Kendal Past And Present
Britain In Old Photographs
John Marsh £11.99
Sutton Publishing
LONG before Kendal’s main street heaved with tourists and the beeps of frustrated motorists, the Auld Grey Town was alive to the bleats of sheep and the clop of horses’ hooves.
In a new book, Kendal Past and Present, town-based author John Marsh leads the older generation on a stroll down memory lane and the young on a voyage of discovery.
Packed with photographs - many of them previously unpublished - it shows how the town has slowly transformed from the sparsity of days gone by to its current identity as a tourist haven.
In the grainy black and white days of long ago, the streets look eerily empty. With no cars to jam the highways or street furniture to rest, it is another world of horses and carts, shadowy serious figures and ramshackle but enduring homes and cosy buildings.
In some cases, the buildings are no longer there, or have been renovated, repaired and adapted to new uses.
Crucially, it shows before and after pictures in many cases, so the reader can see the transformation of places like the Romney Road foot bridge, St George’s Church, Highgate in the 1880s and the Old Shambles.
Marvel at the line-up of shabby kids in a line across the old Syke on Fellside, where smoke billows across the rooftops and cats prowl the cobbles.
See how well-dressed crowds clutched umbrellas and packed a barge for a Whitsuntide trip with Change Bridge in the background. Or Gillinggate, devoid of its margin of cars, resembling a dirt track with no markings and ornate gas lamps standing as proud guardians of the pavement.
There are sighs of regret too, as you notice how the individual shops that once gave a town a unique identity now no longer exist so that every town centre now boasts the same collection of high street retailers, be you in Kendal or Kent.
Nonetheless, as Mr Marsh, a local historian, acknowledges in his opening notes, the level of interest in the town he calls home remains high.
He writes: “As a town guide, I discovered that the true story of Kendal has been wrongly written for well over a century and much of it has just been made up.
“In the early days of the town walks, I thought that local people would be upset to find that their long-held knowledge of the town was based on fairy stories. But as more and more of the true story of the town came to light, the walkers appreciated having their knowledge updated.”
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