If you have any comments, or have any old photographs
that we might feature, please e-mail Picture the Past.
Alternatively, you can make direct use of our Messageboard.
Click here.


Church Street in February 1937 as the 1st Luton and St Mary's Scouts, plus Rangers, Guides and Cubs march to the accompaniment of a Scout band to St Mary's Church to attend a farewell service for the Rev A.F. Lee. The houses on the right were demolished to road improvements, but the Melson Arms pub, on the left, is still there.The view is looking beyond John Street to Guildford Street.


Miss Flecknoe's dancing class and their dolls presenting their end-of-term display in April 1951.


The Stopsley bypass now runs through what was Bolter's Meadow where this fancy dress parade was held as part of a Festival of Britain field day on August 18, 1951. The event was organised by Stopsley Ward Association Labour Party.


When Santa arrived at Partridge's toy store in Chapel Street it was a big family event - and, as this picture from December 1945 shows, people were prepared to join a long queue to see Father Christmas.Partridge's continued in business for about 80 years, eventually closing in January 1980 to be replaced by the now also closed offices of the Bank of Ireland.


Before Luton had its carnival, the annual Co-op Day brought the crowds into the town centre. In this picture the famous Dagenham Girl Pipers have formed up in the now hardly recognisable Church Street to lead a procession of floats around town in July 1952. They have just passed the Wheatsheaf pub, top centre, which was demolished in 1957 to make way for technical college enlargement after last orders were called in February of that year. The power station in the distance would disappear a few years after that.


Luton's new cattle market opened in Park Street, near the Baptist church, on January 4, 1937. Prominent local auctioneer Hugh Cumberland auctioned the first two beasts, which were owned by Lady Ludlow. The Park Street market continued for 20 years and replaced one that had operated in Bridge Street since 1899. The new market had pens for cattle, calves, sheep, pigs and poultry - and a modern cattle weighbridge.


Second World War legend Group Captain Douglas Bader piloted this Percival Vera Gull on a visit to Luton Airport on July 25, 1952. It was the aircraft in which female aviation pioneer and long-distance flights record holder Jean Batten had flown the Atlantic, and the war hero was to fly it in a bank holiday air race.


Time and the good people of Luton stood still on Market Hill on February 15, 1952. Indeed, the whole country stood in silence to mark the funeral of King George VI, who had died at Sandringhan nine days earlier.By then most of the Corn Exchange had been reduced to the White Rose Restaurant but Blundell Bros' imposing shop and the Plough Inn next door were still in business. The former Luton Modern School is just visible through the Park Square gap.


The last big agricultural show to be held in Luton - the two-day county show - was held at Stockwood Park in July 1951. Around 20,000 people attended the 142nd show staged by Beds Agricultural Society which featured cattle, horses and pigs as well as smaller animals such as dogs, rabbits and cage birds. The show had previously been staged locally at Luton Hoo in 1925 and at the Waterlow sports ground in Dunstable in 1929.


The first Percival aircraft ever built in Luton.The Vega Gull was being dragged through the mud on January 22, 1937, with the partially completed Percival factory at the yet to be opened Luton Airport in the background. It was to be given a 15-minute test flight with Captain Edgar W. Percival at the controls and was to be flown days later by Welshman David Llewellyn in a bid to create a new record for the England-South Africa-England 14,000 mile flight. Luton Airport was opened by Secretary of State for Air Sir Kingsley Wood on July 16, 1938.


Santa swapped his sleigh for a fire engine when he turned up for a children's party in Luton in December 1944. He arrived in style for the event organised by members of 3Y station of the National Fire Service in Brantwood Road.


A police-led funeral procession for Luton alderman and freeman Murry Barford provides a glimpse of Park Square in February 1937. The buildings in the square survived until the 1950s, among them Johnson's snack bar, Farmbrough's furniture store and the Waverley Hotel at the top of Church Street.


A detachment from the 5th Bedfs and Herts Regiment leading the Remembrance parade along George Street to St Mary's Church on Sunday, November 11, 1951. The head of the procession, which included Sea Cadets, the Army Cadet Force and local dignitaries, is passing the junction with Cheapside with Blundell Bros' store and the True-Form shoe shop on the corners.


Dorset Street residents of Park Town pictured during a Festival of Britain street party in August 1951. The former Coronation Street area of Luton was largely cleared in the 1960s to be replace by redevelopment centred around high-rise flats. The only echo of Dorset Street remains with one block being called Dorset Court.


A now unfamiliar view of Stuart Street from 1952. The road along which members of the Boys' Brigade are marching to the centenary celebrations of Chapel Street Methodist Church on Sunday, May 25, now has car parks replacing the shops on the left with the ring road passing over them. The junction on the right, half way up the hill, leads into George Street West.


Members of the Stopsley branch of the Luton United Liberal-Conservative Association preparing to board a Seamarks coach for a day trip to London on January 29, 1949. The group are standing outside the Jolly Topers pub at Round Green, a particularly busy spot for traffic these days, and the large tree to the left was the one felled after being declared unsafe to be replaced by a sapling a few years ago.


A dancing display - along with children's races, a gymnastics display and traditional sideshows - was one of the attractions at the Davis Stove Company gala day for employees and their families held at the firm's sports ground in Dallow Road in July 1952.