17 August 2024 : Snap

 

Those ever-present companies of seaside photographers - going by names such as Seaside Snaps and the like - deserve recognition for their role in documenting twentieth-century life. My two examples document life in Bridlington in 1950: that’s my father and uncle on the left and that’s me on the right!

16 August 2024 : North Bridge Messing

This is the last of the "taken whilst waiting for my wife who was at the dentist" sequence which is probably a good thing as I was getting a bit silly by this point. The photo was taken from North Bridge, Halifax looking towards Dean Clough. The messing about was done on the seat opposite the dentists whilst waiting for my wife to come out.

15 August 2024 : Beacons

 

They used to hang bodies up there, or light beacons to warn of invading Spanish armadas or French onion sellers. They had fancy beacons to shine down on the folk of Halifax below. What they should have had, however, was a good old cast iron gas light, that would have been a beacon befitting Halifax and its eponymous hill.

14 August 2024 : Green

100 years ago you would have had difficulty seeing the hills that surround Halifax because of the smoke and the smog. 50 years ago you would have seen them but they would have been bare and battle-scarred, testament to what industry can do to land. Now they are green with stone-coloured highlights. You can say what you want, but that's progress.

13 August 2024 : Patterns

 

The second of the series of photos taken while waiting for my wife to emerge from the dentist's. These are the steps leading up to Broad Street Plaza in Halifax - a delightfully curve-less concrete and steel prospect that faces off against the classical elegance of Halifax's Victorian Town Hall on the other side of the street.