railway

The Borough of Stockton is famous for its industrial heritage. The town owes much of its past prosperity to its situation on the River Tees which allowed it to act as a major port. This along with the land based transport infrastructure provided by the Stockton and Darlington Railway from the early 1820’s led to its rapid industrialisation and urbanisation.

One of Stockton’s claims to fame is that it is the origin of the worlds first passenger carrying locomotive railway. The line opened on the 27th September 1825 with its original terminus being at Stockton Riverside at Castlegate. Original buildings for the line survive at Bridge Street where the booking office, Railway Tavern and coal and lime depot can be seen. By the 1850’s there were a great deal of railway lines providing excellent transport links for the thriving local industries. Many features of these early railways are now prominent landscape features such as the viaduct which cuts through the market town of Yarm.

The growth of Stockton led to an increased demand for building materials. The glacial and solid geology of the district was ideal to suit many local needs including clay for brickmaking, sand and gravel for aggregates and whinsill stone for roads. Many large quarries now mark the landscape in the form of lakes and nature reserves.

As many of these industries are now passing from living memory archaeology plays an increasing role in understanding how they operated. In 1999 an excavation took place at Thornaby Bottle Works. This led to recovery of previously unrecorded information about the technologies employed at the site along with details of some of the products manufactured.

19th century Stockton