Explore
Waterscapes: Reservoirs, Environment and Identity in Modern England and Wales
Andrew McTominey
2025
0 Ungluers have
Faved this Work
Login to Fave
How did reservoirs alter the countryside and city life? The answer is a riveting story of water and identity in modern Britain. The building of reservoirs in England and Wales was key to urban growth across the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, with the management of waterworks projects closely tied to the social and economic fortunes of rural areas, as well as the treatment of urban populations. Drawing on methods from environmental history, cultural history and historical geography, this book explores the multiple and long-term impacts of reservoir construction and management in rural England and Wales from the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. It examines how reservoirs transformed the rural environment, the management of the urban-rural hinterland, the development of cultural landscapes, the expansion of novel leisure activities, and the social impact on local communities. Incorporating case studies from Leeds’s Washburn Valley, Liverpool’s Vyrnwy Reservoir and Birmingham’s Elan Reservoir, amongst others, the book’s comparative approach highlights commonalities and differences in waterworks management across the country, thereby transforming our understanding of the national water industry during this period, contemporary attitudes to the environment, and the identities – civic, gender and professional – that were intertwined with these waterscapes.
This book is included in DOAB.
Why read this book? Have your say.
You must be logged in to comment.
Rights Information
Are you the author or publisher of this work? If so, you can claim it as yours by registering as an Unglue.it rights holder.Downloads
This work has been downloaded 2 times via unglue.it ebook links.
- 2 - pdf (CC BY-NC-ND) at OAPEN Library.
Keywords
- Culture
- England
- Environment
- Historical geography
- Landscapes
- Leisure
- nineteenth century
- Reservoirs
- Rural
- thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1D Europe::1DD Western Europe::1DDU United Kingdom, Great Britain
- thema EDItEUR::3 Time period qualifiers::3M c 1500 onwards to present day::3MP 20th century, c 1900 to c 1999
- thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHT History: specific events and topics::NHTB Social and cultural history
- thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHT History: specific events and topics::NHTP Historical geography
- Twentieth century
- urban
- wales
- water industry
- water management
- Waterworks
Links
DOI: 10.63674/cxiv5434Editions