BOOK FEATURE

STOURBRIDGE WOLLASTON & AMBLECOTE
A Second Selection

By Bob Clarke & Michael Reuter

The publishers of this book say that the first edition was extremely successful, hence this second edition. In fact, their books on Stourbridge and surrounding areas are amongst the top selling in the UK. Part of the "Britain in old photographs" series, they are available for most towns in the UK, so why is a little provincial Midlands town such as Stourbridge so popular? Having lived in the town all my life makes it difficult for me to comment, so does anyone want to give an opinion? Let me know and I will put responses on the site. Click here for views

Many towns have fallen victim to the 1960's view of planning, a vision of a brave new world that all seemed to go terribly wrong a few years later. Towns that have the benefit of buildings of architectural or historical significance were able to escape this blight to some degree so English towns tend to fall into several categories: the classic English town, such as Shrewsbury, Bath, Cheltenham, Ludlow or York are arguably the most endearing, at the other end of the scale is the "new" towns, that retain very little of their past.

Stourbridge is fortunate in having retained many of its old buildings, but has still fallen victim to changing attitudes in planning to some extent, most notably, the ring road. For example, the Bath Road area was once a wonderful leafy suburb with fine houses and is now part of the ring road. So this book of Stourbridge in old photographs is interesting because even though there have been changes to the town, there is still enough of the old remaining for comparison.

As in the first edition, the book draws upon the huge collection of old photos and postcards of the authors, together with their great knowledge of the area. Over 120 pages of old photos make it a must for anyone with interest in the town. Here's a few examples from the book, please click on an image below to see a larger version (5 seconds download time), with description taken from the book. We intend to include some more "timewarps" but they take a lot of time to produce!