Can anyone identify this 1970s rhododendron?

[NewspaperTaxis]

I'm trying to reinstate a rhododendron that used to be in the garden - but I am a bit rubbish at this. It was often called an azalea, so I bought one of these and it is currently very nice to look at. But it's an azalea i.e. not large and won't get larger. It's more for a border in the front garden.
So I look at rhododendron images on the net and nothing seems to match what I'm after. Some will be a bush, or a tree, it's neither as you can see from the attached pic with Nellie the cat in the foreground.
I admit it's larger in the pic than I recall, I think we must have cut it back. It had scarlet red flowers when it did flower.
But I can't find anything on Google Images that simply says: This is it, this is the same one.
If I can find a closer pic of the rhododendron I will aim to scan it in...
Can anyone help?

It certainly looks like an Azalea to me, rather than a Rhododendron, but can’t help any further.

You bed to look for a deciduous azaelea they grow much higher and are currently flowering and beautifully scented

Thanks, I will look for one of those. Sorry the photos weren't terribly clear.

Op you have a tiger in your garden.....

Hi, the 'tiger' is Nellie aka Nelson because she had a black patch over her eye. That was her trick of eating from the can of pet food (Happy Pet).
Decades after her death, Nellie appeared in a 2017 Daily Mail spread as part of an expose into care home mistreatment. Mum was still alive at that time - I'm the kid in the photo!
PS You never hear from Surrey Social Services/Safeguarding when these issues go into the press, they don't want to know about it.

Is it this one? deciduous azalea - Azalea mollis Jolie Madame .
I have one my Dad gave me in early 1980's

Hi, no, that's probably too pink. Here's another pic from the 1970s showing the rhodendrum a bit closer. It's a standard looking thing and can't believe it's so hard to find again, problem is Google them and all you normally get are the flowers and not the whole plant or any sense of scale, this is a common problem I find when looking up stuff.

I have bought one for around £20, it's a deciduous azalea as one person suggested, it's a Nabuco which is indigenous to Surrey, where I live, so I thought I'd give it a go, got one from a local garden centre.

The flame red tree at the end of the garden seems to be a Rhus stag horn according to another thread I instigated!

My azalea grows that way. But it’s yellow. It’s a flame azalea and smells lovely - like a honeysuckle.

Crosswater Red. Especially given that it was some time ago. This is an older variety. Even if it wasn’t this one I reckon it’s the closest match. Deciduous azalea are beautiful. I have a creamy one outside my back door and the smell is amazing

…and now I want to know why you are restoring the garden? It looks like a beautiful space.

Is it a dwarf rhodendrum? The standard rhodendrum geow very tall and wide whereas the dwarf ones stay low to the ground. I have a dwarf one in my garden.

I’ve got one that looks very similar. Mine’s a Rhododendron 'Amoena', a Japanese Dwarf Azalea.
www.thompson-morgan.com/p/rhododendron-amoena/t57993TM

Without so many flowers they look like this:

Thanks, @Petronus - it does look like that, a crosswater red! Hmm, seems I've bought the wrong one, the one I've got is too bright red, it looks okay but.... Not sure where to buy one like the cross water however, there's one on eBay - feels odd to buy a plant on eBay but there you go!

I'm 'restoring' the garden in the sense of trying to get it back to how it was, so I got someone to dig the circular flowerbed again - it had grown over - and next week I'll get the marigolds in.

Well, this is the one I went for - it's not the Crosswater Red, it's the Nabuco. Perfectly respectable, that said for marigolds to go around it, it's perhaps not quite the right colour and it occurs to me the garden never had a gaudy look, it was more rustic, rust-coloured, pastel shades.

A Crosswater Red is available on eBay but the seller has loads of bad reviews, it's also available from a garden nursery but currently not in stock.

That said, here is a neighbour's Rhododendron which is not dissimilar but a lot larger of course. The right kind of shape. I asked her what type it was and she had no idea. Anyone know what this one is? I guess it is way too large for me.

Rhododendron May Day?

Well, I finally dug up my old azalea (the foxes have had a go at digging up my new azalea, man's piss is the deterrent according to Mumsnet) or at least a picture of it. This shows how my memory is all shot, because in this picture the azalea looks fairly pink and I never remember it being like that, more red.

So... has anyone got an idea of what kind of 1970s Azalea this is? It did seem to go reddish later in the year, I'm sure I've got another picture of it being red-like. This picture appears to have been taken in spring if the other pics with daffodils in are anything to go by...

Just bumping this to see if anyone knows what kind of azalea this is, now I've found an old picture of it?

Maybe azalea japonica?

There are hundreds of different rhododendron species and it’s impossible to say from your photo which type it is. You’d need good photos of the flowers to give a clue. The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, near where I live, has a huge number of rhododendrons and there is also a specialist garden centre in Perth that might be able to help if you send clear photos.