Welcome to the Website of Alan Burnett: writer, blogger, collector of old photographs, and devotee of all things pointless and inconsequential.
Paris Pub
I’ve always been attracted to this part of Halifax: the steep hills, cobbled streets, brooding mills ….. and, of course, the delights of the Shears Inn, whose stone-tiled roof features in this photo of mine from 40 or 50 years ago. There’s a story which says the area’s name – Paris Gates – came about when the final letter “h” fell off the original “Parish Gates” sign. I prefer the idea that it was the entrance to an early attempt at a…
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From The Archives
I’ve always had a fondness for old newspapers: give me a half-comfy chair and a pile of old newspapers, and I’m a happy man. If I can’t get my hands on the…
More Shapes
Some shapes are instantly identifiable: the distant sweep of the moor-lined hills and the grand lines of a dye-works chimney that had ideas above its industrial station. The whole scene viewed from…
The Shape Of Things Gone By
This is not so much the shape of things to come as the shape of things gone by. That unmistakable shape of 1980s cars, TV aerials, telephone lines stretched across streets -…
The Only Decent Place In Fixby
This early twentieth century picture postcard has a fine view of Fixby Hall, which was one of the ancestral homes of the Thornhill family, but, by the time of this…
Timeless Style
The Victorian photographer, John Bell, promised “photography in the latest styles” on the reverse of his classic carte de visites. There is, however, something timeless about the face featured on…
Albert In A Flap
Our Sepia Saturday theme this week is all about strange shapes, and the closest I seem to be able to get to it is this photograph from almost 100 years…
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