Meet Our Networkers in Wales

Vice Chair, Web Officer, Regional Adviser Wales

Beth Thomas

At present I’m the Vice Chair of the OHS but I’ve been a Trustee since the 1980s. I’m also a Regional Adviser for Wales. I’m now retired, but before that I worked for many years at the open-air museum at St Fagans, Cardiff. I worked there as a dialect researcher, sound archivist and oral historian, eventually becoming Keeper of History and Archaeology for the National Museum of Wales as a whole. Before retiring, I was very proud to have led the content team for the redevelopment of St Fagans as a participatory national museum of history – a project that resulted in the museum being awarded the Arts Fund Museum of the Year in 2019. Since retirement, I have been responsible for redeveloping and managing the OHS’s website. If you are in Wales and would like advice about an oral history project, please get in touch.

Rwy’n siarad Cymraeg ac wedi gweithio gyda chymunedau ar hyd a lled Cymru. Os ydych yn gwneud prosiect hanes llafar trwy gyfrwng y Gymraeg, mae pob croeso ichi gysylltu am gyngor.

Regional Adviser Wales

Emily Hewitt

I am a Regional Adviser for Wales and currently work as Archivist at West Glamorgan Archive Service in Swansea.  

Between 2016 and 2025 I was Assistant Archivist at the Richard Burton Archives, Swansea University, and supported undergraduate and postgraduate students using oral history as part of their research. I was closely involved with the Voices of Swansea University, 1920-2020 oral history project, with Dr Sam Blaxland.

My oral history career began at the British Library, where I worked from 2012 to 2016 as Assistant Archivist with the Oral History department and National Life Stories. In 2017 I was Project Manager on the Gower Landscape Partnership oral history project, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund to preserve the history and heritage of Gower through oral history. 

My professional interests focus on the archival management of oral history and exploring ways in which oral history can be made more accessible. If you are in Wales and would like advice about oral history, I’d be happy to help.