ALAN CASH - web pages
Collection of books on Welwyn Garden City
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ALAN CASH - web pages Collection of books on Welwyn Garden City |
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This is a remarkable book by Maurice de Soissons (pictured below) son of the
architect Louis de Soissons who planned the town in the 1920s and designed many
of its buildings.
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Maurice de Soissons From the rear cover of the book (click image to enlarge) |
Starting from the ancient history of the site the book describes fully and in detail the development of Welwyn Garden City up to the present (1988). There are 158 black and white images (mostly photographs of street scenes and buildings in WGC - many pre-war - but also including maps and plans) and 43 colour images. The images are mostly of good quality especially the b/w ones but not very large, most occupy about 1/4 to 1/3 page in size. The page scanned below shows pictures taken in the 1920s when the construction of the Town was only just beginning. This book will have great nostalgia value to anyone living there in the pre-war or post-war eras (as I did from 1945 onwards).
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Plate 30. Constructed in 1922, the first Barclays Bank building served the town until 1929. Plate 31. The first houses in Parkway under construction in the early 1920s. The wealth of fine hedgerow trees kept is evident from this photograph. Plate 32. The town's name soon began appearing in many guises, advertising its existence in mid-Hertfordshire. (click image to enlarge) |