Memories in miniature: Vintage souvenir on show
How a tiny booklet of seaside views became big business. Tony Henderson reports.
Pioneering photographers Matthew Auty and Richard Ruddock put their money on an idea for a seaside views album the size of a pound coin to cash in on the growing number of visitors to the coast.
Part of their business partnership in Front Street in Tynemouth from the late 1880s was aimed at establishing the new postcard trade.
Now one of the tiny metal album booklets will be on show - and for sale - at the Great North Decorative Antique Fair at Newcastle Racecourse on Saturday and Sunday (April 26-27).
It is being offered by the Art From the Lens online gallery, run by photographer Richard Oakland who lives in Gateshead and was previously based in Front Street in Tynemouth.
Richard specialises in original vintage pictures with his collection dating from the 1860s.
The booklet features views of Tynemouth Castle yard with its lighthouse in the background, views along and from the old Tynemouth pier, Kings Edward’s Bay, Longsands and Tynemouth Palace - later Plaza.
“The booklets would have been bought as a novelty, a souvenir, or the perfect gift as trips to the seaside were increasing. They could also be worn as a pendant or from a bracelet,” said Richard.
Auty and Ruddock also produced a pocket-sized book of local seaside views.
It is a mark of how commercially aware Auty and Ruddock were and how they helped develop a market for their images beyond the normal studio portraits.,” said Richard.
“They pretty much set the standard on where to shoot as well as what to photograph that would bring people to Tynemouth. They were the Instagram influencers of their day.”
In 1892 the two men went their separate ways. Ruddock opened his own portrait studio in Newcastle and Auty continued to run the Tynemouth business.
Richard is also an admirer of photographer Lyddell Sawyer, born in North Shields in 1856, who was one of the leading practioners in the field of art photography.
He ran studios in Newcastle and Sunderland before setting up in Regent Street in London.
Earlier this month five of his images came up for sale at a London auction and Richard successfully bid to bring the pictures ‘home’. They will also be on show at the Newcastle weekend event.
“Lyddell Sawyer is a local hero,” said Richard.
“When you look at an original picture, it speaks, and you think about the stories behind it. A good photographer makes you want to find out more."
But he is concerned about the move from printing pictures to accessibility only online.
"As we print fewer pictures we are in danger of society losing a connection to the past. Photography has been about truth but now it is a case of ‘is it real?’"