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 Clifton, the Suspension Bridge 1887 (ref. 20163) | Shipping still made its way up-river to Bristol when this photograph was taken. Today, the increase in size of vessels has led to a new port being created down-river at Avonmouth. Visiting ships now miss this magnificent suspension bridge. Designed by that great engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, it stands 245 feet above the river. Construction started in 1836, but owing to a shortage of funds, the bridge was not completed until 1864, six years after Brunel died. |  Add your own Memory Add to your Album |
 Bedford, Suspension Bridge 1921 (ref. 70446) | The river Great Ouse in Bedford is as popular today with boaters, walkers and fishermen as it was eighty years ago when this picture was taken. The suspension bridge and park to the right are virtually unchanged, and you can usually see boaters out on the water. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Leighton Buzzard, the Grand Union Canal c1955 (ref. L211049) | Loaded narrow boats head north on the Grand Union Canal, their cargo concealed from both weather and prying eyes by careful sheeting. This spot is only a mile or so from where the Great Train Robbery took place in 1963. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Eton, Romney Lock 1909 (ref. 61893) | At Romney Lock, a Salter Brothers' passenger steamer – the 'Nuneham' – heads towards Windsor Bridge. Judging by the high fashions on display aboard, cruising the river was a popular event, even in those days. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Eton, 4th June Procession of Boats 1906 (ref. 53724) | Our cameraman was standing quite close to the excitement of this riverside party, organised by Eton College. This celebration marks the monarch's official birthday, and has been held for centuries. The top hats sported by the boys can still be seen, even if they are no longer generally worn for the rest of the year. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Maidenhead, Boulters Lock 1913 (ref. 65542) | Here we see the lock itself, another busy scene. Only a few years earlier, every head would have been hatted. As the reign of Queen Victoria receded, a slightly more laid-back atmosphere was starting to take hold. The Great War – only a year away – would change things for ever. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Sonning, the Bridge and the Hotel 1904 (ref. 52034) | Upstream from the lock at Sonning, the 18th-century bridge spans the river, and the recreational use of the water is plain to see. The skiffs and punts available for hire across the water are from what is now the Great House Hotel. The church suffered at the hands of 19th-century 'restorers', although there are some 15th-century brasses to be seen. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Windsor, Castle from the River 1895 (ref. 35367a) | Another pleasure steamer ploughs its watery furrow in the shade of Windsor Castle. In the foreground, a group of girls are getting muddy and wet. Their younger sister stands on the bank, clear of trouble. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Aylesbury, the Canal 1897 (ref. 39642) | The Aylesbury arm of the Grand Union departs from the main line at Marsworth, and has some 16 locks in 6 miles, very narrow and not for the faint-hearted. Here, children are trying their luck at fishing in the Aylesbury Arm of the Grand Union Canal. Just beyond the bridge is the delightfully named Hills and Partridges Lock. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Aylesbury, the Aylesbury Arm, the Grand Union Canal 1921 (ref. 70564) | Here we see a pair of loaded working boats on the Aylesbury Arm near Broughton on the edge of town. The wooden stumps (bottom left) are known as strapping posts, and were used to tie up boats. Their state in this view appears to be somewhat poor. Two ladies, dressed in the fashions of the day, take their ease. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Cambridge, View on the Granta 1914 (ref. 66906) | The Granta rises near Thaxted in Essex. A trip on the river is an unforgettable experience; the Granta bustles with punts and skiffs against a backdrop of green fields and leafy trees. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 St Ives, Old River 1914 (ref. 66958) | In the 17th century, the ingenious Dutch engineer Cornelius Vermuyden forged a navigation from the sea cross-country to Bedford. Much of the land through which the Ouse idles has dropped 15 feet in level since, and is now highly fertile farmland. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Wisbech, the Canal 1929 (ref. 81972) | Wisbech's five mile-long canal once connected the villages of Outwell and Upwell with the River Nene at Wisbech. It has since been filled in and closed down. Wisbech is the capital of the Fens. It was once a strategic seaport, where coasters transhipped their cargoes into fenland lighters. Yet the tides have played the town foul over the centuries, silting up successive estuaries of the River Nene so that now the town is stranded ten miles from the sea. However, ships still struggle in to berth at the quaysides of the town. At low tide they are knee deep in mud. In this view of the canal, the old lock is in the background. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chester, Suspension Bridge 1914 (ref. 67546) | Chester sits on a sandstone spur north of the Dee, which winds past the ancient castle, begun in 1069, but now much modified by late 18th-century additions. Here we see the beautiful, delicate suspension footbridge; a steam launch is passing underneath. Below the weir at Chester, the Dee was a busy commercial waterway until its silting up prevented seagoing vessels from reaching the city. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Eccleston, Eccleston Ferry 1895 (ref. 36455) | The River Dee rises at Bala, and makes an 80-mile dash for the sea, sweeping through a dangerous switchback of rapids and rocks to Llangollen. Here it dips under Telford's masterpiece, the magnificent Pontcysyllte Aqueduct on the Welsh section of the Shropshire Union Canal. At Eccleston, just up river from Chester, it charts a more leisurely course. Here we see holidaymakers being carried across the Dee on the chain ferry. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Lymm, the Canal c1960 (ref. L122026) | The Bridgewater Canal flows through the pretty town of Lymm in Cheshire. An empty pair of boats (the one in front is the 'Clio') head towards Manchester, probably to collect coal. It is unusual that the butty has no steerer, although the tiller is in place. Perhaps he/she had just popped below to put the kettle on. Heating and cooking was performed on a coal-fired range, whose chimney we can see behind the tiller. On the right, in front of the bridge, there is a lifting winch. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Lymm, the Bridgewater Canal c1960 (ref. L122054) | A pair of Horsfield's craft are carrying coal, the once horse-drawn butty (the 'Marjorie') towed by the motorised narrow boat. By the time this photograph was taken, commercial carrying in narrow boats was almost at an end; it was kept going in many cases by early canal enthusiasts, for whom working long anti-social hours in all weathers was actually a pleasure. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Northwich, Swing Bridge 1900 (ref. 45422) | The River Weaver creates a link with the Trent & Mersey Canal by way of Northwich's mighty Anderton Boat Lift, where a pair of narrow boats could be lifted 50 feet in two caissons. An impressive modern commercial waterway, the Weaver acts a a funnel for industrial products from Cheshire, carrying them down to Weston Point Docks, where there is a link with the Manchester Ship Canal. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Northwich, Anderton Boat Lift c1960 (ref. N43026) | The Anderton Boat Lift linked the Trent & Mersey Canal (above) with the river Weaver below. Narrow boats entered a caisson along the trough to the left and were lowered down to the river. One such can be seen sandwiched between two barges. The Anderton Lift created a much faster passage for boats and increased the tonnage of river traffic to 226,000 in 1913. It was converted to electric power in 1906 and extensively renovated in 1974. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Runcorn, the Locks c1955 (ref. R67003) | The Duke of Bridgewater has been called 'the parent and father' of our canal system. In 1760 he employed the pioneering engineer James Brindley to create a waterway connecting his coal mines with Manchester. This is a historic view, as these locks, linking the Manchester Ship Canal and the Bridgewater Canal, were infilled in 1966. There were 10 chambers, each one duplicated to speed the flow of traffic. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
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