In and Around Cambridge in the 1960s
Regular price
€23.99
A unique book showing Cambridge in the late 1960s from different angles. Striking, previously unpublished photographs show famous buildings as well as the river and backstreets and some of the small towns, villages and countryside nearby. Students and distinguished members of staff are here, with builders, shoppers in the market, and men from the gasworks. This was a time of 'demos', protests and disruption to established, maybe complacent, academic traditions. The author draws on archive sources to illustrate 'official' concerns at that time with, for example, major worries about overreactions triggering widespread unrest. However, he also draws on personal recollections as a Cambridge student, together with anecdotes from others and further archive material to suggest that most students were far more interested in the quality of meals they were served, and the state of the showers. Cambridge students from any generation, and anyone else who knows the city, will find themselves entertained and challenged.
But the book's appeal goes further: there are amusing reflections on moving from the north of England to Cambridge almost half a half century ago, and on student life in post-war Britain; the eye-catching photographs will have widespread appeal.
Although most of his family hailed from Yorkshire, Richard Gaunt was born in Lancashire and grew up in Darlington, where he attended QEGS. His education also included Corpus Christi College Cambridge, and University of Wales College Cardiff. His working life included spells in construction, chemicals, steel and local government, followed by 25 years as a director of a policy and research consultancy based in Cardiff. From his teenage years onwards, however, he has been taking photographs of the changing face of life in Britain. His photographs have been widely published; this is his sixth book for Fonthill Media.