Free learning resources from arts,
cultural and heritage organisations

All Images

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

• Introduction
• Audio accounts of young steel workers
• Age: How old was I when I started work
• Clothes: What I wear at work
• Conditions: What it's like where we work
• Hours: How many hours I work each week
• Leisure: What I do after work
• Lunch: What I eat for my lunch
• Pay: How much I get paid each week
• Training: How I learn to do my job
• Travel: How I get to work
• Viewpoint: What I think about my work
• Booking a session/ acknowledgements

• Smaller Text
• Larger Text
• Print

A Day in the Life of a Young Sheffield Steel Worker

Leisure: What I do after work

2000s:

"Well at things like Christmas they will go to the dog tracks together and all put bets on and that and maybe go to the pub after or, but usually they keep to themselves... "

1950s:

"There was a works league where different companies competed against different companies at darts and I think there was a work league for snooker, football teams, cricket teams, rugby. We had our own sports ground."

Victorian times:

"I asked how the children spent their time after work. Robert Newburt aged 15 told me ' I get some play after I get home, I have my dinner' where as George William Ross aged 12 said ' I can read and write, father sets me to it sometimes in the evening and if I don't feel tired I can do as much as I’ve a mind to. Some days I feel so tired I can do nowt at all. There's a night school sometimes and I always go to it when it's open and I go to Sunday school on Sunday afternoon."

Questions:

• Which image matches each time period?
  
• In which time period do you think the young steel worker had least time to enjoy leisure activities?
• In which time period do you think they had the most leisure activities organised by their workplace?
• Which time period would you enjoy most for leisure activities?