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Wimborne in the 1950s | Then and Now

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This month Barry Cuff has selected two images of Wimborne Minster – and while the passing decades have brought inevitable change to the town, its sense of place remains strikingly intact.
The towering silhouette of the Minster still anchors the town, just as it did when Currys delivery vans advertised cycles as well as radios and televisions, and full-height double-decker buses served the town. Independent shops have come and gone, but the rhythm of the High Street continues. The photographs from the middle of the last century capture everyday life looking remarkably similar to that 75 years later.
Today’s streets might have different cars, the streets themselves have different edges, and the shopfronts less signage and awnings, but the view down Eastbrook or along the High Street is still unmistakably Wimborne.

The 1950s High Street is a busy place – and it was served by double decker bus. Note the Currys delivery van, front left.
Today the High Street is still recogmisable. Coles, front right, is now the Museum of East Dorset, and the Albion is now known as 1777 at the Albion.
Wimborne Minster visible through the streets to Eastbrook Bridge over the Allen. ‘Then’ postcards courtesy of the Barry Cuff Collection, and ‘now’ images by Courtenay Hitchcock
The scene today – The large white building which housed the Citroen garage and Banwell the antiquarian bookseller is gone, but much of the rest of the street is recognisable, despite modern facelifts

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