The Magic of Cornwall
Bookmark and Share Subscribe

The Magic of Cornwall - Old Cornwall Pages

The Magic of Cornwall presents a growing selection of images showing Cornwall as it used to look in the 19th and 20th Centuries. The photographs are taken from The Francis Frith Collection, an online image library of over 120,000 images taken all over Britain between 1860 and 1970 and covering 7000 locations. Prints, both mounted and framed and mounted are available to purchase from the Francis Frith site, just click on the link beside each picture to view the range of formats available. Each location here has about 10 selected images to view, though the Francis Frith site will often present many more. Have a good browse, I am sure you will find it a fascinating experience.

Cornwall Locations from The Francis Frith Collection

Bodmin Boscastle Bude Camelford Charlestown
Falmouth Fowey Hayle Helston Launceston
Liskeard Looe Lostwithiel Mevagissey Newlyn
Newquay Padstow Penzance Port Isaac Redruth
Saltash St Austell St Ives St Mawes Truro
Wadebridge

The Francis Frith Collection - A background Summary

The Frith archive was founded by Francis Frith, the pioneer Victorian photographer, in 1860 and today contains over 365,000 photographs of some 7,000 towns and villages throughout Britain. Taken between 1860 and 1970 these form a topographical record of Britain without equal and is recognised as probably the only photographic collection of national importance in private hands in Britain today.

The importance of the Frith archive is as a topographical and social record. It provides an amazingly detailed visual record of over 7,000 towns and villages, as well as illustrating the enormous social and structural changes which have taken place in Britain since 1860. For each town or village there is an average of 80 photographs. These were often taken from the same spot but many years apart, giving historians a unique opportunity to study landscapes, streets and buildings across a century and more of change. Whilst some of the photographs are undoubtedly artistically outstanding, the real value of the archive lies in its scale. There is no other archive which can illustrate this period of British history so extensively or to such a high quality.

"A unique and priceless record of life in the last Century"

Financial Times