The personal archive of Margaret Harrison CBE, founder of Home-Start, has been protected for the future as it has been donated to the British Library.

Margaret, who died in 2015, founded the first Home-Start in Leicester 1973. It was a pilot project after her experiences talking with parents in local parent and toddler groups around the city. She realised that the best way to provide meaningful support to a parent was by visiting them in their own home. She found the most effective way of improving outcomes for children was by supporting parents.

Following the success of the initial Home-Start in Leicester, Margaret was personally involved with helping to spread the idea into towns and communities. Firstly around Leicestershire and the East Midlands, then across the UK and internationally.

The archive contains correspondence, newspaper cuttings, photos and documents related to the growth of Home-Start. From an informal group of friends and supporters in Leicester to a nationwide and international movement of volunteers as Margaret went on to inspire the growth of similar Home-Start organisations around the world.

The power of Home-Start was that each project was an independent charity, bound by the belief in the power of non-judgemental, compassionate support for families delivered in parents’ homes by volunteers. Whilst also being responsive to the needs of their local community.

In the 1980s, and into the late 1990s, Home-Start was one of the fastest growing organisations of its kind. The number of families that Home-Start supported and the number of referrals for families looking for support is higher than ever. Fifty years on, 44,000 families and 79,000 children benefit from Home-Start support in the UK.

As the archive material was picked up from the Home-Start UK office in Leicester, Margaret’s daughter, Jane Lund said:

“Margaret’s collected papers are leaving Leicester for the first time! They contain her thoughts and writings, her awards and her abundant communications with people from all walks of life. She created Home-Start with ‘most heart’ (an anagram of Home-Start). It's good to know her own collection will be in such good hands, available to inspire and enrich the lives of people for decades and centuries to come.”

Home-Start UK deputy chief executive, Vivien Waterfield CBE said:

“Home-Start was founded as a local organisation in an ordinary house in Leicester. Over the years it spread throughout the country and then around the world. Many thousands of people have been involved in the growth and success of the organisation, but it is because of the work of one remarkable woman that we are here at all. We are very proud that Margaret’s archive will be kept by the British Library. We hope it will be useful for others who want to learn more about the power of ordinary people to make an extraordinary and lasting difference to society.”

The archive was collected in person by representatives from the British Library.

Eleanor Casson, Curator, Contemporary Archives and Manuscripts, Politics, Science & Society at The British Library said “The British Library is pleased to have acquired The Margaret Harrison Archive consisting of the personal papers of Margaret Harrison, founder of Home-Start. The Library will hold the collection in perpetuity as part of our National Collections in the Politics, Science & Society, Contemporary Archives and Manuscripts Team. In due course, the collection will be catalogued and made available to researchers in the Manuscripts Reading Room in the Library's St Pancras building."

Over the past 50 years, Home-Start has supported 1.5 million children and 700,000 families. Since the first volunteers began supporting families in Leicester, Home-Start volunteers have given 15 million hours of support to families.