Former Visiter writer
Continuing our A-Z series in which Geoff Wright takes a look at the history of Southport and nearby areas
NOSTALGIA concludes its trilogy featuring Southport’s wonderful old trams with some excellent photographs, many of which appear in the superb 2008 publication ‘Southport: In the Age of the Tram’ written and compiled by Southport-born James Dean and former Visiter journalist Cedric Greenwood, who we now look at more closely.
Last week we shared some biographical details of the posthumous co-author, the talented tram expert James Dean, who was a ‘walking encyclopaedia of Southport’s tramways,’ and looked at his wonderfully evocative coloured line drawings.
This impressively detailed book is still the most comprehensive story of the resort’s street tramways (which closed in 1934), a lovely publication from nearly a decade ago, which features some 60 fine rare photographs and detailed maps.
Cedric also penned the elegant-looking 1986 publication ‘Glasgowtrammerung: The Twilight of the Glasgow tram’, and has written a bevy of other tram books. Tram treasure
Many of you will know Cedric Greenwood as a muchrespected and knowledgeable journalist and feature writer for the Southport Visiter, who compiled numerous, excellent, local history articles.
To others, Cedric will be best known for his superb 1971 publication (reprinted in 1990) ‘Thatch, Towers and Colonnades – The Story of Architecture in Southport’ (Carnegie Publishing), which is still the best book written on this topic.
However, for the Southport tram book, Cedric (who moved to Holt, in Norfolk) benefited from the contributions of Graham Fairhurst (formerly of Southport borough Engineer’s Department), and two transport historians and authors, T.B. Maund and Ron Phillips, as well as assistance from members of the National Tramway Museum in Crich and staff at the Atkinson Library.
This collaborative work makes for a very important and valuable contribution to local history – a publication that is nothing short of tram treasure! Additional books
Cedric’s additional handful of publications were written for the best-selling Recollections Series, produced by Silver Link Publishing – a few still to be released next year, which take the readers on a nostalgic tour of Britain during the 1950s, 60s and 70s.
Cedric provides a photo- graphic journey featuring a wide selection of atmospheric shots taken during those three decades.
Highlighting buses, trams, trains and ships, the reader can view street scenes and life as it was back then.
The fashions, the vehicles, the shops, the industries, the landscape and much, much more, frozen in the moment, captured by Cedric’s camera for us to enjoy many years later! Sights and sounds of steam
One of his books provides a vivid, contemporary account of the sights and sounds of the last two years of commercial steam on British Railways, from the detailed diaries of a journalist, photographer and sound recorder in north-west England, in that final theatre of