SALISBURY has featured in a collection of interwar aerial images from the 1930s.
Historic England has published the Air Pictures Portleven Collection – a collection of aerial images taken by little known aerial photographer, Arthur William Hobart, which has been newly digitised by the Historic England Archive.
The collection features 242 black and white aerial images showing the national landmarks, towns, industrial sites, construction projects and seaside resorts of 1930s interwar England.
Locations are focused on London, the south-east and south-west of England, including Salisbury Cathedral and Wilton House.
The content of the photographs reflects the market demands of the time. Photographs for postcards were Hobart’s largest market, but municipal authorities and the press were also principal clients.
The Air Pictures Portleven Collection forms a part of a larger and mostly undiscovered body of Arthur William Hobart’s aerial photography work, thought to be around 10,000 images.
Born in 1882 in London, Arthur William Hobart was an early commercial aerial photographer who started in the business around 1920.
To date, no service record can be found for Hobart, however many early commercial aerial photographers had served during the First World War in aerial-related roles, and prior to the First World War he worked as a baker, commercial traveller and a draper’s clerk.
In the 1930s, aerial photography was a young industry. This way of capturing new developments and industry of the time provides a fascinating and informative insight into a changing country.
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The Air Pictures Portleven Collection takes its name from a misspelling of ‘Porthleven’, a Cornish fishing village where Hobart lived.
Chief executive of Historic England Duncan Wilson said: “Flicking through these photos lets you take flight over 1930s England, to see the changing face of the country in the interwar period.
"Many of us will not have seen so many well-known landmarks and sites from this fresh perspective provided by aerial photography.
"We are the guardians of the largest national collection of aerial images in the country and hope that releasing this Collection helps inspire people to learn more about their local history through our online Aerial Photography Explorer tool.”
Over 480,000 images from 1919 to the present day have been added to Historic England’s Aerial Photograph Explorer platform, covering nearly 30 per cent of England, allowing people immediate digital access to its nationally important collection of aerial photographs to discover the changing face of England’s urban and rural landscapes over the last 100 years.
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