I emailed Liz Conway, local bookbinder, to chat about preservation binding of this valuable old, and very tattered guide to the Roman Wall District, that came to my attention recently. Yes, she said, she could do it nicely in either hard or soft back. So that should preserve this relic for another generation or two, I should think.
Meanwhile, the photographs and advertisements are so intriguing, that they should really occupy a place here in the diary. I’m pretty sure some of the prints were part of the collection of glass plate negatives forwarded on from a Bellingham councillor to their counterpart in Allendale, some years ago — doubtless the Allen Valleys Local History Group has all the photographs in their archive. But in context they make fascinating browsing.
Someday, perhaps, a century or two hence, someone may unearth an old, tattered soft-bound copy of this Allendale Diary, and muse their way through. What might they make of us, I wonder, the things we’ve thought about this year?
Wonder where Hipsons was in Shield Street, think where I lived was a shoe shop in its day but could be wrong……
Larry
I was waiting to respond properly to this as I knew that Woodhorn Archives were scanning those glass plates you mentioned in your piece. They have come back to me now and I must say they are very illuminating on aspects of Allendale life. I’m trying to date them properly and there are some clues if you look more closely. Also, they were meant to be sold as postcards and therefore not to be seen much above a six by four inch size. Looking at them blown up on screen reveals so much more. So, the local history group is planning to exhibit the results, firstly at a meeting in November and hopefully, later on as an exhibition elsewhere.