North Tyneside Council tenants’ past and present are being invited to contribute their memories towards a display at the council’s annual tenants’ event on Thursday August 1, celebrating 100 years of council housing.
The 1919 Housing Act heralded a huge council house building programme across the country in the decades since, including over 30,000 homes in North Tyneside. This nationwide expansion included early replacements for slum dwellings and households bombed out during the two World Wars, as well as major new estates to meet growing post-war demand.
To support celebrate this centenary North Tyneside Council wants to hear resident’s stories, pictures and other memorabilia for a display at the council’s Quadrant East office, Cobalt Business Park.
Cllr Steve Cox, North Tyneside Council’s Cabinet Member for Housing, said: “Many thousands of families have benefitted from council homes in North Tyneside over the years, and our display is about marking this significant contribution to our communities.
“We have been searching council archives and libraries for some of this exciting material, and I hope as many people as possible dig out their own personal memorabilia and let us know so we can include it in the display.”
Some of the first council homes built in the borough after the Act was passed were in Wallsend in 1920. A cornerstone laid by the then Mayor of Wallsend commemorates the commencement of the Wallsend Housing scheme which is still there today, located on St Peters Road, Holy Cross, Wallsend.
Now housing engagement officers are in the process of collecting items from photographs to rent books that will be shown on August 1, and they want contributions from residents who have lived in a North Tyneside Council house.
To find out more and to provide contributions, contact engagement@northtyneside.gov.uk or call 0191 643 2828.
