Interview: Angela Atkinson, author of books including Secret Swindon and Swindon in 50 buildings

Swindon Link's Barrie Hudson speaks to local author and writer of the blog 'Born Again Swindonian', Angela Atkinson.

Angela Atkinson has no time for those who would have us believe Swindon is an architectural desert.

“What would you rather have? Would you rather have classical architecture with columns that was funded by slavery and tobacco, or would you rather have Victorian red brick funded by good, honest toil?

“That’s what I say, and I know what I’d rather have.

“As I wrote in Secret Swindon, ‘Let’s go to Swindon for a spa break,’ said nobody ever. ‘Let’s go to Swindon for jobs and economic prosperity,’ said thousands and thousands!”

In addition to being an author, Angela is a copywriter and Volunteer Area Lead with the Federation of Small Businesses.

Her blog, Born Again Swindonian, is described as a personal celebration of the town, and can be found at swindonian.me

Secret Swindon, her first book, was published in 2016, and delves into aspects of the town and its history of which many people are unaware.

Swindon in 50 Buildings came in 2019, as did Ken White: Muralist and Painter, which is about Swindon’s most famous living artist.

Swindon: A Born Again Swindonian’s Guide came in 2020.

The author’s description of herself as a born again Swindonian is not an idle one.

Originally from a mining community whose nearest town was Worksop in Nottinghamshire, Angela came to Swindon in the 1990s with her daughter who was then 12.

“I came to Swindon with no negative perceptions of the town. In fact, I came here thinking I had come to the land of milk and honey, and that was because I had, compared to the devastation left by Margaret Thatcher and the mine closures.

“I came as a single parent. I had to find full time work, so I spent about 15 years, going to work, coming home, having my tea, getting washed, going to bed and doing it all the next day, and taking not much more interest in Swindon than that.

“I liked it well enough - this was in the days when we still had Littlewoods, British Home Stores - a really good town centre.

“But it was only when I was at university, doing my English degree, about 10 years ago now, that I started the blog to amass material for a travel-writing module. A conversation with my lecturer triggered it.”

Angela told her lecturer that she didn’t do much travelling - and was inspired by his response.

“I’ll never forget this. He said, ‘Angela, the last thing I want on my desk is another gap year in Thailand. Tell me what you see when you walk to your Tesco Express.’

“I just wrote stuff over the summer before we went back for that third year, and so it was from that, really.

“A lot of it is to do with what I left behind, which was slag heaps, mass unemployment and emphysema - oh, and heroin addiction. Worksop became the heroin capital of Europe by the 1990s, or even the late eighties, such was the level of hopelessness.

“Obviously all of that influenced my affection for Swindon.

“A general affection slowly turned into a passion.

“When you think of Swindon’s story, that these men and their families walked - they walked - from Scotland and Wales and the north of England knowing nothing other than that there was opportunity...they came here and they built not only a railway but a community.”

The pandemic hampered her schedule, but there are further research and writing projects, with progress detailed in the blog.

One is a sequel to Swindon in 50 Buildings entitled Swindon in 50 more buildings, with about half of the entries complete and available on the blog.

“What I’m aiming to do is one or two from the wider borough, some more of the railway-related buildings that I didn’t do in the book, basically just trying to plug some gaps.

“It’ll be a bit more random than the book was, really, just filling in things I wanted to do but couldn’t.”

Angela has also joined forces with two other well-known figures on the local history and heritage scene, Roger Ogle and Frances Bevan, for a book called West Swindon: What the Eye Can’t See, which she hopes will be pubished this autumn.