Romeo And Juliet

A Modern Day Romeo Installs A Juliet Balcony
A Modern Day Romeo Installs A Juliet Balcony
River Don and St George’s Church, Doncaster.
An old faded postcard comes up as fresh as a sepia daisy following a good scanning. These days the church is surrounded by plate-glass and concrete buildings, but the Rover Don still flows quietly by.
Two people sat on a boat (I don’t know who they are) in a harbour (I don’t know where it is), a long time ago (I don’t know exactly when). Despite all the unknowns, the picture is a treat.
Street photography is all the rage at the moment. As a photographic genre it is usually said to date from the introduction of miniature 35mm cameras in the 1930s. But this old print – which appeared in a mixed batch of old photographs bought on eBay – dates from at least a decade earlier. It really is a fine example: whatever the camera, it has managed to capture a moment in time with both style and substance. That look between the two girls is worth a short novella, that busy background could give rise to a short thesis on social history.
I live in Fixby, which today is in Huddersfield. According to Wikipedia, “Fixby is traditionally part of Huddersfield“. This is not the case at all – the township of Fixby was traditionally part of Halifax. It was only transferred to Huddersfield (and Kirklees) when the M62 motorway was built and someone decided that the motorway would henceforth be the division between the two boroughs. One can only assume that, at the same time, they dug up this ancient dividing stone and shipped it off to retirement in a park in West Vale. I plan to kidnap the old stone and replace it in its original position and thus return Fixby to its rightful place in the world. Has anyone got a chisel I can borrow?
This little albumen carte-de-visite of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales (who was later to become King Edward VII) turned up in a job lot of old Victorian prints I bought the other week. It dates from about 1862 and comes from the Paris studios of Emile Desmaisons.
The print is now over 150 years old and as fresh as a pasteboard daisy. How many of the smartphone snaps of today will achieve the same longevity?