Max Archiving and Archivists Podcast Series
Helen Close – Women’s Engineering Society
Helen Close talks about her role as Centenary Trail Project Officer for the Women's Engineering Society, working to highlight the contributions of female engineers throughout the years. Founded in 1918, the Society aims to support the education and employment of women in all areas of engineering.
The collection for WES is housed with the IET, and the Centenary Trail project celebrates the 100th anniversary of WES by expanding digital resources. Helen talks about engaging volunteers in Wikithons to increase the number of research pages for female engineers, creating an interactive map for people to see the diverse spread of where these women came from and digitizing The Woman Engineer journal which WES has published since 1919.
The project has increased interest in the history of women's engineering and has led to new donations to the collection, better representation in museums, and the commission of Blue Plaques in honor of significant female engineers.