Sourcing historic images — Heritage Trail Guide

Historic photographs are often the most powerful element of a heritage trail. A single image — a street of demolished cottages, a factory full of workers, a village fête from a century ago — can make a location feel alive with human history in a way that words alone rarely achieve. This chapter will help you find the right images, use them properly, and get them ready for the trail.

Why images matter

Visitors to a heritage trail are standing in the present. The most effective thing you can do is give them a window into the past at the exact spot where they're standing. A photograph of the same view taken fifty or a hundred years ago — showing buildings that are gone, activities that have ceased, people who have long since died — creates a moment of genuine historical connection that is very hard to achieve through text alone.

Images also serve a practical purpose: they give visitors something to look at while they're reading or listening to the stop description, and they break up what would otherwise be a screen of text on a small phone display.

Not every stop needs a historic photograph — a clear, well-composed photograph of the feature itself, taken today, is better than a poor-quality or irrelevant archive image. But where a good historic image exists, it is almost always worth using.

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Then and now pairs The most compelling approach is a matched pair — an archive photo and a modern photo of the same view. Even if the trail app only shows one image per stop, you can include both in the stop description: "The photograph shows this junction in 1923 — the row of cottages on the left was demolished in 1962 to widen the road." Visitors will look up from their phone and make the connection themselves.

Start with your own archive

Before looking anywhere else, work through what your society already holds. Local history groups often accumulate photographs, postcards, maps, and documents over decades — material that is frequently better than anything available online, because it is specific to your exact location rather than selected for general interest.

Types of material worth looking for in your own collection:

Photographs and glass plate negatives — village scenes, events, businesses, individuals. Even a poorly composed snapshot can be invaluable if it shows something that no longer exists.
Picture postcards — widely produced in the Edwardian era and into the 1930s, postcards often show village streets, pubs, churches, and events in excellent detail. Many have messages on the back that add a further human dimension.
Ordnance Survey maps — particularly the 25-inch series, which shows individual buildings, field boundaries, and features in fine detail. Your society may hold paper copies of maps covering your area from different periods.
Newspaper cuttings and programmes — often include photographs of local events, businesses, and people.
Members' personal collections — ask your members. Family photograph albums, slides from the 1960s and 70s, and inherited material often contain images that have never been shared more widely.

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Don't overlook members' knowledge An experienced member who has lived in the village for sixty years may be able to identify the people in an undated photograph, name the business that occupied a building, or recall an event that no written record survives of. That knowledge is as valuable as any archive image — and it won't be available indefinitely.

Free online sources

A number of excellent resources make historic images freely available online. The quality and coverage varies, but for most MK-area villages you will find something useful in at least two or three of these collections.

Source	What it holds	Cost and use
Britain from Above	Aerial photographs from the 1920s to the 1990s, searchable by location. Excellent for showing how a village or town layout has changed — fields, buildings, roads, and features that no longer exist.	Free to view and download for non-commercial use. Clear licensing terms on the site.
National Library of Scotland maps	Historic Ordnance Survey maps from the 1880s onwards, zoomable and comparable with modern maps. The 25-inch series is particularly useful for showing individual buildings and boundaries.	Free to view. Downloadable for non-commercial use with attribution.
Flickr Commons	Photographs from major archives and libraries worldwide, including the British Library and many regional collections. Searchable by location and date. Coverage is patchy but occasionally excellent.	Free. Each image has its own licence — check before using.
Wikimedia Commons	A large collection of freely licensed images including historic photographs, maps, and illustrations. Quality varies considerably but there are genuine gems, particularly for well-documented locations.	Free. Licence varies per image — most are Creative Commons. Check and follow the attribution requirements.
Francis Frith Collection	An extensive collection of Victorian and Edwardian photographs of British towns and villages, including many in the MK area. Strong on street scenes, market squares, and landmarks.	Images can be viewed free. Using them on a trail requires a licence — contact Francis Frith directly. Prices are reasonable for non-commercial community use.
Geograph	A volunteer project to photograph every grid square in Britain. Primarily useful for recent images of specific locations, but some contributors have uploaded historic photographs too.	Free under Creative Commons licence with attribution.

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Always search for your specific village name General searches for "Milton Keynes" or "Northamptonshire" will return too many results. Search for the specific village — "Deanshanger," "Olney," "Stony Stratford" — and you will find material that is directly relevant. Try variant spellings of older place names too, as historic records sometimes differ from modern usage.

Local archives and collections

For images specific to your area that are not available online, the local archives listed in Chapter 1 are invaluable. Most hold photographic collections that can be consulted in person and, in many cases, reproduced for non-commercial heritage use with permission.

Milton Keynes City Discovery Centre

The Discovery Centre holds an extensive photographic archive relating to the MK area, including village photographs, images of the construction of the new city, and material donated by local families and organisations. Many images are unique — not available anywhere else. Visits are by appointment; contact them at mkdiscovery.org.uk to arrange access and discuss reproduction.

Buckinghamshire Archives

Holds photographic and map collections relating to the Buckinghamshire parts of the MK area. The tithe maps and estate papers often include detailed plans that can be used as images in their own right. Contact Buckinghamshire Archives to discuss what is available for your specific village and the terms for reproduction.

Northamptonshire Record Office

As above, for the Northamptonshire parts of the area. The Record Office also holds some photographic collections and can advise on what exists for specific villages.

County and local museums

The Milton Keynes Museum at Stacey Bushes holds a substantial collection of objects and images relating to local history, including agricultural and industrial material. Northampton Museum and other county museums may hold relevant material for groups further afield.

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Be specific when you contact an archive Don't ask "do you have any photographs of Olney?" — ask "do you hold photographs of the High Street in Olney, particularly showing the lace-making trade, from the period 1880 to 1930?" The more specific your request, the more useful the response. Archivists are busy and a precise question gets a precise answer.

Copyright — what you need to know

Using an image without the right to do so is a legal risk, even for a community heritage trail with no commercial intent. The rules are not as complicated as they might seem, but they do need to be followed.

The basic rule

In the UK, copyright in a photograph lasts for 70 years from the end of the year in which the photographer died. This means that the age of the photograph is not by itself what determines whether it is in copyright — what matters is when the photographer died. A photograph taken in 1920 by a photographer who died in 1990 remains in copyright until 2060.

In practice, for photographs where the photographer is unknown — which is common with historic local images — there are specific rules that may apply. If you are unsure, seek permission rather than assume it is free to use.

Traffic light guide

Generally safe to use

Images from your own society's collection, donated without restriction
Images explicitly licensed as Creative Commons or public domain
Ordnance Survey maps published before 1954 (Crown copyright has expired)
Photographs taken by people who died more than 70 years ago, where the photographer is known
Images from Wikimedia Commons marked as public domain

Check before using

Images from online archives — check the individual licence, not just the site's general policy
Francis Frith images — viewable free, but reproduction requires a licence
Photographs from local newspapers — the newspaper or its successor holds copyright
Images donated to your society — check what conditions, if any, were attached
Photographs where the photographer's identity or death date is unknown

Do not use without permission

Images found by a general web search — appearing online does not mean they are free to use
Photographs clearly credited to a named individual or organisation
Images from commercial image libraries (Getty, Alamy etc.) without a licence
Photographs taken by living photographers without their explicit consent
Images from other groups' websites or trails without asking

Asking for permission

For images where you are unsure, the simplest approach is to ask. Most archives, local newspapers, and private individuals are willing to grant permission for non-commercial community heritage use, often for free or a small fee. A brief, polite email explaining what the trail is, how the image will be used, and that it is non-commercial will usually receive a positive response.

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Keep a record of every image's source and licence Before you publish the trail, make sure you have a simple record — even a spreadsheet — of where every image came from, who holds copyright, and what permission you have. This protects you if a question arises later, and is essential if you ever apply for funding, as grant-givers may ask for evidence of proper rights clearance.

Scanning and photographing originals

If you have access to original photographs, postcards, or documents — whether from your own collection or borrowed from members or an archive — you will need to create a digital copy. There are two ways to do this: scanning and photography.

Scanning

A flatbed scanner produces the best results for flat originals — photographs, postcards, maps, and documents. Most modern flatbed scanners are adequate for trail use. Scan at 600 dpi as a minimum; higher for small originals that you may want to crop or enlarge. Save as TIFF for the master file and export a JPEG for the trail (see the next section).

If you don't have access to a scanner, many libraries — including MK Library — offer scanning services. Members of MKHA may also be willing to help with scanning.

Photographing with a phone

For larger items such as maps, framed photographs, or documents that cannot go through a scanner, a modern smartphone camera is usually adequate. Follow these guidelines for the best result:

Lay the original flat on a clean, plain surface — a table with a white or neutral cloth works well
Shoot from directly above, not at an angle — even a slight tilt causes distortion
Use natural daylight if possible; avoid direct sunlight, which creates glare and hotspots
Make sure the whole original fills the frame without being cropped
Take several shots and keep the sharpest — even a small amount of camera shake shows up in a detailed image
Use your phone's document or scan mode if available, which corrects perspective and improves contrast automatically

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Scanning fragile originals Be careful with old photographs and glass plate negatives — some are fragile and can be damaged by the pressure of a scanner lid. If in doubt, photograph rather than scan. Never attempt to flatten a curled original by force. Archives will advise on handling their material if you ask.

Preparing images for the trail

Images for the trail app need to be in JPEG format, sized appropriately for a phone screen, and small enough to load quickly — particularly important for visitors who may be using mobile data rather than wifi.

Target size and format

Format: JPEG (.jpg)
Width: 1200 pixels (this gives sharp display at any phone resolution)
Aspect ratio: 3:2 landscape works well — portrait images are also fine but display differently in the app
File size: aim for under 200KB per image. Most images can be compressed to this without visible quality loss.

Free tools for resizing and compressing

Squoosh (squoosh.app) is a free, browser-based tool that resizes and compresses images with no software to install. Drag your image in, set the width to 1200 pixels, choose JPEG quality around 80%, and download. It shows the file size in real time so you can see exactly what you're getting.

For processing multiple images at once, IrfanView (Windows, free) has a batch conversion feature that can resize and compress a whole folder of images in one go.

File naming

Name your image files clearly and consistently before uploading them to your trail folder. Use lowercase letters, hyphens instead of spaces, and no special characters. A consistent naming convention makes it much easier to manage the files and link them correctly in the map editor.

Avoid

IMG_20240315_143022.jpg
High Street 1923 (scan).jpg
photo of the mill copy 2 FINAL.jpeg

Prefer

stop-01-high-street-1923.jpg
stop-02-mill-exterior.jpg
stop-03-workers-1910.jpg

Writing captions

Every image on the trail should have a caption. A caption tells visitors what they are looking at, when it was taken, and where the image came from. This is not just good practice — for images that require an attribution credit as a condition of use, it is a legal requirement.

A good caption for a trail stop answers three questions:

What is shown? Be specific — name the street, the building, the event, the people if known.
When was it taken? Even "circa 1910" or "between the wars" is better than nothing.
Where did it come from? Credit the archive, collection, or individual who supplied the image.

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Example caption "High Street, Deanshanger, looking north, circa 1908. The building on the right is the original post office, demolished in the 1960s. Photograph courtesy of Deanshanger Village Heritage Society collection."

In the map editor, add the caption as part of the stop description — either at the end of the main text, or as a separate line below the image. Keep it brief: one or two sentences is enough.

Image checklist

Before finalising each stop, work through this checklist for every image you plan to use.

Permission confirmed — you have the right to use this image on a publicly accessible heritage trail
Source recorded — you have noted where the image came from and what licence or permission applies
Image is relevant — it shows the location or subject of this specific stop, not a general area view
Quality is acceptable — the image is sharp enough to be meaningful at phone screen size
File is correctly formatted — JPEG, 1200px wide, under 200KB
File is correctly named — lowercase, hyphens, no spaces or special characters
Caption written — what it shows, approximate date, and image credit

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A trail without images is still a trail If you cannot find a suitable historic image for a particular stop, don't delay publishing the trail — use a clear, well-composed photograph of the location today, or leave the image blank and rely on the text. A trail with some stops missing images is better than no trail at all. Images can always be added later as you find them.

← Previous chapter Writing for a heritage trail Tone, length, and how to make history feel alive Next chapter → Recording an audio guide Good audio on any phone, editing basics, and file formats