Projects at Plymouth and West Devon Record Office

Here are details of some of the latest projects being undertaken at the Plymouth and West Devon Record Office. Some have been made possible by external funding and most take place thanks to the help and support of our volunteers.

Pride in our Past

A project working in partnership with the Plymouth Pride Forum to record the history of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) community in Plymouth funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund. The Pride in our Past project aims to create an archive of memories and experiences and was born through the realisation that some of the older members of the community had witnessed a change in attitudes during their lifetime that was unlikely to be repeated in history.

North Prospect History Project

The project aims to capture the unique character and history of North Prospect by building a community-led archive that will showcase the heritage of the area and its people.

Plymouth Pictured

The 'Plymouth Pictured' project is a joint initiative between Plymouth and West Devon Record Office and Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery to record and digitise over 80,000 photographs from the Plymouth area which date back as far as the 1890s.

Local and Naval Studies Library: cataloguing and scanning of images project

A project to catalogue a collection of over 10,000 Plymouth-related images. This includes photographs, postcards, lithographs and reproductions of works of art. Copies of the images will also be made available on the internet.

Of the Parish...

Formerly 'Of the Parish of Stoke Damerel' is a project to take images of headstones from Plymouth and West Devon burial grounds, to create a name database from them and make them available on the Internet.

Plymouth Pasts: A City Through The Lens

An innovative project to blend paper and film archives.

Western Morning News: cataloguing and scanning project

A project to scan and catalogue 35,000 glass plate negatives, the earliest of which date from 1941 and make them available on the Internet.

Plymouth’s Architectural Heritage, Maritime City: Plymouth’s Built Environment

A project to catalogue the first 16,000 building control plans (planning applications) for the City of Plymouth, dating from 1851 to the 1970s.