Page 121 - Greystones Archaeological Historical Society

GREYSTONES ARCHAEOLOGICAL & HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 8

not yet been built. The expanse of beach is broader than one
would expect and the original railway embankment can clearly
be seen, as can one end of the Crab Wall. In the background at
the extreme left of the photograph stands a stone-built store of
some kind, possibly a boathouse, and a straggle of ‘Snuffs’ have
been pulled right up to the edge of the track or road way in the
foreground. The most significant feature is that the gables on the
building have a plain finish at roof level. There is no indication as
to who took the photograph.

On the following pages he has reproduced a number of later
photographs which most assuredly were taken by Robert
French. They are numbered from 3291.W.L. to 3339.W.L.,
although not all the photographs in the sequence are included,
and those that are, are mixed through others, as if Derek at the
time he published the book was unaware of how they connected.
He can hardly be faulted for that, however, because although the
Lawrence Photographic Collection had been in the possession
of the State for quite some years, I doubt if it had at that stage
been digitally processed and made accessible on line.

It took me quite a while to get my head around the various
surviving plates that make up the sequence, which may have
been taken over as little as two days. The key was in the
numbering, as well as in the photographs themselves.

The first, which is numbered 3291.W.L. and is the third of
three photographs on page 107 of Derek’s 1993 book, was taken
from the green sod at the back of the rocks near the flagstaff and
takes in the two Sugarloaves and the north beach from the
boathouse to north of the dipping tank.

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