British museums remember the 1984 miners’ strike

The danum Gallery, Library and Museum in Doncaster feels the need to explain something to visitors to one of its exhibitions. “A trade union”, a screen in the gallery informs them, “is an organisation of members who are employees in a particular industry or service”. The gallery goes on to explain what coal is, and provides a lump of the stuff for illustration. It seems odd, until you realise how few Britons are now members of unions and how very little coal is mined or burnt in the country. Forty years is a long time.In March 1984 most British coal miners struck in protest against pit closures. It was the beginning of a bitter dispute that lasted for a year and ended in defeat for the miners. At least ten museums and galleries have put on exhibitions to mark the anniversary, some larger than others. Four are in Yorkshire, where miners were particularly militant and clashes with the police were violent. The exhibitions are strikingly ambivalent—so much so that they hint at a profound change in Britain.