Industry has been more than a simple influence on our society, environment and landscape. It has shaped who we are and where we live, and it has brought about social change on an unprecedented scale in an unbelievably short period of time. But Chronos doesn’t discriminate and buries it all, so a discipline emerged after World War II (when the retooling of industry began to destroy elements of an earlier industrial time) to make sure this collective heritage wasn’t lost. That discipline is Industrial Archaeology.

Industrial Archaeology focuses on buildings, machinery, artifacts, sites, infrastructure and documents within their social and historical contexts. It provides technical information on obsolete processes not obtainable from other sources, and its subject matter covers everything from bridges to factories to railroads to mines to dams to workers’ housing.