The Rolt Lecture was established in 1975 to honour the first President of the AIA, L T C Rolt, who had died the previous year. The first Lecture was delivered by Professor Alec Skempton at the Annual Conference of the Association, held in Durham in September 1975, and this was the first of an unbroken series of annual lectures that has continued to the present year. From the outset, the intention has been to commission a person of distinction in academic scholarship or professional experience to speak on a theme of their own choice, but with some industrial archaeological interest. Some of the Rolt Lecturers have been senior members of the Association, but others have been leaders in business or the professions, in museums or local government, frequently being chosen as people knowledgeable in the industrial archaeology of the area in which the Annual Conference is being held. In 2010 the normal lecture was replaced by a Rolt Symposium with a series of short personal recollections from people who knew Tom Rolt.
Listed below are the lecturers in each year and their subjects, together with the issue of Industrial Archaeology Review in which the lecture was published.
All editions of I A Review are now available to AIA Members and others with a subscription online at: T & F Online
| 1975 | A W Skempton | Engineers of Sunderland Harbour | IAR 1.2 |
| 1976 | Frank Nixon | Aircraft Industry (Unnamed) | (Not published) |
| 1977 | D S L Cardwell | History of Technology: Now and in the Future | IAR 3.2 |
| 1978 | A R Griffin | Sir Humphrey Davy: His Life and Work | IAR 4.3 |
| 1979 | Arthur Raistrick | The Old Furnace at Coalbrookdale | IAR 4.2 |
| 1980 | Joe Bagley | (Title unrecorded) | (Not published) |
| 1981 | Bernard Kaucas | Railway Buildings | (Not published) |
| 1982 | Michael Robbins | What must we keep? | IAR 6.2 |
| 1983 | M J T Lewis | The Water Supply of Lincoln | IAR7.1 |
| 1984 | John Harris | Industrial Espionage in the 18th Century | IAR 7.1 |
| 1985 | Douglas Hague | The Artist as Witness | IAR 7.2 |
| 1986 | Neil Cossons | Amateurs and Professionals | (Not published) |
| 1987 | Angus Buchanan | The Lives of the Engineers | IAR 11.1 |
| 1988 | John Butt | Landscape with Machines | (Not published) |
| 1989 | Kenneth Powell | Re-use of Industrial Buildings | (Not published) |
| 1990 | J Kenneth Major | Wind Engines | IAR 14.1 |
| 1991 | W K V Gale | Researching Iron and Steel: A Personal View | IAR 15.1 |
| 1992 | Barrie Trinder | Archaeology of the Food Industry 1660-1960 | IAR 15.2 |
| 1993 | Marilyn Palmer | Industrial Archaeology: Continuity and Change | IAR 16.2 |
| 1994 | Edwin Course | Engineering Works in Rural Areas | IAR 18.2 |
| 1995 | David Crossley | The Fairbanks of Sheffield | IAR 19.1 |
| 1996 | Peter White | I.A. in Wales | (Not published) |
| 1997 | Michael Stratton | New materials for a New Age | IAR 21.1 |
| 1998 | Keith Falconer | Swindon – Brunel’s Ugly Duckling | IAR 22.1 |
| 1999 | Alan Crocker | Early water turbines in Britain | IAR 22.2 |
| 2000 | Ken Hudson/Shane Gould | Retrospect & Prospect | IAR 23.1 |
| 2001 | Stuart Smith | Industrial Museums in Landscapes | IAR 24.1 |
| 2002 | John Hume | Technology as Culture | IAR 25.1 |
| 2003 | David de Haan | New Research on the Iron Bridge | IAR 26.1 |
| 2004 | Denis Smith | Landscape with Writers | IAR 27.2 |
| 2005 | Mike Nevell | Recent Trends in I.A. Research | IAR 28.1 |
| 2006 | David Gwyn | Industrial Archaeology on the Periphery | IAR 29.1 |
| 2007 | Colin Rynne | Technological Change as a ‘Colonial’ Discourse | IAR 30.1 |
| 2008 | Wayne Cocroft | Dan Dare’s Lair; The I.A. of Britain’s Post-War Technological Renaissance | IAR 31.1 |
| 2009 | David Alderton | Death of the Industrial Past? | IAR 33.2 |
| 2010 | Buchanan et al | Remembering Rolt: A Symposium in honour of the 100th Anniversary of L. T. C. Rolt’s Birth | IAR 33.1 |
| 2011 | Patrick M Malone | Dams and Damages: Controversies Over Waterpower in Lowell | IAR 34.1 |
| 2012 | Shane Gould | Industrial Heritage at Risk | IAR 37.2 |
| 2013 | Miles Oglethorpe | The Public Benefit of Industrial Heritage; Taking a Positive View | IAR 36.2 |
| 2014 | Richard Newman | Harbour developments as a precursor for industrialisation: Lancaster and Whitehaven | (Not published) |
| 2015 | John Minnis | Defining the Vintage Car: L T C Rolt, the Vintage Sports Car Club and the rise of motoring heritage | IAR 39.1 |
| 2016 | John Yates | The Three Ages of Ditherington Flax Mill | IAR 38.2 |
| 2017 | Nigel Crowe | Conserving the Waterways Heritage | IAR 40.2 |
| 2018 | Geoffrey Stell | Science and Engineering at War: Scapa Flow, 1939-45 | IAR 41.2 |
| 2019 | Peter Stanier | Landscapes Without machines: Remembering the little things | IAR 42.1 |