This week’s image started life as a magic lantern slide. It would most probably have been used for promotional purposes by EM Whaley outfitters, of Salisbury, in the 1920s.

The lantern slide was at one time the property of Mr Compton, who was employed as a tailor and window dresser at Whaley’s for a number of years.

But his employment came to an end in the 1970s, following the death of Mr Whaley, soon after which time the business closed down.

Mr Compton and two of his colleagues, Ada Conlon and Dennis Whitehead, were immediately re-employed by Chas H Baker, in Milford Street. Ada had been running the school uniform department at Whaley’s – a speciality which she continued to coordinate during her time working for Baker’s.

Edward Montague Whaley lived at 2 Elm Grove Road and from 1891 he worked as a gents’ and boy’ clothier with Mr Trayton Cheesman of 1 Queen Street, Salisbury.

At that time, two new shops had recently been erected in the south east corner of the Market Square. One of these was acquired by Mr Whaley in 1906, and that was the start of EM Whaley – a business that was to serve the people of Salisbury over the course of the next 70 years.

Many adverts appear in the Salisbury Journal during the Edwardian period with one stating; “Do you need a neat and natty, well built, smart Suit for Summer Wear? A suit you can wear for business or pleasure, and not feel like a back number while you are wearing it? Then you should just step along and look at our new patterns, and let us take your measurements. We will take back anything that does not satisfy you, and you can make this a condition of every transaction you have with us,”

The shop’s premises are now occupied by Reeve the Baker.