Now I have been a great fan of Roger Shelley’s photographs for over a decade, ever since he shared a collection of pictures he took of a group of young lads playing in the near ruin of Hough End Hall nearly 60 years ago.
And so, I was very pleased when he posted another group of images he took during the house clearances in Hulme and Moss Side.
The pictures are a mix of street scenes, and the people he encountered, including kids at play, men and women at work and the ever present piles of rubble as the grand plan advanced and centuries old houses disappeared under the impact of the wrecking ball.
Like the work of Shirley Baker* his pictures don’t dwell on sentimentality and don’t make judgments of the wholesale clearances of communities.
They just record what he saw.
I don't have exact locations for the images, but some can be traced through the odd street name or feature.
And with his permission I will be working my way through the portfolio, fastening on images which tell their own stories.
Location; Hulme and Moss Side in the 1960s and 70s
Pictures; from the collection of Roger Shelley, https://www.flickr.com/photos/photoroger/
*Baker, Shirley, Without a Trace, Manchester and Salford in the 1960s, 2018
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