Amersham - 1979

In 1979 I was doing a school project on the development of Amersham. The following pictures were included in the project. The quality of the original pictures is rather poor, but I think they are quite interesting

Sycamore Road. On the original picture we can make out the shops Browning Chiltern and Blacks Opticians, Pram & Toy Bar (this was taken over by Gary Grant, who then made it the Entertainer, the first shop in his now successful chain of toy shops), Haddock (photography), Sketchley, Wheatleys, Abbey National (with what I always thought was a strange looking shop front) and Multi Broadcast. There is a butchers shop (with red and white canopy) called something & Sons - anyone remember what it was?

Where the optician, toy shop and Haddocks is in the photograph has since been demolished and replaced by a new building now occupied by The Book Shop and Superdrug.

The opposite side of Sycamore Road. From the original photograph, we have been able to make out (from left to right) Gateway Travel, Rediffusion, the Chinese Restaurant, Challis (ladies fashion), Bertram Allen (menswear) and Midland Bank.

Hill Avenue. When you walk down Hill Avenue, you don't always appreciate the actual hill, but this picture shows it. We have been able to make out the following shops - Hamnett Raffety Chartered Surveyors, Amersham & Chesham Advertiser, Home & Colour, Express Dairies, Bennets Shoe Shop. The post office is also clearly shown, as is if you look carefully the old Station Garage Building, now where the brick office block is opposite the station.

Close up view of the station end of the above picture of Hill Avenue, you can make out the station garage building better.

If I have got my geography right, this view from Chiltern Avenue of the police station and courts is not available today because the Chiltern District Offices occupy the site of the car park.

Raans School opened in the 1950s as a mixed school, then it became a boys school following the opening of Brudenell school for girls, the school closed in the 1980s with the boys being transferred to Brudenell which was renamed The Amersham School. Raans has long been demolished, replaced by houses, although the playing field remains.

Well, the Old Town does not change much. The only real difference in this 1979 view is Scoops on the right and perhaps more traffic because there was no by-pass?

Little Chalfont - we believe the shops were Arthur Cooper (off licence), Her Hair (hair dressers), Lloyds bank, Martins (newsagents), Catos (hardware), Budgens (2 units), Gerrards (green grocers), Robinsons (butchers), Supertone Radio and Appliances, Kathleen Graham (bakers) and Stimpson.

Another view of Little Chalfont, which has changed very little over the last 20 plus years

The flats on White Lion Road, well before the improvements of the 1990s

click here for the old picture index

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