Aerial view of Huish Church discovered...1929!
Found this aerial view of St Mary's Church at Huish Episcopi this week. Dated 1929.
The only familiar buildings apart from the church are the church hall opposite on one side and the vicarage opposite on the other. You can also see the war memorial, just a few years old at that point (think it was unveiled in 1926) and which of course only listed those locals killed in the 1914-18 conflict, the Second World War hadn't happened yet.
Notice what looks like allotments on the land where the Courtfield houses now stand. The graveyard also appears far smaller than it is today...and there's no church car park.
To give us an idea of what was going on back in 1929...just down the road from Huish Church at the Rose and Crown (above)...Eileen Scott was living with her parents Maud and Eli. She was just 6 years-old.
- and several of my own great grandparents were alive and kicking....in Wearne, Bow Street, Curry Rivel and Street.
Indeed, in 1929 Langporters were still all living under gas light, parafin and candles - the town didn't get electricity until the early 1930s...and both Langport East and West railway stations would still have been open.
In international politics, Hitler was already stirring things up as an opposition leader in Germany. He came to power 4 years later in 1933.
Here's another aerial view - this time of Langport - also dated 1929.
The
large building in the centre on the top side of the road is the primary
school, to the right is what was the police station.
You can just make out the old barn opposite the school which for many of us was a motorcycle shop and car mechanic's in the early 80s, before that in the late 60s it was where the school dinners were made before being carried across the road.
(it could also have been one of Boilertec's old addresses)
I have no idea what the large plot of buildings was directly opposite the school and to the left of that long barn, but to the left again is, I think, the old cattle market. This later became the police station and the telephone exchange.
It is also where Langport's air raid siren was put several decades later, on top of a pole, during the cold war. If that had ever gone off you wouldn't be reading this today. It eventually disappeared sometime in the 80s. Today there are private homes on the site.
Look at Eastover....just empty fields. Just up the Eastover turning and off this photograph on the far left would have been the railway station, the land on the far side of the rec is also empty...that's where St
Mary's Park would eventually be.
...and you can just see the roofs of the White Lion and its neighbours along North Street.
For more old aerial pictures of Langport in 1929, click on the link below. No idea who took them...the Luftwaffe trying to locate the Langport Arms?
Nothing like a bit of history to send you all to sleep.
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