Cars and their proud owners is this weeks’s theme from Sepia Saturday - a popular topic and I revisit photograhs from my family collection and those of my local heritage group - Auld Earlston.
My parents wth my Aunt Fran in the middle, with my brother and Imyself. I have my pigtails pinned on top of my head, Austrian style. I presume my Ucle Fred was taking the picture.
Band of brothers - my father with his older brother Fred c.1960s
Dad again, John Weston (on the left) with his younger brother
Charles. I was delighted to get this photograph from my cousin, as it
is one of the few photographs I have of my father prior to his marriage
in 1938 to my mother, and means a lot to me. John and Charles were close as
brothers and often went on motoring trips together. Here looking very suave in a smart casual style of the day. c.1936.
A happy photograph of my father with a later car.
A photograph from my cousin's collection on his Oldham Family
From Baker to Butcher - with a rather rickety looking vehicle belonging to Donaldson family in Earlston - no relation!
Andrew Taylor & Sons, Ironmonger & Grocer in Earlston,
- listed in a Directory of 1931.
Back to Family
A photograph of my elegant mother taken I suspect before my parents married in 1938. She never learned to drive.
Like Mother, LIke Daughter
Fast forward to 1968 (this photograph was dated) - I am surprised that my father allowed someone to sit on the car.
This was my husband's first car -
a silver grey Ford Escort, bought just a few weeks before we first met
in 1970. He was always proud of his cars and looked after them well.
This brings back memories of our engagement. It must have been love,
that he actually suggested I sat on top of the car for this photograph -
not something he has allowed since! But he did spread out the tartan
rug for me. For once I am quite in fashion with my miniskirt, peter pan
collar blouse, and
1970's striped coat!
By 1972 we had graduated to a bronze Ford Cortina (right) and
this reminds me of the time when we were planning for the birth of our
daughter - so a larger car was called for with room for the pram and all
the baby paraphernalia etc. This photograph was taken near
Smailholm Tower in the Scottish Borders.
My brother (the tiny tot in the first photograph) with his pride and joy - pity, though, that the car bonnet was cut off the image!
My mother outside our home in Edinburgh, c.1960s
Mum
and my Aunt Edith - they were very close as sisters (born only a year
and a week apart) and Edith was also my much loved godmother. Here
taken c. 1965 against the far background of the historic Forth Rail Brid and the tower of the new Road
Bridge, completed in 1964. This was most likely a Sunday outing which
my father enjoyed doing, but look at their formal wear - hat, gloves
and court shoes for just going out in the car!
The
car daughter and I hired on our trip to New England in 1996 - my first
visit there since I had spent a year working in Cambridge, Mass
1965-66. This was in Falmouth, Cape Cod where we stayed in this
wonderful cottage and made a magical trip on a beautiful Autumn day
sailing across to Martha's Vineyard.
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And Finally - to early days of the motor car as described in a report in “The Southern Reporter” newspaper of 24th March 1898.
"MOTOR CAR SPOTTED IN EARLSTON - A motor car passed through the village on Sunday morning. The two gentlemen who were driving it left Newcastle-on-Tyne the previous day en route for Edinburgh. In this neighbourhood one of the tyres got damaged and it was resolved to put up at the Red Lion.
This was done and the car when it reached the hotel, being stopped for a little while, was quickly surrounded and examined with no small degree of curiosity, this being the first time such a machine has been seen in operation here. "
It was obviously a newsworthy event!
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Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity
to share their family history through photographs.
Click HERE to find out what other bloggers have found
in this week's prompt photograph.
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Great pix of family & cars - some I remember from other posts, some I haven't seen before. The 1898 newspaper article was a hoot. :) I remember being at an auto show in the 1960s in San Francisco back when we were driving those large cars we called "boats" in later years, where the small compact Honda was first shown & everyone crowded around to see & remark on such a small car - some saying they'd never drive something so small. And then came the gas shortage days & suddenly everyone was looking for smaller cars that didn't use so much gas! :)
ReplyDeleteAnother great medley of photos to match our theme. I like the early tradesman vans because only a few years before those men would been photographed next to their horse-drawn wagons. Until I visited Britain for the first time, I had never understood why British automobiles were so much smaller than comparable American cars. But when I got to drive on England's maze of little country lanes or Scotland's steep twisty mountain roads, I quickly learned to appreciate being in a smaller, narrower vehicle!
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