#59 – Plum tree blossom

Plum tree blossom, UK [Alamy image ref. AX668R]

For the past decade in France I’ve very much been a “blue sky” photographer… which is easy really because the climate in the sud-Touraine, compared to my decade or so in the hills of mid-Wales, is sunnier – warmer by around 12 degrees Celsius on average – and also much drier. Where I am now there are about as many days of blue sky with fluffy white clouds as there were in Wales with totally overcast cloud cover and the occasional patch of blue sky peeping through.

When there were blue skies up above in west Wales I would work overtime at the wheel of my car covering as many locations as possible within the limitations of the number of bracketed exposures I could make with a pair of Pentax 6×7 bodies which gave only ten shots to a roll. On this occasion I had been driving back from Shrewsbury and came across this glorious Plum tree on the Shropshire-Powys (English-Welsh) border. I stopped initially after seeing the striking display of blossom against the blue sky… but before becoming aware of a very old woman leaning on the entrance gate to her cottage garden. It was almost a scene from a Helen Allingham painting… but there were essential elements missing such as the traditional old-English garden Hollyhocks and roses, as well as a number of modern appendages in view such as TV aerial, telephone wires, gaudy plastic child’s swing, etc., making it impossible to create a shot of similar Edwardian-period attraction.

The Plum has many forms and varieties… my favourite being the Mirabelle, which I have never seen growing in England, but is common here in France. It was probably cultivated for European soils by the Romans, from origins in the Anatolia Caucasus. Shakespeare refers to cultivated Plums, Prunes and Damsons… and many gardens of his time must have contained a large variety of those fruits. From his contemporary, Gerard, in his own “Herball” (1597)…

“To write of Plums particularly would require a peculiar volume… Every clymate hath his owne fruite, far different from that of other countries; my selfe have threescore sorts in my garden, and all strange and rare; there be in other places many more common, and yet yearly commeth to our hands others not before knowne.”

The Image was licensed by Alamy for use in a retail textbook with a 5,000 print-run for use in France for a 1-year period under my “Nature” pseudonym.

#52 – Methodist Chapel, Wiltshire

Methodist Chapel, Wiltshire, UK. [Alamy image ref. AP2TEK]

Chittoe Heath Methodist Church was built in 1882 and is a simple rectangular chapel with rear extension, built of red brick with yellow detail. However Methodism had been going in the village of Chittoe for many years before that date. The present building was built on land donated by the local squire because the “society”, as it was then, used to meet in a house close to his own manor house. The singing was so exuberant that in desperation he gave the land for the new chapel to be built, as far away from the Parish Church as possible! The building is relatively unchanged since those days and there is a small graveyard beside it. The sign over the door proclaims its “Primitive Methodist” background. It is believed that Chittoe Heath Methodist Chapel was the original inspiration for the BBC radio programme of yesteryear called “The Chapel in the Valley”.

In 1808 the Methodist lay preacher Hugh Bourne was expelled from the Methodist movement. Bourne and his 200 or so followers became known as Primitive Methodists, a name he adopted from a statement that had been made by John Wesley in 1790: “I still remain a primitive Methodist.” Bourne’s followers were also called Ranters.

Bourne built his first Primitive Methodist Chapel in Tunstall in 1811. By 1842 membership had increased to nearly 80,000 with 500 travelling evangelists and more that 1,200 chapels. Membership continued to grow and by 1875 had reached 165,410. Unlike the Wesleyan Methodists, the Primitive Methodists encouraged women evangelists and they also provided many leaders of the trade union movement in the late 19th century.

I can’t remember exactly which lens I used for this image, but am fairly certain it was my Canon 35mm T&S lens rather than 35mm PC (Perspective Control) Nikkor… I briefly had both systems at the time. Many years later I scanned the slide with a Nikon Coolscan V to produce a 48mb image for Alamy (the minimum size accepted by Alamy was reduced to 24mb around two years ago).

Licensed RF (Royalty Free) by Alamy as a 448 x 688 pixel (900 kb) file for unlimited use under my “UK Scenes” pseudonym.