Archives Committee - TrustNews Spring 1996
Winchester Slide Collection poster
which will be circulated to the public
The Trust's Archives committee has recently been reorganised for the purpose of looking after the care of both the photographs and archives of the Winchester Preservation Trust and the Heritage Centre, and to administer the loan arrangements for the Trust's Loan Slide Committee.
An initial project being undertaken is for the presentation of the collection recently donated, of more than 2,000 negatives taken of activities and scenes in the City 1960-80s. These cannot be adequately viewed in negative form so pages of contact prints are being printed for viewing purposes. This will continue for a long while due to the numerous negatives.
Minutes, letters and documents of the work of the Trust and the Heritage Centre from the beginnings 1957-1990 have already been passed from The Trust's office. These are currently being listed.
During 1994 the Urban Studies Committee of the Winchester Preservation Trust decided to form a photographic slide collection on Winchester.
To start with, during 1995 the centre of the City has been photographed, the area being roughly that bounded by the ancient walls. Most of the shots are general views of each of the streets, gap sites, and buildings which look as though they are ready for refurbishment or rebuilding. More detailed shots of buildings, shop fronts, street furniture etc will be taken during 1996, in addition to the continuation of slides showing changes as these occur. We also hope to widen the scope of the collection by photographing areas immediately outside the walls.
The concept has been widened and enhanced by donations of slides from many people and range from about 1960 onwards. There are some 600 of these slides all of which are dated before 1995 which Harold Sturges accepted on our behalf and kindly catalogued them. No mean task when many of them were undated and not labelled in any way.
All slides in both the pre-1995 and post-1995 collections have been triplicated, one set for loan (see adjoining information), one set as a spare and the third and original sets which are to be placed in the care of the Hampshire County Records Office. Both sets of slides will be on loan from 21 February 1996 and the collection will be in the care of the Archives Committee of the Winchester Preservation Trust. There will be a form available from the Heritage Centre giving details of the loan conditions.
In particular we would like to thank Carol Leaman, Richard Plincke, James Lunn Rockliffe and Kevin Reader for their enthusiastic support, Harold Sturges for his work and for all who have contributed as members of the Archives Committee to the cataloguing and organisation of the whole collection and its preparation for easy accessing.
We look forward to 1996 and the continuation of the expansion of the collection so that it can become an interesting and informative record of the changes in the life of the City of Winchester.
To this end anyone wishing to assist us with photography in 1996 by being responsible for monitoring any alterations, demolitions etc. within a small area of the City, please contact the Chairman, Archives Committee, at the Heritage Centre.
A promotional launch of the Loan Slide Collection will take place in the presence of the Mayor, Cllr P Norris who has kindly consented to attend at 6.30 pm, 21 February 1996 in the Heritage Centre. All interested members are welcome and invited to attend this launch and/or to assist in the running of this innovative project or with any aspect of the Trust archives.