Feltwell
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- 6,377
- Location
- Shropshire, England
We've been given a rather fascinating old photo album by my mother-in-law, which we believe belonged to my wife's great-great uncle. All rather vague, but we think he was a chauffeur for a rich Edwardian family - the album depicts some motoring tours around Europe in 1905 - 1906.
From the look of the pictures it seems they spent most of the trip in Austria and Italy - lots of photos of hairpin bends as roads zigzag up and down the Dolomites. Those roads are hairy enough now, what they were like to drive as little more than tracks in those very early days of motoring I dread to think! It also shows the cars being lifted on and off ships, long before roll-on roll-off ferries.
The album has some writing in the front that it was given as a Christmas present in 1906 by a Philip Dawson to "Bert" as a momento of their motoring trips - we believe Mr Dawson was the employer, and Bert was the chauffeur. Pure conjecture but it seems plausible that this may be the Philip Dawson - he's about the right age and would likely have been a wealthy man, plus he had the language skills to manage such a trip.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Dawson
We do rather wonder what to do with it? It won't have any real value in monetary terms, but it is a fascinating snapshot of an early motoring trip and it seems a shame to just let it continue gathering dust in a family attic somewhere.
From the look of the pictures it seems they spent most of the trip in Austria and Italy - lots of photos of hairpin bends as roads zigzag up and down the Dolomites. Those roads are hairy enough now, what they were like to drive as little more than tracks in those very early days of motoring I dread to think! It also shows the cars being lifted on and off ships, long before roll-on roll-off ferries.
The album has some writing in the front that it was given as a Christmas present in 1906 by a Philip Dawson to "Bert" as a momento of their motoring trips - we believe Mr Dawson was the employer, and Bert was the chauffeur. Pure conjecture but it seems plausible that this may be the Philip Dawson - he's about the right age and would likely have been a wealthy man, plus he had the language skills to manage such a trip.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Dawson
We do rather wonder what to do with it? It won't have any real value in monetary terms, but it is a fascinating snapshot of an early motoring trip and it seems a shame to just let it continue gathering dust in a family attic somewhere.
