Of postcards and holiday homes

The Children’s Garden Village “Belmont”, Cheadle, Cheshire

I am and always have been a big fan of the picture post card.

Not only are they a fascinating glimpse into what the past looked like but if you are lucky the messages that accompany the image tell you much about the hopes, disappointments and attitudes of people during the late 19th and a big chunk of the 20th centuries.

Most of the pictures were dictated by commercial considerations and so the same beauty spots, the same set of landmarks and famous buildings crop up again and again.

And the postcard companies also focused on variety performers, actors and politicians.

What I was not prepared for was the cards focusing on the children in the care of the Manchester & Salford Boys’ and Girls’ Refuges’.

Boys at the Manchester Boys’ Refuge Camp, Southport

It is an organisation I have frequently gone back to* because from 1870 it worked to help destitute and abused children, providing them with a home, and training for a future career and also a holiday, which is where these images come from.

They feature in the recent blog of the Together Trust and rather than repeat what Liz the archivist has already said I shall just direct you to the site and leave it at that.**


*Manchester and Salford Boys' and Girls' Refuges, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Manchester%20and%20Salford%20Boys%20and%20Girls%20Refuges

**The Charity on a postcard, http://togethertrustarchive.blogspot.co.uk/
 
Pictures; courtesy of the Together Trust, http://togethertrustarchive.blogspot.co.uk/p/about-together-trust.html