Ordnance Survey: Photographs and Pictorial Images

OS 51

1950-1969

This series contains photographic and pictorial images, some of which were created for the covers of published maps or to be published in booklets etc, produced by Ordnance Survey; others were created to record the process of map-production by Ordnance Survey and the history of the Survey itself. The photographic images include a record of the exterior and interior of buildings occupied by Ordnance Survey, and equipment used in the surveying and printing of maps.

The initial transfer will consist of slides. Each of these slides is titled individually, and a full listing of the material will be created with slides grouped in their existing broad subject areas.

Public Record(s)

English

1537 glass plates

Subject to 30 year closure unless otherwise stated

From 2001 Ordnance Survey

The initial transfer of positive black-and-white glass slides will be transferred in its existing case. The case comprises a wooden box, a cube of 50cm sides, with drawers. It is possible these slides will be put onto CD-ROM.

Topics

Maps and plans

This series will accrue, though after the arrival of the glass slides and the artwork from Ordnance Survey's exhibition centre, it is likely to be only of a minimal nature with a few photographs or solitary original piece of artwork each year.

The initial transfer will consist of about 1,500 lantern slides, ranging in date from about 1950 to about 1968, together with a catalogue. Subsequently, a collection of 35mm transparencies will also be transferred. These two collections provide a unique photographic record of the Ordnance Survey and its work. The artwork for map covers (some of it commissioned from famous artists of the earlier part of the twentieth century), will be selected in its entirety.