SIFTING through the files in preparation for our move from Hylton Road to pastures new has shed light into drawers and cupboards that haven’t seen much for years and thrown up some interesting finds. Not the least of which is a little book which is apparently a Worcester city guide.

The cover has long gone but the pages, most of which are still bound together, have been protected in a plastic bag. Nevertheless many are a bit battered. Possibly the date of this guide appeared on the missing cover, because frustratingly it is nowhere to be found inside and I have trawled virtually every word.

However, by dint of bits of information contained, I would make an educated guess it was published in the early/mid 1930s. Because it mentions projects completed at both the Royal Grammar and King’s School in 1928, so it obviously dated after that, and also says the Silver Cinema in Foregate Street has “one of the most comfortable halls in the county”. The Silver Cinema was knocked down in the late 1930s to make way for the Odeon, so the guide predated that event.

READ MORE: How letters were delivered in the old days

According to the preface, it was the 21st edition of “The Official Guide to the City of Worcester” and was “arranged with the view of assisting the Visitor in a tour throughout the City”. Ancient buildings were covered, as were leading industries, places of entertainment, sporting events and, of course, Worcester’s long and intriguing history. For any visitor who fancied a trip out of town, there was a useful list of “RAC Circular Tours from Worcester for Motorists” to places like Cheltenham, Tewkesbury, Stow-on-the-Wold, Malvern and Hereford. One to Symond’s Yat, Chepstow and Monmouth covered 141 miles, which was a good day out in the vehicles of the time.

Among the advertisements there are many which will be familiar to anyone who can remember the city in the 1950s and 60s. For example there is one for the Crown Hotel in Broad Street, with special notice that it is centrally heated. Jewellers JW Cassidy & Son Ltd at 64 High Street sold “Souvenir Spoons (presumably of Worcester) in several varieties”. While WH Aston(Worcester) Ltd at the Reliance Works in Diglis Dock were English and Foreign timber merchants from whom you could buy everything from coffin boards to pit props. Then there was Littlebury & Company, printers, who ran The Worcester Press and had telephone number “No. 13” , and The Shakespeare Cafe at 77-78 High Street, which boasted “a first class orchestra”. Not bad for a caff!

Lost in the mists of time have been establishments like the Savoy Billiards Room at 95, High Street, Chas. F Brown’s marble, stone and granite works in Sansome Street and the Severn Salmon Warehouse of JG Hunt, which sold fish, game and poultry and had ice stores at 37 High Street.

All in all it’s a fascinating little book and here are just a few of the images in it.