Another Favourite

ss36, a photo by Forgotten Faces on Flickr.

I have to confess that I really like the early seaside photos and this is another one of my favourites.
I have created a group on Flickr called Vintage Seaside. There are over 1500 seaside photos there at the moment.

The "Betty" Cards

Ok, I have now uploaded the Betty cards to Flickr and here is the link to the Set that I have put them in. I have posted just four pictures here but it is best to go to Flickr to see them all.
This is a great little collection of photo's of someone through the early stages of her life and I dare say that in time we may find out a little more about Betty.

Betty Cards

Well, the "Betty" cards arrived today and I am now sure they are not of Betty Driver from Coronation Street. I have scanned them all but have not been able to upload to Flickr yet as I have been very busy today.
I am not too disappointed as I believe these cards have a story to tell and I am very pleased to have got them. I will upload tomorrow with all of the details.

Tea Time !

o9, a photo by Forgotten Faces on Flickr.

Carrying on with my look back at earlier uploads to Flickr I think this deserves another look. It's been really good for me to look through my collection again as I have not seen some of these cards for a couple of years now. Must make more time to browse !!

Betty ?

I am waiting for a group of postcards to arrive that I recently purchased on ebay. They are all supposed to be of the same girl but at different ages. The seller believes her name to be Betty.
Unfortunately there has been a delay in receiving these cards as the seller did not put enough postage on the parcel but that is all sorted now so I should get them this week.

Looking at the cards on ebay I have a feeling that these cards are of Betty Williams ( Driver ) who plays Betty Turpin in Coronation Street. I can't be totally sure even after checking out some pictures of her on the web but I have this feeling !

There are some studio portraits but also some family groups. I will wait for them to arrive and check out any messages on the reverse. The seller did say some cards had information on them.

As soon as I have them I will post them here and on Flickr. If it is Betty Driver I would like to try and return them to her.

This is the image of the group of cards taken from ebay

Oh..We Do Love to be Beside the Seaside !

ss22, a photo by Forgotten Faces on Flickr.

Another favourite of mine from my earlier uploads to FF

More Links to Research by Sarah

Sarah has carried out some research on a number of my cards apart from the wedding one so I thought it would be good to post some links to them...

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spm89 fg247 spm97 afa25 The Workington Set

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This has really been a good week for me and Forgotten Faces as we have now managed to get a lot of background information on a numer of cards...great stuff !

The Wedding

w30, a photo by Forgotten Faces on Flickr.

Well, Sarah has come up trumps again and has managed to put names to faces in this lovely wedding group. Also we now know the location which is Shoreham on Sea. She has also discovered a link to a local web site which has this exact same picture displayed along with lots more of the family.
Please click on the picture to read more on Flickr. I have included here the link to the local site but it is also in one of Sarah's comments on the picture.

Looking Back

ss10, a photo by Forgotten Faces on Flickr.

Thought I might start featuring a few postcards from way back when I started this project.
Also gives me a chance to revisit some photos that I have not seen for ages.

This is an early favourite of mine

A Quick Update on the House in Exeter.

Just wanted to say a big thankyou to Sarah my Flickr contact who did the research on the house and to post a link to her Flickr site

I am going to write to the address in Exeter and send a couple of prints. The people who live in the house may find it interesting and who knows...they might be related to the original occupants shown on the postcards. Bit of a long shot but stranger things have happened !

Also thanks to Family History Monthly Magazine who have tweeted about this on Twitter.

I will post an update if anything turns up.

A House - Then and Now

Going back to the point I made in my previous post about how important it was and is, to record as much information on the back of these old photos I can now show you some evidence of this.

Some time ago I purchased a batch of postcards that the seller was sure came from the same family and you can see these on my Flickr site in the set called A Family Album . Many of the photos were taken in a studio in Exeter, Devon so I assumed that this family lived in the West Country.
One of the postcards show two ladies standing outside a house and fortunately someone has written the first line of the address on the back of the card which is - 14 Churchill Road.

One of my contacts on Flickr has kindly taken the time to do some research on this set of photos and has come up the exact location of the house and it was and still is in Exeter. There is another picture of this house in the set but this time there is a young boy standing outside.

With the exact location known, my contact has carried out further research and has come up with lots of information about the house and the people who were living there.

The picture below is the house at 14 Churchill Road, Exeter as it was in the early 1900's



And thanks to Google Streetview this is the house today and as you can see, nothing has changed that much. The image below is interactive so you can zoom in and out and move around.


View Larger Map

Don't take any notice of the address shown on the Streetview image as they can be out by quite a bit.
I might now send a copy of the old photo to whoever is living in the house now. They might find it interesting and also give them the link to the Flickr image which shows the history of the house.

spm102

spm102, a photo by Forgotten Faces on Flickr.

It is not often that I buy just a single card of a male portrait but in this case I had to make an exception. I think this portrait is stunning and apart from being a very handsome young man he also has a " sense of purpose " about him.

Why oh why didn't people put information on the back of these cards. I would have loved to have found out a bit more about this young man.

St Philps School - Class 5

This card has just arrived and it has to be one of my favourites at the moment. I will try and find out a little more about St Philips School but there are a number of schools with this name and of course there is a good chance that this particular school may no longer be in existance.

The sad thing about these school group photos is that most of the children shown are probably no longer with us. I wonder what happened to them all ? Did they all survive to adulthood and have families of there own? What a shame that we shall really never know.

I will update this post if I manage to find out any more about Class 5.

Lots of views on Flickr !

Well, since the publication of this months Family History Monthly magazine the view counts on Forgotten Faces have gone through the roof. In just a few days there have been 5300 views with 1333 of these yesterday alone !
Its a pity there is no way I could make some money out of all these hits. It would help to finance some new material. Having said that I have just been going through a mountain of postcards that I have to scan and upload and thats going to keep me busy for a while but I do need some fresh stock.

Hats, hats and more hats !

I love this wedding card that I have recently obtained. The importance of hat wearing in the very early 1900's is clearly demonstrated here. I also like the way that the gentleman in the front row has decided not to wear a bowler hat like all of the other men. Maybe he was the father of the bride and wanted to stand out from the rest !

It's a shame that there is no information on the card about who these people were and I suppose it's a good lesson to us to make sure we always record information about our photographs for future generations.

Update on the Family History Magazine Project

Well, its been a hard couple of months since mum died but I am slowly getting on top of things again. Her house is now cleared and the keys have been handed back today. All we have left to do is to spread her ashes with dads.
Our holiday over the last couple of weeks was much needed and now its time to get back on track.

Julys issue of Family History Monthly magazine contains a large article about Forgotten Faces and I am very pleased with the finished item. If you can buy this magazine you will find the article on page 36 " Pictures of the Past ". It includes five pictures from FF. I am a happy bunny !

I must now press on and upload more pictures and more importantly get hold of some new material.

Family History Magazine Cover

Well, they have now printed June's edition and one of my images from Forgotten Faces is on the front cover. Very pleased with this and also got a mention on their Twitter site which pushed the view counts through the roof for a couple of days. All good stuff ! They may also be doing a feature on Forgotten Faces in their summer edition so watch this space !

The Top Three Pictures

Thought it would be nice to share the top three cards on my Flickr site based on view counts.

Coming in at number three and somewhat of a surprise with 1318 views is ..



And at number two with 1319 views is ..



And the current most popular card in my collection with 2999 views is ..

Update on the Family History Magazine Project

I have now provided the magazine with some hi-res images for the project and hopefully one of them will be on the front cover of the next issue. Looking forward to seeing the proofs and the finished product. As soon as I find out more I will post up some pictures.

Exciting News

Had an email from Family History Monthly magazine the other day and they would like to feature some of my postcards in the next issue and also use some for the front cover. This is really exciting and maybe get a few pennies as well. I will update this when I find out more.

Rocking Horse card

This is the single card that I purchased recently and as you can see it is not in the best of condition. I did start to tidy it up a bit on Photoshop but after a while I abandoned the project. Had I continued the image would have been so heavily doctored that there would have been very little left of the original image. Some things are meant to be I think. To be fair the image is 100 years old at least. It is still a lovley picture so best left alone !

This weeks Favourite

Out of all the new cards I received this week this is my favourite...



Followed closely by this one...

Arrived

Got the first batch of new cards on Saturday and I am very please with them. Just the odd one to come now so should get that soon. Hope to start uploading these this evening.

Success

Well, I was lucky with the auction and won the two lots of cards so I will be scanning and uploading them when they arrive. I was really pleased to win the single card I mentioned in my last post. Its not in the best condition but it shows a little girl standing by her rocking horse. I will upload to here as well.

New Stock

Well, I have had a quick look around on Ebay and have put a couple of bids on for some new cards. The first one is a group of 15 cards which , if I get them for my maximum bid will be good value. The other is a single card and not in the best condition but it is one of those " must haves "so I will let you know how I get on. I have a feeling that I will be outbid but we will see.

Todays Uploads to Flickr

Just a few uploads today due to the faded condition of the postcards. Had to do a little bit of work on Photoshop !
I try not to over-do the fixing, just restore a little colour to the really faded ones and remove any spots that draw your eye away from the subject matter but it still takes time.

Although I still have many cards to scan and upload I think I need some fresh stock so I am going to spend a bit of time later on Ebay to see what I can find.

The Flickr Widget

Installed the Flickr Widget the other day on the blog which lets readers see the last few uploads I have made. Its at the top of the page and also provides a direct link to my Forgotten Faces. Pretty good I think.

Managed to get a few uploads done and my favourite today is shown below. I know there were a few cute baby ones but there is a freshness about this picture that I think puts it at the top.

A Bit of a Quandary

Some while ago I was bidding on a collection of postcards of children dating from the early 1900's upto the 1930's. Unfortunately I was outbid but the seller displayed hi res pictures of them on the auction site and I saved them all on my pc.

Now, the quandary is - shall I display them on Flickr with a note saying that I do not actually own the cards ? The thing is there are some lovely cards here and it would be a shame for them not to be seen. I have uploaded four so you can see what I mean...


Forgotten Faces on Flickr

The Return of the Blogger

As you can see from the date of my last post I have been taking a few steps back from this blog and my Flickr site . I think that I needed to do this as I was getting pretty bogged down with the whole thing.
Its pleasing to see that although I have only uploaded a small amount of images over the last few weeks my all time view count has reached a staggering 306,416. There have been lots of comments and lots of interest shown in certain pictures.

With this in mind, I think it is now time to press on with the rest of my collection and get the scanner whirring into action again.

Forgotten Faces on Flickr