A LOCAL historian and author has published his second work associated with the Stockton area's industrial heritage.

Alan Betteney has followed up his work on shipbuilding in Stockton and Thornaby with a 64-page book called The Brickworks of the Stockton-on-Tees Area.

The main part of the book is a gazetteer of the 80 to 90 brickworks that once flourished in the borough.

The area covered is from Wynyard, in the north, to Yarm and Picton, in the south, and Cowpen, Billingham and Haverton Hill, in the east, to Eaglescliffe and Long Newton, in the west.

The book, illustrated with old maps and photographs, outlines the history of many of the brickworks.

Mr Betteney, who is a member of the Tees Valley Heritage Group, said it had taken about seven years to complete the book, because of delays with funding and other difficulties.

He said: "There has been a lot of research to do, because there is not a lot of information available, and none of the brickworks is left.

"There is very little in the way of remains. There are some kilns at Picton, and some ponds in the country park at Cowpen, but everything else has been flattened and built on, or landscaped."

Brickworks began to spring up in the 17th Century, following the Great Fire of London. They started off as small, one-man concerns, but grew during the Industrial Revolution.

Mr Betteney said: "In the good old days, one man and his wife could produce up to 20,000 bricks a day by hand."

The book includes stories of the attraction of some works to "gentlemen of the road", and women workers who could shift 65 tons of bricks in a day.

The last remaining works in the Stockton area, at Coatham Stob, Eaglescliffe, closed in the 1990s, and was demolished in 2003. The site is now used as a transport depot, and the clay pits for landfill.

Mr Betteney said: "I knew nothing at all about brickworks until I started to compile this book, but it has been fascinating to find out about the history of it all."

The book costs £5.50 plus £1.50 for postage from Tees Valley Heritage Group, 24 Albert Road, Stockton TS19 7EW or from Stockton TIC, Preston Hall Museum and local book shops.