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[OM] OT - Long - An Irish Mystery

Subject: [OM] OT - Long - An Irish Mystery
From: "Giles" <cnocbui@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 28 Jun 1999 00:20:17 +0000
What follows is way off topic and long.

The year is 1996, Summer, though you could easily be fooled by the grey mist in 
off 
the Atlantic.  Not an uncommon occurrence in that part of the world at any time 
- 
Ireland, west coast, Connemara.

In the mist sits an old house which has seen better days, but many like this 
one.

A lone figure positions an old  step ladder beneath a hatch in the low ceiling. 
 
The ladder is pocked with many tiny holes attesting to its off duty function as 
a 
wood-worm high rise.

The figure climbs the ladder and stands balanced on its top.  He knows you are 
not 
supposed to do all sorts of things like this with ladders but knows equally 
that he 
won't be the first or last.

The hatch is pushed and rises at one edge.  The opposing edge is secured with 
hinges and the hatch goes over to lie flat on the beams.  It doesn't go over 
with 
a bang as expected but has to be pushed against the resisting slightly rusty 
hinges. 
  It is not completely dark in that space between ceiling and roof.  A thin, 
weak 
grey light filters down through some chinks and slits marking where A few 
slates 
have parted company from their peers.

The beams feel unpleasantly dusty under the hands as the body is hefted off the 
step ladder and into the thinly lit gloom with a motion that is fairly easy to 
execute going up but is another thing entirely coming down.

There is a smell - musty, dusty, acrid - the result of many bats and rats doing 
their thing over the decades.  Dirt and rubble are everywhere.  Most of it the 
product of lime mortar parting company from the undersides of the slates above. 
  
Cobwebs abound  making sure the dirt has a vertical as well as horizontal 
dimension.

Below the hatch is darknesss - the power is off.  Ladders are one thing...

A torch is turned on - its light seems so yellow compared to the grey variety 
from 
above.  A couple of empty clear glass bottles - whisky probably, wires, 
junction 
boxes, beams, rubble dirt, rat droppings, bat droppings, stonework of the 
chimney 
passing through, rotted cardboard - a best guess anyway, what look like small
paper packets - one, two - no three. They are covered in dirt dust and 
droppings.

I pick one of them up and give it a good blow. There is the inevitable cloud of 
dust, the inevitable coughing, the inevitable thought that I knew that would 
happen 
so why did I do It this time, the last time and probably the next time too?

The yellow torch light reveals the paper to be  pale blue or grey.  There is 
writing 
and graphics discernible now as well as irregular holes and missing sections 
with 
edges that remind one of the aftermath of an insects feasting on a leaf.

16 sheets 4 1/2 x 2 3/4    GLOSS

SELTONA
COLLODION

SELF-TONING PAPER

CONTAINING GOLD
Needs fixing in Hypo only.  Full instructions enclosed
SOLE MANUFACTURERS:
WELLINGTON & WARD Ltd.
ELSTREE HERTS.

This is on the biggest of the three packets.  The other two are smaller and of 
the 
same size.  They differ only in the top line  - 10 Sheets 3 1/2 x 2 1/2     
MATT.  - 
and a small sticker on the back of one which reads -
DISTRIBUTED BY
 ILFORD LIMITED
ILFORD:::LONDON

There is a small circular graphic on the sticker of a steam ship with an aft 
raked 
funnel and a large paddle wheel on the side mid-ship.  From one of the masts 
there 
is a pennant flying with ILFORD on it.  There was smaller writing below the 
ship but 
it has gone but for a couple of letters.

The packets don't need to be opened to reveal their contents - there are holes 
enough for that and some of the negatives are protruding provocatively.  Medium 
format 6x6 negs - I know those from my primary school days and a Rolliecord.  
There 
are also a few of a larger size - rectangular -  I am unfamiliar with.  Have to 
measure those.

I gingerly remove a couple of negatives and hold them up to the wan light from 
above.  They are stained, dirty and seemingly in poor condition.  I expect to 
see 
images relating to ancestors and this house I am in but the images prove to be 
entirely unfamiliar.  I wonder what they are?

I am still wondering to this day.  I took the packets back to Australia with me 
when 
I returned.  I had the negs cleaned and  some proofs printed.  The negs 
scrubbed up 
better than I had hoped for but the proofs were done on colour paper using a 
normal 
processor geared for colour and the negs were B&W.  The proofs came out with a 
sepia 
tone to them which I thought rather appropriate, though they were none to sharp.

I consulted my mother to see if she had any idea as to the origin of these 
photos or 
who might be depicted in them but she did not know and is as intrigued and 
puzzled 
as I am.

The reason for our puzzlement is that the house I found them in has been in my 
family for four generations.  It was rented out as a summer holiday home in the 
'60s and early '70s but clues in some of the photos lead me to think that at 
least 
some of the images date to the 1930s or even perhaps 20's.  It seems unlikely 
that someone on holiday would bring with them such old negatives, climb into 
the ceiling and leave them there.

Another twist to the mystery is that some clues lead me to think the photos 
were 
taken in the UK and not in Ireland at all.  On one of the smaller packets is 
the 
word 'Wraysbur' written in pencil.  I have found a place of that name in 
Berkshire 
just outside the western fringes of the greater London area.

On the second of the small packets is the beginning of Oxfordshire or perhaps 
it is 
just Oxford as there is a hole after the 'd'.  There is also a number which 
might 
denote the year 1938.  However one of the larger format negatives out of the 
largest 
packet yielded an image of three ladies in a boat.  I and others who have seen 
this 
picture think the clothing they are wearing is probably earlier than that.

Earlier this year I had the negatives printed here in Ireland and they were 
done on 
some Kodak colour process paper intended for B&W negs in a processor set up for 
it.  
 The results were much better than the first proofs, though I suspect real B&W 
paper 
and an enlarger could do better.  In any case the resulting prints are a 
testament 
to the toughness and longevity of B&W as a medium.  That roof space has near 
perpetual high humidity and I am amazed that moulds, fungi and insects left 
anything 
to find.

Thanks to Garth's kind auspices I am able to share these images and their 
mystery 
with you.  If you are at all interested the are here -

http://www.taiga.ca/~gallery/subpages/stewart/mystery/mystery.html

So for the Sherlock Holmeses among you I invite you to look for any clues you 
might 
find that would shed some light on locations or dates.

Thanks Garth!

Giles

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