John Lysaght Esq 1832 - 1895

Founder of John Lysaghts Ltd who passed away shortly after the site of the Orb Steelworks was purchased, His company went on to become a major feature in the life of Newport,.

Steelworks Gates in 1935

The Steelworks main gates each gate featured the works Orb logo which was painted gold to make it stand out from the black painted gate.

Aerial View of the Steelworks in 1935

The gatehouse is located top right, Pill Farm house is located in the top left with the sports field and training school in front. The mid left is the Race which was the steelworks main factory floor during the works early years. The whole area shown in the photograph was cleared by July 2009 and is set to become the site of 550 homes.

Pill Farm House

the 100 Acre Pill Farm on the banks of the river Usk was bought by Lysaght's in 1895 from Col Lockwood. The Farm house was converted into the site offices.

Pill Farm House

The offices remained in use until the upper half of the steel works site was sold off for development in 2008, the offices were burnt out in a fire during march of 2009 just on month after my visit to the Orb Steelworks

The Race 1936

The stock of rolled sheet on the right is waiting for Annealing or coating the mills are located on the left of the building and the Annealers on the right in the background.

Hand Sheet Rolling 1936

Hand sheet rollers seen in the race during 1936.

Mechanisation of the Sheet Mills

To meet increasing demand for their sheet products several mills were improved during the early 1930's with chain driven sheet feeds and elevated returns greatly improving the production with fewer men required to run the machine.

Chemistry Lab 1920

The chemistry lab tested all incoming materials including coal, oils and steels using wet chemistry methods.

Calendar Room 1914

The calendar room monitored conditions in the annealing furnace 40 clockwork powered thermocouple recorders were installed the first installation of its type in the world.

Royal Visit of 1944

Mr RP Perry MBE General Manager and Mr Tom Crowther Mayor of Newport 1930/31 escort Queen Elizabeth and explain some of the details of the works.

The Lysaghts Excelsior's Amateur Football Club 1909

The works 1909-1910 football team became known as the Ironsides and went on to become Newport County AFC in 1912.

Lysaght's Amateur Football Club 1947 - 1948

South Wales League Champions, G Johnson, W Rogers, A Jordan, G Pitt, F Bough, A Hinton, M Lynch, A Jones, A Studley, D Lewis, G Gripton, J McLoughlan, W Screen, K Brown, H Priestnal, A Bell, K Priest, K Hughes, A Dando, Mr E C Lysaght, L Thorpe, Mr Way, T Smith, K Smith, H Walton, G Hill, J Carvell, J Lewis, T Allcock.

The Orb Cricket Team 1911

The Orb cricket team photographed in 1911 at the opening of the new Lysaght Cricket Pavilion on May 16th.

Lysaght's Amateur dramatic society 1958

The amateur dramatic society's production of trial and error in 1958 the cast includes Bill Clissold, Mr and Mrs Parry and Jean Phillips.

Ladies Tennis Team 1973

Sue Reed, Margaret Taylor, Karen Simms, Jennifer Beardmore.