Industrial heritage topic of presentation

By JANE NORDBERG, DMG Writer

HOUGHTON —Sweden might be halfway around the world, but it’s not as removed from the Copper Country as one might think.

“This project pays attention to urban planning and renewal and the reuse of industrial buildings, the same issues that we are grappling with here,” said Michigan Technological University Department of Social Sciences Chair Bruce Seely.

Seely’s department and the Visiting Women and Minorities Scholars Series are co-sponsoring a presentation by Anna Storm from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. Storm’s lecture, titled “Industrial Heritage and the Heritage Industry: Some Experiences in Sweden,” will be held Thursday at 7:30 p.m. in Fisher Hall Room 138 on the MTU campus.

In her dissertation, defended last month, Storm examined three case studies of re-development, economic growth, and heritage tourism in former industrial areas: Koppardalen in Avesta, Sweden; the Ironbridge Gorge Museum in Britain; and Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord in the Ruhr district of Germany. Her academic training is as a historian of technology, with special attention to industrial heritage issues. Anna has been part of a research project at the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Stockholm on “The Transformation of Industrial Society: Industrial Growth and Change in Company Development and Municipal Planning.” Her particular contribution to this study was to explore the role of the industrial heritage in municipal planning and renewal.

Although an academic, Storm has prepared her lecture for a general audience, Seely said.

“Anyone sensitive to history, heritage and development issues here will get a chance to hear how people in another countries are working on similar topics,” he said. People in the Copper Country tend to feel isolated logistically from other areas, he said, and that leads to the misconception that they are fighting these battles by themselves.

“Here’s a chance to hear how people in another country with similar development and circumstances are working on those problems,” Seely said. “There’s a lot to learn from other nations who, like us, are trying to make heritage a key economic feature of their tourism and future.”

For more information, contact Bruce Seely at the MTU Department of Social Sciences at 487-2113 or by e-mail at bseely@mtu.edu.



Jane Nordberg can be reached at jnordberg@mininggazette.com