Then And Now

This section of the site is provided in partnership with The Swindon Society and The Richard Jefferies Society. It enables you to see how the surrounding area used to look and learn more about your town. We are adding value by providing a current photograph taken as far as possible from the same position. The project involves a fair bit of detective work, so if you can add or correct information, please get in touch. This is your site, so if you would like to get involved in extending this project, please let us know.

Title Description Date
High Street, Goddard Arms 1920

The hotel in 1920, note the billboard for Ascot races and a lady in a fashionable hat

 June 1, 1920 Then
High Street, Goddard Arms 1910

view of the Godard Arms in 1910. A few years later, in April 1914, a maid at the Godard Arms, Frances Priscilla Hunter aged 24, was shot dead by her jealous lover

 June 1, 1910 Then
High Street, Goddard Arms, 1885

Old Town's landmark hotel in 1885, Zephaniah Dodson was an early Swindon photographer with premises in Victoria Street. Note the extensive advertising for Howes and Dodson's Great American Circus, which would have been quite an event for local residents at that time

 June 1, 1885 Then
Marlborough Road (then Coate Road) Midland Railway wagon c1905

M&SWJR (Midland and South West Junction Railway) Goods transfer wagon near the company sheds. The M&SWJR was independent until taken over by the GWR in 1923

 April 1, 1905 Then
Cromwell Street, (Now Brunel Centre) The Coalman delivers 1912

Apparently impromptu portrait of William Toomer, Swindon Coal and Coke merchant based in Bath Road. As it is taken outside the Cromwell Street studio of photographer William Hooper, it was almost certainly taken by him or one of his staff

 June 1, 1912 Then