Celebrating our collections dating from 780AD to the present day
Alan Green ‘If you can remember the 1960s you weren’t there” runs a well-known maxim. Whether you were there or not, it was a decade irredeemably associated with permissive attitudes and the ripping out of the hearts of so many towns and cities in the name of modernisation, often as a result of dodgy dealings…
Continue reading ➞ Sense or Insensibility : Chichester in the 1960’s
Chosen by Richard Childs, former member of staff My favourite document is the map of the Manors of East Dean, Graffham and East Lavington, 1597 (Add Mss 48838). My reason for choosing it is not simply because it is the oldest manuscript estate map in the Record Office, nor that being drawn on paper, it…
Continue reading ➞ Map of the Manors of East Dean, Graffham and East Lavington, 1597 (Add Mss 48838)
Chosen by Alan Readman, former member of staff West Sussex Record Office has been the repository and conservation centre of Screen Archive South East since the inception of the regional film archive in 1992. Moving images offer a unique and evocative portrait of life in the 20th century and this documentary reflects many of the…
Continue reading ➞ An English Village. A view of South Harting in 1956 (Video 259; PH 22367)
Chosen by Louise Goldsmith, Leader of West Sussex County Council One of my most favourite pleasures is visiting our Record Office. It never fails in providing interesting snippets of what was happening in the county at any one time and I naturally feel very proud of WS Record Office. As a local politician I…
Chosen by Ine Van Dooren of Screen Archive South East (http://about.brighton.ac.uk/screenarchive/) In 1995 my life changed. I was appointed Moving Image Archivist for the South East Film & Video Archive, now called Screen Archive South East. I got some of my belongings in a car and moved from…
Continue reading ➞ ‘Shippam’s Guide to Opera’, 1955 (SASE 3266)
Chosen by Sheila Rhodes, volunteer Edward Heron-Allen was a remarkable man. Born in London in 1861, Heron-Allen's interests were many and varied; a qualified solicitor, he was also an expert in violin making and cheirosophy (the art of reading a person's character through the formation of their hands and fingers), a published author of early science-fiction stories and…
Chosen by Christine Chowne, volunteer John Holland Ballet Fletcher was a local man, born in 1879 in Worthing. He was the only surviving child of William H. B. Fletcher, former mayor of Worthing and later Lord of the Manor at Aldwick, now Hotham Park House, and his wife, Agnes. John read law at St…
Continue reading ➞ The Spread Eagle, Midhurst, 1902 (PH 26114/51)
Chosen by Matt Dell, member of staff Although our oldest record here at West Sussex Record Office dates to 780AD, you would be mistaken in thinking that only historic records live under our roof. In addition to the collections of religious records, military records, estate papers and more, we are also home to the Records Management Service, which manages the County…
Continue reading ➞ Chichester – Parking of Cars in the Highway, 1936 (WDC/CL28/1)
Chosen by Kim Leslie, former member of staff This coaching poster is dated about 1828, when Worthing was an important coaching centre between Brighton and Portsmouth. Stage coaching was at its peak between 1820 and 1840, a time when many coach proprietors were locked in furious competition to outbid each other’s reputation for speed, comfort…
Chosen by Nichola Court, member of staff The 1601 Poor Law Act created a national system for managing the poor. It was superseded in 1834 by the New Poor Law, which compelled unions of parishes to build that most Victorian of institutions: the workhouse. In a bid to keep the poor rate to a minimum,…
Continue reading ➞ Plan of East Preston workhouse, 1872 (WG9/56/1/2 no.3)
West Sussex Record Office 