Vanishing Cambridgeshire

Author: Mike Petty

Vanishing Cambridgeshire

In 1925 a group of Cambridge antiquarians set off on a journey into the unknown. They loaded their car with cameras, tripods and glass-plate negatives and their journey took them into a landscape of ancient remains, crumbling churches and dilapidated cottages, where residents drank water from wells. While others explored the relics of ancient Egypt, these intrepid explorers never strayed more than a few miles from the magnificent towers of the university town of Cambridge.
For this was Cambridgeshire in the inter-war years. The explorers - a printer, a doctor, an anatomist and a pathologist - were members of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society and they were reviving a project that had begun at the start of the century.
Their mission was to produce a photographic survey of Cambridgeshire, to record both buildings and a way of life, the vanishing landmarks of a region.
Now Cambridgeshire historian Mike Petty has made a powerful selection of photographs from their pioneering survey to give this insight into a way of life that has disappeared forever.
The photographs of the town of Cambridge show streets that have since changed out of recognition, industries, shops and homes that have vanished from the map. Many of the pictures have been copied from glass lantern slides that have never been seen since they were taken over 60 years ago.
The photographs are supplemented by contemporary reminiscences and newspaper stories that paint a picture in words of the hardship of country life before World War Two.
The result is a compelling study of a county that in many ways has changed beyond all recognition - Vanishing Cambridgeshire.