Qualla: Workington https://qualla.com/workington en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:16 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_res/siteimages/rsslogo.png Qualla: Workington https://qualla.com/workington Workington: Introduction https://qualla.com/workington/ There used to be a saying around the West Cumbrian coast: 'Workington rails held the world together.' It was the kind of phrase a town earns by exporting steel rails to every corner of the British Empire, and Workington had earned it. The world's first large-scale steelworks opened in the Moss Bay area of town because Cumbria's iron-ore field — to the south of Workington — produced phosphorus-free haematite, which was, for the first quarter-century of the Bessemer process, the only kind of ore that could make mild steel in volume. With cheap local coal feeding the furnaces and the docks loading rails outbound, a small Cumberland port became an industrial pillar.

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/t/q/workington-wp/gctq-workington-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Workington: Before Steel https://qualla.com/workington/ The place name comes from an Anglo-Saxon charter of 946: Wurcingtun, the settlement of Weorc or Wirc's people. Before the Saxons came the Vikings — a Viking sword turned up at Northside, suggesting a settlement by the river mouth — and before the Vikings, the Romans built forts a...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/t/q/workington-wp/gctq-workington-before-steel.mp3 0:06 2 full Workington: When the World Came for Steel https://qualla.com/workington/ The Industrial Revolution turned a small port into an iron and steel centre. Henry Bessemer's process, patented in 1856, made mass-produced mild steel possible — but for its first twenty-five years it required phosphorus-free haematite, and Cumbria was the world's premier source....

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/t/q/workington-wp/gctq-workington-when-the-world-came-for-steel.mp3 0:06 3 full Workington: The Workington Man https://qualla.com/workington/ After coal and steel, West Cumbria became one of the country's most quoted unemployment blackspots. The town pivoted into chemicals, cardboard, electronics recycling, and dock work, and many residents now commute north-west to the nuclear industry around Sellafield. Eddie Stobart...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/t/q/workington-wp/gctq-workington-the-workington-man.mp3 0:06 4 full Workington: Bill Shankly's Town https://qualla.com/workington/ Bill Shankly managed Workington A.F.C. early in his career — one of the first teams the future Liverpool legend ran. The club had been founded in 1888 by 'Dronnies,' a group of steelworkers who had migrated to Workington from Dronfield in Derbyshire. Workington A.F.C. was a Footb...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/t/q/workington-wp/gctq-workington-bill-shanklys-town.mp3 0:06 5 full Workington: The River and the Floods https://qualla.com/workington/ Workington sits astride the River Derwent on the West Cumbrian coastal plain, with the Solway Firth and the Irish Sea to the west and the Lake District fells rising to the east. The river that powered the docks for two centuries also flooded the town in November 2009, damaging or...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/t/q/workington-wp/gctq-workington-the-river-and-the-floods.mp3 0:06 6 full