Author Archives: Drew Whitworth

Mar 08 2023
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Daily Post, Landscape

Porthcurno’s important beach

Wednesday 8th March 2023, 1.20pm (day 4,213)

Porthcurno Beach, 8/3/23

I said yesterday that Penzance, or more generally this part of the world, has not always been peripheral. On this beach at the tip of Britain, the main trans-Atlantic and international telegraph and, later, telephone cables came on shore, from 1870 onwards. That fact explains why I am here — thanks to the Cable & Wireless training centre (for telegraph operators) being built around this vital connection in the country’s communications network, buildings that nowadays house the archive that I have come down to Cornwall to consult.

Either way, Porthcurno has a damn fine beach, one that you would never know was such a strategically important spot. This is the southernmost shot I’ve yet taken in England, and as there is only a tiny portion of the country further south than here (just the Lizard peninsula), this sets a record that I may never beat.

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Mar 08 2023
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Daily Post, Transport

Penzance Harbour

Tuesday 7th March 2023, 8.40am (day 4,212)

Penzance Harbour, 7/3/23

And here’s what more-or-less the same part of the world looks like in the morning — pointing the camera in the opposite direction. Seems an OK place, Penzance — attractive, plenty of pubs — but it’s a long way out, and typical incomes in Cornwall are among the lowest in the whole UK. Being peripheral is not an economic asset these days: but the thing is, in some ways this is the centre of things. More on that tomorrow (if I remember).

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Mar 06 2023
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Daily Post, Urban scene

Further south than I was this morning, for sure

Monday 6th March 2023, 7.30pm (day 4,211)

Arrival in Penzance, 6/3/23

This photo is garish and could certainly be sharper but with my camera in the state it is presently in (following the still-painful St Helena Tarmac Incident) it is as good as we’re going to get at the moment, after dark. I like the picture anyway: first, it represents that moment that I finally got to have some fresh air after nearly 11 hours on three separate trains today (none of which had on-board catering) and second, that I arrived in what is both the most southerly and most westerly decent-sized town in Britain, namely Penzance, Cornwall. Where you get to see palm trees outside the bus station. We’re not in Yorkshire any more, Toto.

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Mar 05 2023
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Daily Post, Interior

The loneliness of the Sunday morning car park

Sunday 5th March 2023, 8.55am (day 4,210)

Sunday morning car park, 5/3/23

I have got it down to working about two Sundays a year, and today was one of them. Appearance on campus before 9am on the ‘day of rest’ allows the experience of the virtually empty car park, and its mysterious ‘T’. Maybe it was once an arrow, but not any more. A recent run of interiors continues.

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Mar 05 2023
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Uncategorized

In the Barum Top, Halifax

Saturday 4th March 2023, 12.55pm (day 4,209)

Barum Top, 4/3/23

Yes, OK, it’s another pub, and at lunchtime too — but then again it is a) Saturday, and only a 1-day weekend this time round as I’m working tomorrow and b) Joe’s 20th birthday. But he is up in Dundee, so it became instead the 20th anniversary celebration of Clare’s giving birth, and by now it’s accepted that will be the only time she does so.

This isn’t Clare by the way. Or Joe. Just a random patron. But I like the shot.

Mar 04 2023
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Daily Post, Interior

In Affleck’s Palace

Friday 3rd March 2023, 3.30pm (day 4,208)

Affleck's objects, 3/3/23

The independent retail institution that is Affleck’s Palace in Manchester seems, thankfully, to have survived all that virus-related crap and remains the place to go if you want to buy just about anything that is a little off-beat (and see its previous appearance). There are dozens of stalls like this. I wasn’t in the place to pick up a gas mask, however, in case you were wondering.

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Mar 03 2023
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Daily Post, Transport

Cattle truck

Thursday 2nd March 2023, 8.05am (day 4,207)

Cattle truck, 2/3/23

Documentary. I got on this train at 7.56am at Hebden Bridge. A few minutes later I got off it again, at Todmorden (where this shot is taken), thanks to it being, as you can hopefully tell,. a stupidly overcrowded two-carriage cattle truck, and waited for the next one. On Monday I have to spend about 10.5 hours on a train…. what we do for our kicks, eh?

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Mar 02 2023
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Daily Post, Family Member, Portrait

Engaging with St Helena (as it was in 1988)

Wednesday 1st March 2023, 3.25pm (day 4,206)

St Helena map book, 1/3/23

This place is taking up the majority of my thinking energy at the moment and will continue to do so for some time to come. These maps of how things were in 1988 are not going to play a major part in my cogitations and analysis — particularly not number 7, at the bottom of this spread — but it’s all a useful insight into how things once were: this is why we need records, and archives to store them in.

And yes, I know I have hairy arms and hands. It’s always been the case. This is the first self-portrait since October.

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Mar 01 2023
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Daily Post, Portrait, Stranger

Bod bar, Stoke station

Tuesday 28th February 2023, 6.00pm (day 4,205)

Bod bar, Stoke, 28/2/23

And so ends February 2023, a varied month for me, some very interesting periods and some deadly dull ones. Photographically, it ends in a pub on Stoke-on-Trent station, mainly for lighting reasons. Though the beer was quite good too.

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Feb 28 2023
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Daily Post, Interior

Non-binary pepper

Monday 27th February 2023, 4.05pm (day 4,204)

Non-binary pepper, 27/2/23

“I know I present as red. But inside there’s that little bit of green that’s always been on the verge of coming out.”

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