Exploring the Archives:

With Chris Cassidy, Archivist (Access, Inclusion and Engagement),

Explore York Libraries & Archives

At Explore York archives we hold just over 500m³of records, documenting nearly 900 years of the city’s history and providing extraordinary details of the lives of its citizens. The archive tells the story of York’s many communities, not just that of the centre and we have a wealth of information about Tang Hall in our archive.

Tang Hall as we recognise it today is a recent development with the greater part of the estate being developed in the 1920s. However, Tang Hall’s presence in the history of York and within our collections can be traced hundreds of years before the creation of Tang Hall as we know it now.

Through our archive at Explore York you trace the journey that the Tang Hall has been through over hundreds of years. From a list of animals grazing on the land at Tang Hall in 1597 [1], leases for the manor of Tang Hall and its estate in the 18^th century [2], the development of the modern Tang Hall [3][4] and the records of the people, cleared from Hungate [5], who would go on to live there, to Air Warden reports showing the impact of the Blitz on Tang Hall during WWII and much more.

These are just some of the records in the archive that have served as inspiration for these co-creative historical audio dramas and to find out more about the collections visit us on the following link (https://exploreyork.org.uk/archives/), follow us on Instagram (exploreyorkarchive), Twitter/X (@YorkArchivesUk) or visit our blog (www.citymakinghistory.org).

[1] Y/FIN/1/2/9 – Chamberlain’s account book – List of animals grazing on Tang Hall land.

[2] Y/LEG/2/6/36 – Lease for Tang Hall manor and estate, Great Tanghall Fields, Little Tanghall Fields and Tang Green

[3] Y/PPT/6/1/5096 – Housing Scheme – Tang Hall Estate Steel Frame System, 1920s

[4] Y/PPT/6/1/5097 – Tang Hall Housing Estates 1920s

[5] Y/PPT/2/1/10/21 – Hungate clearance photographs, 1930s

Y/ORD/4/6/12/29 – File regarding the September 1942 air raid (available via Explore York Archives)