ABSTRACT
As a lifelong Corby resident, looking back, it would be difficult to over-estimate the importance of the establishment of the Pen Green Centre in 1983. In 1980 the British Steel Corporation had announced the closure of the huge iron- and steel-making plant that had been the economic foundation of the town. In 1983 the community was still suffering the social and economic fallouts of high unemployment; in 1983 the adult male unemployment rate in the wards surrounding the Pen Green Centre reached 46%.
