In our last post we explained why cataloguing is an important and exciting part of an archivist’s work but in this post we’ll be handing over to some of our researchers who explain what they get out of using archives:

David Gronow is a historian of Rugby League, a lifelong supporter of Huddersfield, and also does a huge amount of voluntary work on the detailed listing of the Rugby League records:

As historian of Huddersfield Giants Rugby League Club, plus the fact I am on the Steering Committee of the Huddersfield RL Heritage Project, visiting the University Archive has given me a great advantage in gleaming out information on Huddersfield Rugby League that probably no one else has seen …I have unearthed unique items from the early 1900s…documents/photographs/programmes relating to the early history of the Huddersfield club, plus some great memorabilia applicable to the 1946 ‘Idomitables’ Tour to Australia by the England team…fascinating stuff!

And Roger Pugh had the following to report on his experience of using the Rugby League archives:

“Whilst researching for the book I’m writing, the RL archives at Huddersfield University enabled me to access a huge amount of unique material that I’d never have seen otherwise – old Players Registers, notes of the RL sub-committees and the old scrapbooks, for example. Apart from factual information, I got a real insight into what the game was like and how it was run in the early post war period. And the staff at the University have been really helpful!!”

Comments like these are a constant source of inspiration – we want everyone to get as much out of using archives as David and Roger do!