Be a Civic Watchman
The BCA is leading a project to document frontages around Berkhamsted over the years so we can track how the town changes. So much history can be lost as architecture and street environments change.
The detailed photographs of the whole of the frontages of our conservation area were taken over the first few years of the naughties by the late John Cook. We would very much like to keep them up to date and would ask you to take pictures from exactly the same place and send them to us so that we can keep abreast of the changes. Keep a watching brief on changes in our much loved town, help us and Berkhamsted by being our eyes and ears – let us know what you see changing, be it good or bad.
If you by any chance have interesting earlier pictures we would love to have them. Send us your pictures using the contact page. We would love to feature the pictures you send us on our interactive map below.
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John Cook
It was John Cook who took all these photo’s we are using of our town at the turn of this century and we are truly grateful for so much that he did for our town. John died in March 2012 at the age of 83, after a short illness. A resident of the town for nearly 50 years, he contributed to Berkhamsted’s civic and cultural life for all that time, and served as its Mayor three years in a row. He was active in St Peter’s church, the town’s major organisations, and contributed to the Berkhamsted Review like a true (and witty) journalist. By profession he was a distinguished engineer on railways, both in this country and abroad. But for most of us he will be remembered as the town’s historian, taking up the mantle from Percy Birchnell. He served on the Citizen’s Committee and TASC (Townscape) for many years, and was Chairman of the organisation from 1998 to 2000. John was a great asset to the Citizens, of which he was made a Life Member. His work on surveying and describing buildings in the conservation area, which you see on this site, led directly to a higher profile for the Victorian/Edwardian streets and recently the establishment of their greater protection. He also edited The Citizen for ten years. The numbers attending his funeral, and the tributes paid, reflected in what esteem and fondness he was held.