Photo Archive: Roundabout, Scarborough, 2011.

Tags

Beach, bus, circle, Coast, double decker bus, open top bus, Public Transport, roundabout, Scarborough., Seaside.

Rural Idylls.

Tags

cottage, Ephemera, farm house, old photographs, portrait photography, rural idyll, Scarborough., Shield Row, studio portrait.

Both of these studio portraits seems to be referencing a very romantic view of country life.

A couple pose by a garden wall in front of a country cottage, which is actually a painted backdrop hanging in a photographic studio in Scarborough (on the back of the photograph is printed “E Taylor. 63 Eastboro[ugh]. Scarboro[ugh]“). The garden wall appears to have a rather rough, realistic, texture to it, whilst the cottage is a rather fantastic assortment of architectural feature, complete with flowers climbing up the wall.

In the second photograph a lady stand behind a crude constructed gate or fence, which stands at the end of a country lane. The lane is lined with clumps of flowers and in the distance can be seen a very stylised pair of buildings; a farm house possibly, with some very substantial trees behind it. The back of this photograph only has half of a label, “Stephen Young, Shields Row, S…“. Could that be Shields Row, Stanley, County Durham? It appears that Shields Row is not a common place name or so it would seem following my internet search engine enquiries.

What do these photographs tell us? Perhaps they’re about an increasingly urban and industrialised society looking back to an idealised vision of it’s rural beginnings.

“Love Cyril”.

Tags

allotment gardening, Ephemera, gardening, King Edward VII, Postcard, Scarborough., Sheffield, Stamps

Another postcard from “Grannies Parlour” in Hull. What a lovely garden or is it an allotment? It’s rather narrow, but it looks like this gardener and his young assistant are making the most of all the available space. The young lad appears to be in his Sunday best, but the flat caps suggest a family connection with the more sensibly dressed man in front of the greenhouse. The postmark is smudged (and upside down), but I think I can make out a 10 and the stamp is a Edward VII green half-penny, so its definitely Edwardian, all-be-it very late Edwardian. It is addressed to a Mr. Robinson of Scarborough. The address looks like “Saudside”, but its more likely “Sandside”, right by the harbour in Scarborough, assuming there is a 29 Sandside. The message is addressed to “F & M” (father and mother?) and describes a trip to Sheffield; “We had a good day in Sheffield. Went home on the 6.25. Tired & worn out”.    The last line makes reference to “going in the chair next week”; a wheel chair do you think? If so that can’t be Cyril in the photograph, can it? He looks fighting fit to me.