Featured Acquisition January 2018

The Importance of Photographic Evidence

During the summer of 2017, the Sudbury Ephemera team spent all its sessions sorting through the Thornton’s Estate Agency property details – a previously featured acquisition which explained how some of the house details show the living space and facilities available to some of our ancestors who lived in Lion Walk and Inkerman Row.

At the end of our last session for 2017 one of the team found the details for and two photographs of the Deeks and Son shop. This shop was next to the then Midland Bank and eventually became part of the now HSBC Bank. It was unfortunately one of the properties that was badly damaged during the fire of 2015. As many people ploughed through photographs of the town after that tragic fire, it became clear that although the fire damaged area was recognised as a special feature of the town, there were very few photographs of the buildings available. Numerous photographs exist of the Corn Exchange (library) and St Peter’s Church, but the bottom of Market Hill is mostly forgotten. The same is true of the north side of St Peter’s church where searches were made in earnest to try and find a photograph of the previous drinking trough, with no success.

The photographs shows the telephone box, a solid cast iron one, designed to keep the caller safe. As of 2018 many telephone boxes have disappeared, as they are deemed no longer necessary because many people have mobile phones. Phone boxes (or more prosaically ‘telephone kiosks’) are a part of history that has changed from a 4d coin box that could easily be broken in to, to the STD 3d and time limited call, to the use of a prepaid card system, to becoming obsolete (see the Telephone Box for a detailed timeline).

The property is advertised as being for sale by auction and of course the hotel where the auction would take place, the Four Swans, North Street was also destroyed by fire.

Before destroying any photographs of the town, please consider the possibility of donating them to the Sudbury Photographic Archive or Sudbury Ephemera Archive, as they may be able to preserve them for posterity.


Previous Featured Acquisitions

Timetables and Public Transport (Featured Acquisition November 2017)
Thornton’s Estate Agency Property Details (Featured Acquisition October 2017)
Local Adverts (Featured Acquisition August 2017)
The Sudbury Parish Recorder (Featured Acquisition July 2017)
The Sudbury Borough Surveyor (Featured Acquisition June 2017)
Elections (Featured Acquisition May 2017)
Trinity Congregational Chapel – Spite Chapel (Featured Acquisition March 2017)
Property Deeds (Featured Acquisition February 2017)
Town Events (Featured Acquisition January 2017
Clubs and Societies (Featured Acquisition December 2016)
Sudbury Grammar School (Featured Acquisition November 2016)
Retail (Featured Acquisition October 2016)
Fire! fire! (Featured Acquisition September 2016)
Carnivals, Regattas and Fetes (Featured Acquisition August 2016)
Autograph books from the Bell Vue Red Cross Hospital Sudbury (Featured Acquisition July 2016)
What can we find out from a receipt? (Featured Acquisition June 2016)
The indenture of Henry Brackett, 6th July 1844 (Featured Acquisition May 2016)
Nuisance Books or Inspectors’ Journals (Featured Acquisition April 2016)

For more details of all the items we hold, see our Ephemera Catalogue.


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