Anonymous. The First Country Life Picture Book of Britain (Revised third Edition 1953) Ninety superbly printed photographs, illustrating mostly towns, villages, and landscapes. Large format, technically excellent and well composed photos, which don’t pretend to do anything other than show you their subjects. First published in 1937, and by that date already more of a nostalgic record of the Britain that was. About ten years earlier, Roye England had arrived in England from Australia, and was horrified that the English didn’t value their rural heritage. His nostalgia for an England he never knew resulted in Pendon, one of the best public model railways anywhere.The magazine Country Life celebrated the upper middle and upper class county. Up to half of its pages were given over to real estate adverts, many half page, also superbly printed, which extolled the properties as ancient infrastructure ideal for supporting the country gentleman’s lifestyle. My grandparents “took it”, as they said, in large part I think because Grandpa was a realtor and needed to know the market.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. About half a dozen of the photos showed places or buildings that I visited when my Uncle took us on extended Sunday drives in search of surviving royal arms in Midlands country churches. ***
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