Anyone like to help try and solve a local history mystery? Very little to go on but we've had some success before!

[YeOldeTrot]

Hello

I'm back and calling on the Mumsnet history sleuths

I posted last month with a little jewellery box and we made some fascinating discoveries but this one is TOUGH

So, we have a photo. This photo was clearly once in a newspaper - possibly North Wilts Herald.

The couple in this photo are receiving bunches of flowers and it's believed that it was their Golden Wedding Anniversary and they were having their pic taken for the paper.

As for the year ... hard to say but clearly late 60s - early ish 70s?

So we've not got much.

Any pointers appreciated

I agree with others - they have 5 bouquets between them and four of them are identical, which to me suggests that they made them for something. Given the time frame, and even today, what's the odds of anyone getting four identical bouquets of flowers? Which makes me think rather than receiving them, they made them.

The glasses look very 60s/70s, bit like the ones my Great Grandparents wore.

I like this game!

The flowers in the bouquets look like the ones in their garden! Those white ones! Maybe they made up bouquets from their own garden? Did they start their own small business or something maybe?

My grandparents celbrated their Golden Wedding in September 1969. That couple don't look about the same age as them in their pictures on their big day. Grandad was 25 when he married- served in WW1. She had one of those large bouquets with crysanthemums.
My guess would be the picture is from late 60s early 70s.

You can't assume the era from the manner of dress. My grandfather looked like this when he visited our house in the 80s and 90s.

If it is an anniversary photo, it could be a ruby wedding anniversary- there's what looks like a red rose in one of the bouquets?

Also her glasses- cat eye glasses were 'in' from about the 1950s, which makes me think the photo is unlikely to even be late 60s. That + the dress could make it about 1964/5/6.

I think them making, rather than receiving, the bouquets makes sense. Also, it somehow feels more 70s than 60s to me. The clothing, hair and glasses just give the earliest possible dates really. If the dress is from a pattern could be made years later.

Sorry been away from thread.
If you Google Simplicity Slenderette 4860
I'll try to insert photo again, usually can..



The man’s glasses are late 60s to mid 70s. Don’t forget in the past fashions were slower moving outside of larger cities.

The North Wilts Herald is digitised up to 1941 on BNA so searching that is probably a dead end (even if the image was for it).

So, Chrysanthemums and Wantage? Long shot. The man in the attached images was winning prizes for them in 1974 and 1982. The houses in the street he seems to have lived in don't look to me to match the image though. But there was / (is?) a Wantage and District Chrysanthemum and Dahlia Society.

I'm just looking on the British Newspaper Archive for you. They do have the North Wilts Herald, but only up to 1941!

my grandparents dressed exactly like that in 70s when they had a similar anniversary. They were probably very hip and trendy in 50s/60s and just continued with the same clothing. Try early or mid 70s?

@MMBaranova that's incredible sleuthing! And wouldn't it be something if it was him? I'm going to pass it across to the historian to see what he can dig up. I'll also see what I can find on Ancestry about Norman.

I know Orchard Way well, just down the road. No bungalows though I don't think but maybe he moved to the bungalow once he stopped growing prize winning chrysanthemums!

The reason we think it's a golden wedding anniversary pic is because it came in a batch of them - which were definitely anniversary pics

I can't attach a picture for some reason but if you scroll down on this site to the picture of Faringdon primary school staff (1960) the woman, front right, looks like the woman in your pic. It might be a stretch but Faringdon isn't far from Wantage, and it's around the right time? Looks like she's called Mrs King, her grandson posted on the site.

www.faringdon.org/memories-of-faringdon.html

This thread is so exciting. Makes Marple look like a bloody amateur.

The odds of getting 4 identical bunches of chrysanthemums in the 1970s for a birthday or wedding anniversary or retirement was about 100% 😂I would also say it would almost 100% likely be a spray of chrysanthemums or carnations whatever the occasion 😂 The other options would have been roses or lilies but they were more for romance or funerals.

I remember going to the florist to order Interflora flowers with my mother. Florists would only deliver locally. Interflora was a national network so you could order flowers from a sample book to be sent from a florist local to the recipient. There was very little choice because the design had to be something that every florist would have in stock. The cheapest option was always a spray of chrysanthemums 😂They are cheap, stay fresh for weeks and grow in the UK, and a spray requires no arranging skills.

If the flowers were delivered by Interflora rather than bought in person, they will have come from the same florist with the franchise for the area so may well have been identical 😂

I would also say a garden full of home grown chrysanthemums and dahlias was bog standard for the era 😂 Especially for people of their age. There was a big gardening boom post war after gardens had been turned over to vegetable patches during the war. I don’t think you could run a business growing chrysanthemums in a garden anyway.

It's a pity we can't see more of the bottom section of the photo, as I find the geometry a bit odd (although I know different lenses and things can make photos come out with odd angles in them) - but look at the window on the left - look at the angle of the vertical part of the window frame - it's not pointing upwards at quite the same angle as the front door. Then look at the bottom of the front door (you have to click on the photo to see it) - how far in front of the door are they standing? Because if that bar at the bottom centre is the bottom of the front door, and they're standing just a few feet in front of it, it looks as if there must be a few steep steps in front of the door, as their feet seem to be well below where the door starts.

I would also say a garden full of home grown chrysanthemums and dahlias was bog standard for the era 😂 Especially for people of their age

It certainly was. DGF's (born 1900) pride and joy was his garden in the 60s and 70s and he grew fabulous dahlias.

@staybyyou maybeeee? I've mashed them together side by side.

Great write up there @Fitzbillie , definite food for thought

@Namechangeforthis88 I know right? Honestly, the stuff these folk can work out is unbelievable

Very similar! Your pic is grainy but when you zoom in on the picture the glasses are pretty much identical.

If it is the same person in the photos, I would say the second photo was about a decade later than the first.

Can you find where back copies of newspapers are .
They are offen on microfiche and it the main library of area.

@staybyyou yes it's so hard to get a clear pic of the first woman - Mrs King.

There is definitely at least one rose in the bouquets - you can see the stalk and the thorns at the bottom.