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Some old black and white pictures from my archive. These were taken one warm summers night in Fleet Street, City Of London. Here, I was undergoing my training initially as a ‘Copy Boy’ eventually leaving the agency as a trainee court reporter after spending some time covering the proceedings at Kingston Magistrates Court.
I joined the Agency late 1968 and left and joined a local paper in November 1969 and at first I had to read the copy (stories) the reporters brought in by telephone over to the copy-takers on the six National Newspapers which at the time included The Daily Sketch. I also had to run pictures and rolls of film round to those newspapers’ picture desks.
At the time these pictures were taken I was doing the night shift 23:00 to 07:00 and from 02:00 to 06:00 I was on my own just manning the phones in case any of the 2 London evening papers or any of the Nationals wanted a story covering in which case I’d either head there myself or call out a reporter and maybe a photographer if needed.
I had an old car at the time and travelled around London but all I ever covered were some fires, traffic accidents and on a couple of occasions, attempted suicides.
These pics were taken around 01:00 and show myself, trainee photographer Paul and reporter Alan Woodcock being a bit silly. I’ve included all of them and some are out of focus and some have less than ideal exposures but they’re all here, warts and all. A snapshot of time, perhaps.
I don’t know what the camera was but it’s before I had the Pentax or Nikon so it’s possibly a Praktica, which was my first SLR.
I have a few tales from those times which I may relate, they may be of interest, I’m not sure.
Anyhow, without further ado, some old pictures plus a couple of random images.
Kathy & Peter at my Ladywell Flat, 1969 or 1970. Kathy became a Playboy Bunny at Park Lane and Peter went on to form The Only Ones:
Stage left at The Fox Under The Hill Pub, Shooters Hill Road, SE London early 1970:
I joined the Agency late 1968 and left and joined a local paper in November 1969 and at first I had to read the copy (stories) the reporters brought in by telephone over to the copy-takers on the six National Newspapers which at the time included The Daily Sketch. I also had to run pictures and rolls of film round to those newspapers’ picture desks.
At the time these pictures were taken I was doing the night shift 23:00 to 07:00 and from 02:00 to 06:00 I was on my own just manning the phones in case any of the 2 London evening papers or any of the Nationals wanted a story covering in which case I’d either head there myself or call out a reporter and maybe a photographer if needed.
I had an old car at the time and travelled around London but all I ever covered were some fires, traffic accidents and on a couple of occasions, attempted suicides.
These pics were taken around 01:00 and show myself, trainee photographer Paul and reporter Alan Woodcock being a bit silly. I’ve included all of them and some are out of focus and some have less than ideal exposures but they’re all here, warts and all. A snapshot of time, perhaps.
I don’t know what the camera was but it’s before I had the Pentax or Nikon so it’s possibly a Praktica, which was my first SLR.
I have a few tales from those times which I may relate, they may be of interest, I’m not sure.
Anyhow, without further ado, some old pictures plus a couple of random images.
Kathy & Peter at my Ladywell Flat, 1969 or 1970. Kathy became a Playboy Bunny at Park Lane and Peter went on to form The Only Ones:
Stage left at The Fox Under The Hill Pub, Shooters Hill Road, SE London early 1970:
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