Revealing and concealing personal and social problems: family coping strategies and a new engagement with officials and welfare agencies c.1900-12

Researchers from many disciplines have identified new forms of health and welfare services emerging in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Attention has focused on the growth of direct provision by the local and national state, and new relationships between the statutory and voluntary sectors. The literature describes an important transition from the general workhouse to more specialist institutions, and the rise of community care. It also suggests that the increasing number of women employed by statutory and voluntary sector organizations forged new relationships with clients, but to date this research has been limited by a lack of sources and an emphasis on controlling practices. This new research on the work of female sanitary inspectors parallels this interpretation in the sense it was often intrusive, and certainly created new routes into institutional care. However, it also supports the idea that the inspectors were welcomed by some sections of the community and thereby made a distinctive contribution to the evolution of health and welfare services.Wellcome Trus

The Bridgwater Infant Welfare Centre, 1922-1939: from an authoritarian concern with 'welfare mothers' to a more inclusive community health project?

The infant welfare movement in Britain has received considerable scholarly attention but continues to generate controversy and debate. Many of the services began with nineteenth-century voluntary initiative but were later developed by local authorities. Critics have drawn attention to the limitations of such provision; arguing that it was predicated on unattractive assumptions about class and gender roles. Under this interpretation working-class mothers were viewed with suspicion and targeted for advice aimed at inculcating middle-class standards of childcare and housekeeping. This paper accepts that there was an authoritarian character to much of the early welfare work but suggests that over time this gave way to more inclusive approaches that sought to provide clients with the services that met their real rather than assumed needs. This paper reviews the recent historiography, develops an overview of national trends, and then takes a detailed look at the Bridgwater Infant Welfare Centre. The case study benefi ts from unusually comprehensive records and, by drawing on evidence from a small Somerset town, adds to our understanding of infant welfare work that has previously been developed from research on major urban centres.Wellcome Trust Fellowshi

Out of the Valley Bradford MDC's resonse to the Bradford City Fire Disaster 1985-1986

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:87/09091(Out) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Children in care at 31st March 1982

SIGLELD:3172.9622(1982) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Home help study A description of the home help service in Bradford including recent trends and comparisons with other authorities

SIGLELD:7761.105(K134/2/78) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Comparison of two years of Asian referrals

SIGLELD:f83/5325 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Home help study The questionnaire

SIGLELD:f83/5326 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

A study of the 1959 Metal Health Act relating to admissions to Lynfield Mount Hospital

SIGLELD:f83/5331 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Final report on survey of referrals from Asian families to social services during 1978

SIGLELD:f83/5324 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Mentally handicapped adults living in the community Analysis of the questionnaire

SIGLELD:f83/5341 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo