Photographic imagery of Dr Sykes and his family in the Formby Library garden 1937
The Liverpool photographer Edward Chambré Hardman (1898-1988) conducted many portraits of clients on location, often with the client’s home featuring prominently within the image.
Over the past five years, research has been conducted into the commercial portraiture component of the Hardman archive held at Liverpool Central Library. The photographs
presented here are a continuation of this research; what could be considered archival intervention, with the original Hardman portrait featured on the left alongside the exact space as it looks today, taken by Keith W Roberts. The conventionality of a family portrait provides a space of identification, it can thus bridge the gap between viewers who are
personally connected to the event, space or persons ... to those who are not. The emphasis within these images is firmly placed upon the ‘Intermission’ of time that exists between the pairings presented.
Dr Sykes and Family at ASHHURST - 1937
The monochrome images on the left depict Dr Sykes and his family at their home ASHHURST in Formby. The occasion was their Golden Wedding Anniversary in 1937. The images were taken in the back garden of the house which can still be found today at the back of this library. The actual plot for Dr Sykes’ house has now been divided and the physical space where the portraits were originally taken is now to be found just at the back wall of the Library garden. The wall can still be clearly seen and there is also still evidence of Dr Sykes’ famous orchard which still consists of a couple of fruit bearing trees (Pear & Apple). Dr Sykes is well known to the residents of Formby, as it was his intervention a few years prior to this portrait that rescued the land opposite his house from the developer’s planning to build on the site of the old Duke Street Dairy Farm. This land was subsequently gifted to the then Urban District Council by Dr Sykes, with the strict instructions never to be developed, and remains as Duke Street Park to this day, still enjoyed by many Formby residents.
Hardman also used to live in Formby, at Danecroft on Freshfield Road (boarding with
Mrs Ada Short) from the late 1920’s to Sept 1931.
Intermissions
by Keith W Roberts
For any feedback or information:
Dear Formby Bubble...
On a recent visit to Formby Library, I was delighted to see two huge and excellent photographs of Dr. Arthur Barry Sykes and his family in the grounds of his home and surgery at Ashurst in Duke Street, almost next door to the library.
Dr. Sykes was our much respected family doctor and also a stalwart of Formby Football Club and also the man who purchased the farmer's field opposite his home and gave it to the people of Formby in perpetuity as Duke Street Park.
The photographs were taken in 1937 by the renowned photographer Edward Chambre Hardman whose home and studio in Rodney Street, Liverpool now belongs to the National Trust and is open to the public.
It is well worth a visit to the Library to see these gems.
By Joan Rimmer
Dr Sykes & Family - Ashurst 1937
Ashurst 2016
Dr Sykes & Family 1937
