Category Archives: BLDS (British Library for Development Studies)

Reading the history of Zimbabwean independence from airline annual reports in the BLDS Legacy Collection

By Danny Millum – BLDS metadata and discovery officer One of the many strengths of the BLDS Legacy Collection lies in its holdings of annual reports, from both government departments and public and private companies. While obviously vital source material for business and economic historians, these might appear a little dry to others, but onContinue reading “Reading the history of Zimbabwean independence from airline annual reports in the BLDS Legacy Collection”

‘For security reasons it may not be prudent to unfold where I am’ – Ghana’s 1978 electoral commissioner’s letter from hiding surfaces in the BLDS Legacy collection

By Danny Millum – BLDS Metadata and Discovery Officer Cataloguing on the BLDS Legacy Collection project has now reached Ghana, and we’ve just unearthed a fascinating letter from a dramatic time in that country’s political history. On 30 March 1978 the country’s Supreme Military Council, led by Col. Ignatius Kutu Acheampong, held a referendum onContinue reading “‘For security reasons it may not be prudent to unfold where I am’ – Ghana’s 1978 electoral commissioner’s letter from hiding surfaces in the BLDS Legacy collection”

Football, poetry and fables -the surprising features in BLDS African port harbour magazines

By Danny Millum – BLDS Metadata and discovery officer There are many fascinating rabbit holes to explore in the BLDS Legacy Collection, and you often come across them in the most unexpected places. Perhaps this just shows our limited imagination, but when we first came across a run of journals relating to different African portsContinue reading “Football, poetry and fables -the surprising features in BLDS African port harbour magazines”

‘Like a child in a candy store’ Gerardo Serra delves into the BLDS Legacy Collection

Before the spleen of writing, editing (and re-writing and re-editing) sets in, there is a fleeting moment in which the historian is like a child in a candy store, starry-eyed and gleefully lost. I experienced such a moment when, in 2016, I walked into the basement of what was then the British Library for DevelopmentContinue reading “‘Like a child in a candy store’ Gerardo Serra delves into the BLDS Legacy Collection”