centre
Northumberland Square
North Shields
NE30 1QU
Telephone: 0191 643 5270
Fax: 0191 200 6118
Email: discover@northtyneside.gov.uk