Torquay, Devon c.1906. © National Maritime Museum

Exhibition review - 24 Hour Museum's very own bathing belle, Helen Kane, takes a wistful trip around Britain's seaside resorts at the National Maritime Museum's exhibition Snapshots of British coastal life 1880-1950

The notion of ‘a trip to the seaside’ has a nostalgic feel that is uniquely British, conjuring up images of sandcastles, buckets and spades, knotted hankies and donkeys.

Although the seeds of the seaside holiday were sown back in the 17th century, when a certain Dr Robert Wittie from Scarborough recommended dips in the sea for health purposes, the seaside resorts we are now familiar with were products of the industrial revolution.

At this time, an expanding rail network enabled people of all classes to explore the coast and enjoy the resorts that grew in the wake of this new tourism.

The seaside holiday phenomenon, which peaked in the decades covered by this exhibition, was documented by pioneering photographer Francis Frith.

With the growing popularity of picture postcards, his photographic publishing company boomed to become the largest such firm in the world.

Scarborough, Yorkshire.
© National Maritime Museum

When the original company ceased trading in 1971, the National Maritime Museum acquired 1,293 negatives from the Francis Frith archive of British coastal subjects. However, given the prolific success of the business, this represents only a fraction of Frith’s original images.

Nevertheless, the photographs that form the bulk of this charming exhibition offers a fascinating insight into the growth of the seaside resort and the impact this had upon the industries found along Britain’s coastline.

The exhibition is arranged geographically and the photographs – most of which were taken from glass-plate negatives – cover South-East England and East Anglia, South-West England, North-West England and Wales.

Newlyn, Cornwall in about 1906.
© National Maritime Museum

Also on show is a small selection of Punch and Judy puppets, which belonged to Peter Butchard. He became a Punch and Judy man after retiring and took his show around the world. He gave his last performance in Greenwich in 1999 – at the age of 90.

Some of the puppets are over 150 years old and look suitably battered - Judy obviously having taken her fair share of head-butts from that psychopath par excellence, Mr. Punch.

A policeman and a ghost float in a glass case alongside the dysfunctional couple and give a nice creepy edge to the proceedings.

Given the amount of happy sighs heard emanating from many of the older visitors to the exhibition, Frith’s photographs still manage to extract a wistful longing from their viewers. His talent for translating visual ingredients into nostalgic shorthand was a formula that ensured the success of his trade.

Eastbourne, Sussex.
© National Maritime Museum

One photograph, simply titled Cockle Woman, Exmouth, Devon shows an old woman standing with a hoe staring back at us. She has obviously been interrupted mid cockle-hunt, and peers inquisitively into the lens.

A wicker basket sits in the wet sand beside her bare and bunioned feet. This is not simply a picturesque image. It is a portrait of an industry at odds with the onset of industrialisation.

The huge swathes of coarse cloth that swaddle her sturdy frame show no concession to modernity. It is a 20s-style cloche hat, strapped firmly to her head with a long scarf, which gives the game away, rescuing her from a cockling time warp.

By locating the archaic and the modern in the one image, Frith frames nostalgia within the fast pace of an ever-changing world.

Worthing, Sussex.
© National Maritime Museum

Similarly, the photograph of a fish market in Newlyn, Cornwall shows holidaymakers mingling with the locals demonstrating that the rise of tourism permitted holidaymakers to experience the ways of life found in communities that hadn’t changed in centuries.

In the northeast resorts of Bridlington, Whitby and Scarborough, tourism sat alongside the fishing industries. This was an added attraction to the many tourists visiting these old Yorkshire towns and the surrounding dramatic coastlines.

The development of the railways however didn’t just bring tourism to the coast. The ease in transporting goods was also a boon to seaside business.

Brighton, Sussex in about 1902.
© National Maritime Museum

The photograph of a Grimsby fish dock shows an incredible panorama of sailing trawlers. This reflects the astounding development of Grimsby’s fishing industry between the 1850s and 1891.

During this period, Grimsby’s fleet expanded from one single vessel to 800. The photograph positively groans with sails.

Although Grimsby was never a seaside resort, the neighbouring towns of Cleethorpes and Skegness attracted tourists from South Yorkshire and the East Midlands from the mid-19th century onwards and became home to the first of Billy Butlin’s holiday camps founded in the 1930s.

Although the exhibition doesn’t document the era that saw Redcoats and knobbly knees competitions, photographs of impressive paddle steamers that toured the bay still hint at the appetite for novelty that kept the tourists pouring in.

Bridlington, Yorkshire around 1913.
© National Maritime Museum

In addition to Frith’s images, visitors to the exhibition can relax on a bench or a deckchair and enjoy a short film montage of seaside enjoyments in the small theatre zone. Water slides, funny hats, ice-lollies and bathing beauties all appear in these black and white promotional features aimed mainly at a working class audience.

The soundtrack has George Formby singing a ditty about tourists waiting in a queue (nothing’s changed there) and a voiceover, in BBC-style received pronunciation, champions the delights of Blackpool.

A Cornish mariner also sings a folk tune about seaweed and a Cockney monologue bemoans ‘er indoors’ skiving off to Southend, away from domestic chores.

“Those were the days,” said a man ruefully as he left the exhibition hand in hand with his wife. I wonder if they met beside the seaside?

Beside the Seaside – Snapshots of British coastal life, 1880-1950 runs from September 17 2008 - April 19 2009 at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, London. Admission is free.