Author : Alex F. Young ISBN : 9781807010072 Cover : paperback Price : £11.95
From the front cover photograph of Erminio Rossi outside his Imperial Café in Main Street to the wistful 1950s image on the back cover when Kirkconnel still had its own cinema, this book is a nostalgia romp through this small town in Dumfriesshirersquo;s Upper Nithsdale. Although Main Street had been the principal thoroughfare for centuries, after coal was discovered here in the 1890s the town rapidly expanded with many miners’ rows built in the ensuing decades. This development coincided with the rise of photography as a way of recording places, so many of the images in the book come from old picture postcards published to show the new streets, the local collieries, and even the 1911/1912 gasworks. The book includes later photos such as the local contingent of the KOSB going off to war in 1914 and Fauldhead Colliery in the 1960s. All the photos are accompanied by Alex Young’s lengthy, informative captions.
