It’s the ‘Silly Season’ So Here Are Some Old Picture Postcards – Boring or What?

Published on: 29 Jul, 2024
Updated on: 3 Aug, 2024

By David Rose

The month of August has long been known as the “silly season” by those who gather and report news.

Why? Because it was a time in the yearly news cycle when not so much seemed to happen. In local news there were fewer meetings taking place, or decisions being made, community groups, charities and organisations taking a break, and of course people were packing their bags and going on holiday.

Sales of local newspapers, in particular, were known to dip during holiday time in August.

To fill the pages of the local rag, news teams would write up the more obscure press releases and readers’ letters still languishing at the bottom of the news editor’s in-tray. Perhaps a picture spread of images left over from the month before, and so on – you get my drift?

However, in recent years the “silly season” doesn’t seem to have been so much of a temporary shutdown as it used to be – or does it? It feels a bit like it this year.

Anyway, I thought it would be a bit of fun to write a typical “silly season” story, but with a local history bent.

Here we have some of the most boring vintage picture postcards of the Guildford area in my collection! But keep reading, things do get better I promise as I’ll explain a bit about each one.

This is a view of Millmead, taken in the early 1900s, and what an awful image it is! It’s only made worse by the artificial colouring.

But this was the golden age of the picture postcard, with thousands upon thousands of views taken of every byway, hamlet, village, town and city in the United Kingdom and beyond.

In that period from about 1900 to just after the First World War, millions upon millions of postcards were issued and lapped up by people who sent them to friends and relatives showing them what places looked like, no matter what the quality was like.

This view is of interest to us local history buffs as it shows the saplings that look like they have recently been planted, the chimney of the iron foundry (where the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre is today) and Moons timber yard, where the former Debenhams building stands on a site site awaiting redevelopment.

Perhaps the good people of Guildford were proud of these then-new steps that had been built at the railway station approach. There is a different set of steps today that lead up to Farnham Road. The house creeping into the picture on the far left is on the opposite side of Farnham Road. It’s still there today, and I was once told at one time it had been the station master’s house.

A view of the Castle Grounds in the snow and a real photographic postcard. It’s a shame the contrast is not better. I think the view is looking down the sunken path with the mound and the castle keep off to the right.

The River Wey Navigation as it runs through Guildford was featured multiple times on postcards over the past 120-odd years. Many views include the former Jolly Farmer pub (currently the Weyside) and the adjacent boathouse, some of these postcards are superb. This view pales into insignificance. The said boathouses and pub are away to the left. For history nerds like me, the corrugated iron building on the right close to Shalford Road is of interest, but I don’t know anything about it!

Views that look along roads with little going on were most popular with postcard publishers – I guess times were much quieter back in those days. This shows a heavily tree-lined Woodbridge Road. I’m assuming it’s towards the Ladymead end, where those motor repair garages, kitchen showrooms and a petrol station is today.

This brings us nicely on to another empty road, but proudly featuring a then new bridge over the River Wey. There are two parallel bridges here today. This is the older of the two bridges that itself replaced an even older bridge in 1913. This is the A25 looking towards Ladymead. Away to the right is Woodbridge Meadows. Just beyond the bridge on the right today is the Wickes builders’ merchants and then Magnet kitchen showrooms.

The ultimate “wish you were here?” postcard – in that the sender may have been wishing this was where the recipient of the postcard should be. It’s the Mount Cemetery.

On this one the caption reads: “THE OLD ROMAN ROAD, GUILDFORD”. It’s a view looking down The Mount towards Guildford town centre. Where publishers Judges Ltd got the idea this was a Roman road, who knows? But by stating stuff like this you can see why people believed it and didn’t give it another thought, and passed the “fact” on to others.

More boring roads! However, if you know Cross Lanes, off London Road, you might be able to work out where this view is. I’m not sure if that’s London Road going from left to right in the foreground, or whether it’s where Cross Lanes joins Cranley Road.

Epsom Road this time, with not a lot going on. I’m not sure if this view is looking away from Guildford or towards it. A borough boundary stone can be seen on the right. I have a hunch it might be near the junctions with Lower and Upper Edgeborough Roads.

Boxgrove Road is featured here, published by Judges Ltd, who were based in Hastings. They produced lovely sepia-coloured postcards during their heyday in the 1920s and 30s. This one was postally used in June 1943 and within their message the sender wrote: “We have had five alerts in four days – like old times.” Presumably referring to air-raid sirens being sounded, as they had been earlier during the Second World War.

Two people, one with a dog, stop to have a chat on a path on the Chantries. Could this be the path / track that’s near the car park off Pilgrims’ Way / Echo Pit Road, and goes in an easterly direction along the edge of the woodland?

The captions and the blurb sometimes found on these old picture postcards could certainly led to people believing what was being claimed as fact. This one can’t seem to make up its mind what the view actually is! And we have the old “chestnut” of the images of a never-ending procession of pilgrims using this one route to make their way to Canterbury. But there are some sweet chestnut trees in the Chantries.

And again with this woody view. “Sandy Lane, Guildford, The old Pilgrims Way”. I do like this one (well, I like them all really) as I’m sure this is the location of Sandy Lane going off to Littleton on the right, and up around the sharp bend on the left the road later leads over to St Catherine’s Village on the Portsmouth Road.

And finally, a contender for the most boring – Dorking Road Merrow. Well, where is this? My guess is it’s somewhere along Trodd’s Lane

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