5 out of 5 stars
I have lived in Dorset since 2005 and even though I am not from here I have always felt at home here. I knew that my grandfather was born in Bridport, but it was only after we dd some family history research that we realised that there was a whole Dorset side of the family that we knew nothing about. It is probably why I feel so at home here.
The postcards that are featured in the book were taken around the time that my grandfather was growing up in the county and it sent shivers down my spine seeing the places that he might have seen in his time. This volume concentrates on the towns in Dorset. These have seen massive changes of the last century, often changing from small market towns to much larger municipal centres that we find today.
The postcards are really well-curated, with images selected to show where vast changes have happened as well as some that show places and buildings that are still around today. I did like the fact that they even knew the names of some of the people that were in the photos. It is quite strange seeing a road that I drive down almost every day taken 100 years ago.
This is another excellent collection of collated postcards from the Barry Cuff Collection. Each town featured has an introduction and each of the postcards has a paragraph of details about it or the subject matter. Burnett with the assistance of others has created a fine companion volume to the villages and countryside book published a couple of years ago. If you are a fan of the country then this is a must, but if you know the county then you’ll probably like to see some of the places that you know and love from a century ago.
How lovely! I have a small collection of postcards of the Globe at Swanage – more than you would think you could get – which was part of my general collection I made as a teenager. Although our ancestral homeland is actually Somerset, Dorset is the place my paternal grandmother lived and my aunty and cousins still live, so I go there fairly often (though not for a while and stymied at the last hurdle in the autumn by a cold!) and know it quite well, especially the coastal part.
The companion volume to this is equally good too, that covers the countryside. Next time you are this way we’ll have to meet for a coffee