Communicating Connections
Sharing the heritage of Marconi's wireless world
Between 2020 and 2022, the Communicating Connections project explored the history and heritage of the Marconi Company and its legacy in Chelmsford and Essex more broadly. The project was funded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund.
The Marconi Company was started by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi and opened its first factory in Hall Street, Chelmsford, in 1898. The company was a world leader in wireless technology, with Marconi equipment being used on ships, notably the Titanic, and in the first live entertainment broadcast by Dame Nellie Melba, live from Chelmsford in 1920.
Through the project we recorded over 30 oral histories with people connected to the Marconi Company and digitised over over 50,000 photographs from the Marconi Photographic Unit.
Listen to clips from the oral histories, see a gallery of images, view the online exhibition and find out more about the digital guided walks at Marconi Stories.
In the Resources section of our website you can also find an art activity pack developed by our artist-in-residence Elaine Tribley to coincide with the British Science Festival, hosted by Chelmsford’s Anglia Ruskin University in September 2021.
